We are off to Lourmarin, Provence for a 5 day wedding celebration.  The bride is Georgia, one of Lucy’s bestest friends for the last 10 years from their days at St Andrews.  Georgia has been one of our extended family, spending weekends and Christmas with us on occasion.  Lucy is one of the bridesmaids and there is a massive contingent from St Andrews descending on Lourmarin from all over the world.  Georgia is marrying Florent, a lovely, lovely French chap, so there is also a large contingent of French people and Georgia’s family, from Western Australia.  A very cosmopolitan wedding.  Florent proposed in Lourmarin exactly a year ago….. all very romantic.

Lucy is staying in a massive old house with about 20 friends from St Andrews.  We have a lovely old Provencal Mas that I found on Airbnb website The villa is in Cucuron, a stone’s throw from Lourmarin.  It looks lovely and has a pool because it’s going to be HOT.  It wasn’t clear how many of us would be in the house when we booked it and we have 2 bedrooms free if anyone wants to join us LOL!

Had a good night’s sleep at the Premier Inn, London Heathrow.  An amazing place, more like a full service hotel than a PI.  Restaurants, Costa Coffee shop, all sorts.  We were tired so we more or less turned in when we arrived around 8pm.

Surfaced around 730 this morning.  Daisy was already on her way from her flat to meet up with us at Hounslow West tube station.  We had a new suitcase for her, from China Bazaar in Cyprus, and we needed to switch her stuff into it.  Met her at 930, did the switch, and onto Terminal 3.  We had Meet and Greet parking which went off smoothly and we were checking in by 10ish.

We’d used Avios for our three flights with BA.  Bob and I booked early and got Economy. LOL  By the time Daisy had got her leave booked there were no Economy Rewards seats left, so we decided to treat her to Club Europe.  It wasn’t so many more Avios, and she’s had a tough year at work.  I think it fair to say she got her money’s worth!

Had a very good mooch around T3.  Wow.  Air terminals are like massive luxury shopping malls these days.  Well… no…. they ARE massive, luxury shopping malls.  I did my usual thing and smothered myself in face and perfume products I can’t afford to buy 🙂 Particularly fond of the Guerlain £340 face cream and the Armani Prive Ancien Incens perfume.  Smells like old churches and is apparently Sr. Armani’s favourite and personal choice.  My favourite too!

Daisy enjoyed the BA Lounge to the full.  I have no idea how she manages to remain a size OO.  Certainly doesn’t share a metabolism with me, that’s for sure.  She had 3 meals in the lounge and then a full meal on the plane, and then ate dinner tonight!!!

A slightly stressful road trip up from Marseilles to our rental property.   The address was a bit scanty and then we had to phone the keyholder who spoke no English and then gave us a different address to meet at which we didn’t know if it was her house or the rental house.  It turned out to be the rental house which was completely different address from that on the Airbnb documentation.  Anyway, she showed us around and it is a lovely, lovely house.  4 bedrooms, massive country kitchen, dining room, salon, utility, 2 bathrooms.  Best of all, a huge outside kitchen and dining/lounging area near to the pool. There is a huge built in bbq and oven, full sink, fridge etc etc. WOW.  Very nice and huge grounds behind electric gates.

We were hungry and a bit grumpy by the time we unpacked.  Some of us – not all – hadn’t eaten all day!!!!!   We hoped to meet up with Lu and her gang but there were complications and in the end we went into our nearest village, Cucuron and ate as a threesome.  What a delightful place.  The stereotypical Provencal village a la Peter Mayle.  Central square with a lake and huge poplar trees.  Restaurants around the square.  Charming old houses.

We ate at the restaurant L’Etang, right on the square next to the lake.  It was delightful, friendly service and very good food.  Daisy and I had steaks, cooked bleu, with the most amazing vegetable soufflé, potatoes and offered bone marrow which we chickened on.  🙂 To be fair, I have soooo persevered with bone marrow and tried it on several occasions and it always makes me gip.  There it is…. I just don’t like it.  Anyway, the steaks were great.  Bob had veal Milanese with veg and potatoes.  For dessert he had lemon tart with raspberry sauce and a crème brulee topping.  Daisy had chocolate charlotte with coconut cream and I had a selection goats cheese.  YUM.  Then espressos.  The early courses were washed down with 2 jugs of rose wine and 2 bottles of water.  The whole lot came to about £30 each.  Not cheap but not expensive either for the quality and location.

We came back down the quiet country lanes to our place.  It is soooo quiet here.  Literally nothing around us.

Going to be very comfortable here for a few days.