Rain and darkness after Paris!

From France and a lovely autumn with farely warm weather we are back in Sweden where the rain is pouring and it's dark and chilly outside.

We ate well and enjoyed ourselves in many ways during our visit in France.

Aurore spent 7 hours at her University on Wednesday where she put forward her thesis - a work on the history and development of the Cinematek in Stockholm (programming, economy and film politics).

Meanwhile I visited Musée d'Orsay and spent almost five hours in this magnificient museum without being able to see the exhibition in its entirety.

During our three day visit in Paris we also saw La Maison de Victor Hugo - where he lived between 1832-1848 and Musée de la Vie Romantique with some information concerning George Sand, information complemented in grand scale during our visit in La Châtre.

Aurore's cousin Hervé invited us to dine with him in his new apartment near Pigalle where he lives with Chou.

On Friday another cousin of Aurore, Béatrice - in whose apartment we lived - drove us the three hundred kilometres to La Châtre. Well, she was going there herself anyway but...

In La Châtre we stayed in Aurore's parents' home - where Aurore grew up - living in our own apartment in an annex to the house. We had two rooms, a bathroom and a kitchen all to ourselves!

Aurore's mother drove us around in her car.
We visited markets where they purchase food and many other things. In La Châtre there is a market once a week and it's the same thing in other small towns in the area.

We also visited - as I indicated above - the home of George Sand in Nohant where she lived from the age of four till she died, interrupted by a period during which she lived in Paris.

Her guests are well known to the European visitors and many others: Frédéric Chopin, Eugène Delacroix, Guy de Maupassant, Alexandre Dumas (the younger), Gustave Flaubert, Honoré de Balzac among others.

She paid for their living and the guide told us that the only money Chopin contributed with was the rent he paid for using her piano.

(Photo Musée d'Orsay taken from: http://lieuxtouristiques.com/userfiles/image/image%20folder1/France/The%20Musee%20d%E2%80%99Orsay,%20Paris.jpg)
(Photo Maison de Victor Hugo taken from: http://www.francebalade.com/paris/vosgesvhugo.jpg)
(Photo Musée de la Vie Romantique taken from:http://a7.idata.over-blog.com/547x353/0/52/87/85/george-sand/Nohant.jpg)
(Photo Maison de George Sand taken from: http://cirqueetlivres.midiblogs.com/media/02/00/bd578d356eeebfcbc718a35cc74e1790.png)