River Orb, Beziers, France
It's Saturday, it's a day of memories and browsing in the folders of some old photos. The old images help us keep our memories with us longer, to help us remember better how and what happened. We mostly take photos when we want some beautiful memories to last and to remember them. But not all memories are pleasant. When something bad happens to us or something doesn't go our way ... we usually remember that too. Memories don't ask. They are here.
My son found a pinecone in the city when these memories happened
However, some events that seemed terrible to us a long time ago now can be seen in the other way. We can simply turn that memory into something more comfortable, and look at the positive side of the story. So it will be with this memory that I will now share with you.
It was the summer of 2011. We were travelling home from one of our vacations, and since it was warm, we drove at night to avoid the heat of the day. Everything was fine, my son was sleeping, my husband was driving and I was keeping him company. About two hours after midnight, on the highway, the car started to make a strange sound and in a few seconds the engine turned off. We slowly stopped on the auxiliary lane of the highway and realized that something more serious was happening. The car didn't want to start anymore. Cars break down, no wonder. All of that might be fine, if we weren't somewhere on the highway, in the middle of Friday night, somewhere in France.
One church in Beziers
We called the insurance but they said we are not covered for this. Oh. At least, they sent us a towing service. They towed the car to one car repair garage and a taxi came to us and went to a nearby hotel. We had to wait the whole weekend until Monday, that the technician from the garage tell us that the car can not be fixed, the motor died forever. So we spent 5 days in France, in an expensive hotel as that was the only available (summer season) with a car that can not be fixed until we organized to get everything on way to our home. Including another towing service, to tow the car from France. The insurance never paid us, so that was a bitter memory, but at least we spent a few days, unexpectedly, in a town called Beziers in the south of France.
A roundabout decorated with flowers and a bull in the middle
We tried to make the best of those stressful days. We went with our son to some playgrounds and walked in the town. We had to clear our mind.
The city centre was nice. The typical narrow streets of the old part of the cities and big squares made our time better. I like those old buildings and the charm of the balconies that they have. Although it was summer, the sky was covered with clouds, so everything was a bit dark...like our thoughts.
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We found the Cathedral, Saint-Nazaire-et-Saint-Celse. It is a gothic cathedral from the thirteenth century and was pretty amazing for me to see that it looks like a fortress.
The photos are brihgter, as some of them were taken the next day, when it was sunny and with other camera
We went inside and it was so majestic. Beautiful stained glass windows let in light and coloured rays penetrated the dark space. I saw a big organ also, nobody played on it when we were there, but must have a powerful sound if it is played!
We climbed the stairs to the roof. Wow, what views waited for us.
The whole city could be seen and the river Orb. It was amazing, I loved it!
This is my finger, showing something far away.
One of the next days we went with our son to take a ride with this touristic small train throughout the city. It was his birthday and we were trapped somewhere in France with a broken car, and stressed. Poor little boy, what could we gave him as a present? He wanted to go on the train :) Ok, done. It took us through the narrow streets and then we crossed the river with the Old bridge. The cathedral could be seen from there. The train took us to a place called Canal du Midi.
There were some staircase locks and boats were passing through them. They made a touristic attraction of it, so there were a lot of people watching it. After the show, the train led us again to the city centre and we went to the hotel.
There was one more tricky thing in Beziers. The food. All the restaurants were closing their kitchen at 15:00 o clock, and the first day we didn't know that fact. We could find a place to have lunch. We learned the lesson, so the next day we went earlier to the city centre to eat.
Our small visit of 5 days to that city finished, but the memories are still here in #SaturdayMemories, by 