More springtime in Lille with Bailey

Spring marches on. The days are still getting longer. Sunset this evening is at 9:20 p.m. We went out at 10:00 p.m. last night and still wasn't completely dark. I've been pushing Bailey's second walk to later and later in the evening when the crowds are gone so she's more comfortable. Yesterday I did my longest bike ride to date, about 25 km or more. Between the walks and occasional bike rides my step count has been averaging about 25k per day for the past couple of weeks, and yet, I'm not losing weight, which annoys me. 

Clay received his French driver's license in the mail yesterday. France has an exchange program with certain U.S. states, which include Virginia, so no test was required. Mine is still somewhere in the bowels of French bureaucracy, but it was submitted after Clay's, so we aren't yet worried. We are going to Tours next week, where we will rent a car and spend a few days touring chateaux in the Loire valley. Bailey will be going out to her camp while we're away. 

We went to an afternoon concert of music by Bach and Beethoven played on a pianoforte. We are seeing The Magic Flute at the opera the night before we leave on the trip to Tours. Friday was another holiday here, Victorie, celebrating the end of WWII. We were lucky enough to catch part of a wreath laying ceremony at the war memorial just a couple blocks from our place. 

The buttercups are still beautiful and there are more poppies coming out every day, as well as that beautiful, wild-growing, yellow iris along the canals. And the water lilies are beginning to bloom!

From our walks:

From the concert:

The instrument

The venue

The program

More from our walks:

From a mid-day walk around some of the community gardens in town.

Peonies in someone's garden plot.

One of these signs addresses protection of hedgehogs in the gardens.

From the Victoire 1945 ceremony:

And from this morning's walk:

There's more of this iris in bloom each time we walk by.

Hard to photograph, but these are clusters of pink and white flowers growing from cracks in the stones above the water and cascading downward. 

Clay read something yesterday that said that Napoleon Bridge was the only covered pedestrian bridge in France. It is in the park around the Citadel. 

Waterlilies beginning to bloom

More of those pink and white wildflowers

Bailey is very content to sit with me for a while when I want to rest. 

She tells me it's time to go when she gets bored.

And just for fun:

My U.S. friends might want to save this for the upcoming Fourth of July.

One of France's contributions to science, and democracy.

May Day

Friday, May 1st, was May Day, or as they call it here, "fete du travail." I've always known it as socialist labor day, but unlike labor day in the U.S., they take it seriously here. There are no sales, in fact, all the stores are closed. All of them, except florists, because exchanging lilies of the valley is a tradition here, a holdover from the pagan origins of the spring holiday, I assume. Only recently bakeries are also allowed to be open, because bread is national fetish. Bars are also open because everyone is off work and needs something to do. Workers are supposed to be paid double on the day and get another day off as well. 

So Friday morning was eerily quiet when we woke up. There were no delivery trucks or trash trucks rumbling down the streets, there was virtually zero vehicular traffic and very few pedestrians either since no one was going to work. It was more quiet than Christmas. We had made certain to get all the shopping we'd need done on the day before. Bailey and I went on our usual morning walk but we had the streets and the park mostly to ourselves. 

In the afternoon we walked to Wazemmes (another quartier or part of Lille) because the public transport system wasn't running, for the "fete de la soupe." It's an annual street festival where various civic groups sell homemade soup and promote themselves. The groups had a very definite left wing slant, which was very nice to see. There was not a MAGA Republican anywhere in sight, and that was very nice. There was a good crowd because there was not much else going on in town. We didn't get any soup but did have a couple of beers and walked back home. 

The Rotary Club was there too. I have no idea what they do in France, or elsewhere for that matter.

There were several antifascist groups present, all with soup.

And "woke" is not a dirty word here.

A group that supports gay kids rejected by their families.

The golden ladle awards and jars of soup for the judging in the background.

The following pictures are from a long bike ride I took down the canal path the other day. I stopped to take a few pictures, mostly of swans and flowers.

Swans look funny when they are feeding off the bottom.

A black swan

Wild poppies are coming into bloom.

Bailey looking out the window.