Morning Excursion: Giverny
Welcome to Giverny
This morning we woke up to the low 60's while docked in the small French village of Vernon. We had opted last night after dinner to add a morning excursion to the Claude Monet House & Gardens this morning and so we were up early (to an alarm) and out the door for a light breakfast by 7am. On the bus by 8:15 am and didn't return until about 11:45 am. The quaint village of Giverny is basically one street, but it was here that famous French impressionist painter Claude Monet made his home and created two huge gardens on his property. I'm typically NOT a "garden guy" but much like out stop in the tulip gardens in the Netherlands, I really enjoyed this morning's activity. The weather was amazingly refreshing (especially coming from So Fla where the "feels like" temps have been in the triple digits and the cool breeze just made for an ideal way to walk around the gardens.
After returning to the ship right before lunch we joined Pam & Bob for lunch then went to the top deck to enjoy more glorious weather and my most favorite thing about river cruising.....CRUISING. Just so relaxing and so enjoyable. AND we saw a small castle and the old water power house as we left Vernon.
Docked in the afternoon at Les Andelys and had about an hour and a half walking tour of the village which dates back to the time of Richard the Lionhearted. The highlight was to see the cathedral he financed and in the interior the ORIGINAL stained glass windows & floor. And recently they discovered when they they were cleaning the walls the ORIGINAL paintings on the upper walls. Pretty cool. Topped off the evening with dinner and then spent a little time on the upper deck. Tomorrow we dock in Caudebec where we will remain for two days. We have two excursions tomorrow - one early in the morning along the Normandy Abbey Route where we will visit an abbey that was constructed in 645 A.D. (wow) and then in the afternoon we will visit the village of Honfleur.
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