22 Aout 2015. August 22, 2015. The Day After the Wedding.

Bon Jour – Short and sweet today…

Slept in a bit… and then headed out to Saint Cecile — the next town from Cairanne.. where they have a Saturday market.. strolled the market and then went to a little hotel on the “main street” of St. Cecile for a great salade.. Then we had a funny adventure.. Yesterday we noticed that a light came on in the car… saying that we needed to “Rectify the tyre pressure”.. I may have mentioned this.. The message stayed on for more than 36 hours.. So we decided to bring the car to an auto shop and see what the problem is.. We were recommended to go to Motoriot Solieul.. just at the edge of Cairanne.. So off we went. Nice guy.. not a word of English.. But we showed him the screen on the dashboard and he seemed to know what was going on.. He then proceeded to take air out of the tires and said everything was OK.. but then he started the car and dashed out of the shop with it.. for a little test drive. When he came back he was talking very fast and I was lost.. And the same message was still on the screen… So we called Elizabeth to talk with him and she said that he explained that the car is now safe; everything is fine.. but there is a problem that won’t affect us. OK.. Then he tried to monkey with the dials on the screen — talking French all the while.. You could see that he was frustrated and was trying to read the manual in French, but the buttons and information on the screen were in English so he couldn’t follow the manual. OK.. We said in French that if everything was OK.. we would ignore the screen.. And off we went..

We drove about 2 kilometers and suddenly all the warnings on the screen that were yellow were now red! So we figured the problem was getting worse.. And now we were really nervous.. So we asked the hotel guy to look at the car — He could read the French and the English so that seemed perfect. Turns out that on the Mercedes after you change the pressure (it had been too high and the mechanic rightfully lowered it to the correct pressure), you need to adjust some setting on the internal computer of the car which turned out to be quite easy to do.. And now we are fine.

Did a little work and then headed up to the park in Cairanne (inside the ramparts, just below the old church) where everyone from the wedding was having an early evening picnic — pizzas on the grass with lots of salads. It was sort of funny to be sitting in this amazing setting having pizzas.. but so be it. There were also fierce games of Baton going on (heavy silver balls that you throw and try to get the closest to a marker).. .It’s a good game for big crowds since pretty much everyone including kids can do it.. obviously it requires skill to do it well.. but everyone can play. For a while Richard and Elizabeth’s dog (Gatsby) was meandering around without his leash.. but he’s old and was easy to bring back to the fore.

Then one of the guests who apparently is a big time photographer having worked for GQ and several fashion magazines and having shot the weddings of some very hip folks from big name British bands did a huge group photo against the setting sun over Cairanne and the vineyards.. What could be more perfect?

People then started to dissipate.. some driving back to Geneva, some packing to leave early tomorrow on flights to London and elsewhere… and many turning this into a big holiday — spending another week in Provence… including the bride and groom who are in the house at the wedding venue, along with some of their best friends until next weekend.

We strolled to Richard and Elizabeth’s for a glass of wine.. and then headed to the hotel.

We’ll see family again tomorrow for lunch and then we are headed to Italia for about 5 days — Turin and then Genoa.

Take care —

Fern