26 July 2014

We'll always have Carcassonne

We've just come back from our lovely summer holiday in Carcassonne in the Languedoc-Rousillion region of France. 
You loved your holiday. You loved being there with your cousins and I'm glad we could all be there together.
Three amigos, exploring the neighbourhood and plotting pesky things! 

As much as I love holidays, in the same way as I always did, I now love enriching your life with new experiences as much as I enjoy them for myself. This trip was full of such experiences.
Medieval walled Carcassonne, where knights and princesses resided...in my version of the history, for you

The beautiful coastline at Narbonne Plage where you amused yourself running away from the waves and didn't want to stop

The Départ of stage 16 of the Tour de France in Carcassonne

I am so grateful to have been able to take you to soak up the atmosphere at a stage of France's greatest sporting event in its home country. There's nothing quite like it. 
You played your new harmonica for the riders as they went past

When I went abroad as a little girl I was always overwhelmed to be putting my first foot down on foreign soil as I stepped off the plane. The warm, fragrant air reminding me of holidays past. Poignantly, that feeling came rushing back as I watched you take your first little steps on French soil in the balmy July morning breeze. 
Other familiar childhood feelings returned through you on this trip. In my childhood mind there was always a distant fear of being lost abroad, a million miles from home. It was so distant that it never really surfaced but getting into the car and looking out of the back window at where I could have been left behind made me happier for having that distant fear buried in my subconscious. It made me grateful for the security I had. I was reminded of these feelings as I carried you through airport security and strapped you into the car, and as we left the house to come home again. That childhood fear of mine is now wrapped up inside you. You are now the 3 year old me that I must keep safe. 

“Not all those who wander are lost.” ~ J.R.R. Tolkien
 
Sleep tight baby. See you tomorrow.