Europe

The last school excursion was today.  At Isle de la Sorgue there was a huge market that we explored.  Our guide had told us about the melon here.  There's a well-known chef who makes everything melon, and he's an artist who makes his own paint from melon seeds. One of the stands at the market handed us a sample of the melon and it was so delicious we decided to get some for our picnic.  We asked them if they could cut it up for us because we didn't have a knife and wanted to bring it on a picnic, so one of them came over and started chatting with us for a long time before we had to remind him to please cut the melon.  Where are you from/Where are you studying/Oh! I live near there actually/Do you go out often? Finally he cut two slices from the melon.  "Call me over when you want more" he said.  He was trying to get us to stay at the stand!   We found someone else to finish cutting it for us and we went to find more picnic items. I kept trying to get away from Bradie, actually, because she had seen this bracelet made out of buttons that she liked and her birthday is coming up.  But when I finally used the only thing I could think of: "I'm going to find a bathroom, I'll meet you at the bread stand" she gave me this laughing smile and said "You can't surprise me!".  I can't believe she knew.
Our picnic in the park was accompanied by someone who had brought their own karaeoke machine.  But besides her lovely voice, the park was beautiful.  It was right along the river Sorgue that runs through the town making it Provence's "Venice".
We then rode to Fontaine de Valcluse.  Our guide started to show us through town: the cathedral, the column dedicated to Petrarch, the paper factory....but what really interested Bradie and I were the beautiful mountainside that this town was backed up against and the clearest water I'd ever seen that ran through the river in town.  Rather than enjoying the paper factory with the rest, we snuck off to the park where lots of families were spending their Sunday afternoon next to the water.  It was one of the most beautiful paradises I'd ever seen.