Laurie says lots of blog readers will be interested in seeing where we’re staying for five weeks. I’m not so sure, but here goes…
I think an unsettling moment of traveling is when you arrive at a place – a hotel, a B & B, a rental, whatever – that you’ve seen only in pictures and you open the door. What, exactly, are you going to discover? We’ve seen plenty of places that looked oh-so-good on a website but were not-so-good when the door opened. Our cottage here in Bois-le-Roi gave us the opposite reaction: we liked what we saw on the website, but the reality is better.
Now, we had references, so to speak, for this cottage: our friends the Germains and Rufins both know the owner, we heard that the remodeling work was done by a man who’d done work for both of them, so we expected the place to be fine. From the minute we walked in, though, we knew it would exceed our expectations. It is light, roomy, well-equipped, the re-modeled bathroom is beautiful, the yard is huge and green, it’s on a quiet street, it’s…well, perfect.
Some pictures:
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- Downstairs: living room and kitchen. Upstairs: bedroom, sitting room and bathroom.
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- From the street.
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- Looking from just inside the door from the garden. It isn’t huge, of course, but the size is just fine.
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- Looking toward the garden door. Kitchen has a full-sized refrigerator, dish washer and clothes washer.
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- The bedroom, with a very comfortable bed. Phew.
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- Looking out the bedroom window into the garden.
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- Lunch in the garden. Very nice, eh?
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- And, of course, a picture of our ride this trip. Same kind of car as two years ago, updated a bit. We really like it and its 50mpg mileage.
We have some time in September for which we hadn’t figured out where we’d stay, but now we know: we’ll come back here. This place is a wonderful find. It’s 35 minutes by train to Paris, there are many walking trails, and if we’re lazy, we can just sit in the yard chairs and enjoy the garden (with, of course, a glass or two of rosé).
How wonderfully perfect. So glad I’m reading this on another gorgeous day, or I’d be even more jealous. I am also really very hungry for a great cheese right about now…
Keep writing!!