The past weeks have once again flown. My time in France is peaceful, relaxing and July was spent discovering this area and visiting my Dad and Margaret. I found that taking a train to Munich was the same price as flying, so I flew from Rennes in mid Brittany to Munich, (via CDG in Paris). Our two weeks of wonderful family time was spent chatting over delicious meals and traveling back and forth to Austria on weekends in between my father's dialysis 3 times a week. I admire his brave and positive attitude to this committed medical treatment he now MUST have. It's tiring for him and after a 5-6 hour day of dialysis he comes home weary! Bless his heart, at almost 83, he smiles but the strain of the treatment is visible. I will go back to Munich before the end of September and once again at Christmas of course!
I can't remember the last time I spent a summer in Austria, my visits are usually in the winter time at Christmas. I forgot how stunning the surrounding alps are, how green the pastures, the colourful wild flowers and the majestic mountains. The beauty takes your breath away. The photos that follow are of our area, the mountain range is the Wilder Kaiser, (wild emperor) and that view is from our back door!
I took a hike up the hill behind us and visited the cows with their bells tinkering around their necks. You can see the magnificent view of the valley in front of us. I felt like Julie Andrews in the Sound of Music as I spun around in the warmth of the afternoon. No doubt it would have distressed the cows listening to me singing the "hills are alive..." 
You can look across the valley to the range on the other side and to the "right" see a long green line, that is a super skiing area and where I normally ski when over here. We are hoping for good snow this year!
In Munich we went out to a couple of homely and local eateries, delightfully casual and food to die for. Dad treated us to a lunch on the Starnberger See, a very long lake of some 20 kms long and 5 kms wide. The restaurant sits directly on the water with its own dock, in the photo you can see the water in the window reflection behind us.
One afternoon whilst Dad was at dialysis I took the train into Munich city ; it was warm and the town busy with tourists. The main area is a "walk only" zone and just gorgeous. All the great shopping is there, but the surrounding buildings in Marienplatz are historic and stunning. Here you can see the entrance to the area named Staccus Karls Platz and then Marienplatz further down with its famous church! In the winter the area is filled with market tents and a magic Christmas market named the Christkindl markt.
Talking about driving, I bought a car yesterday!! Does that truly make me a resident of France now? I chuckle, in my quaint little cottage and now my quaint little old car! It's an old 2 door Renault Clio, 1996 and a diesel with 230,000 kms on the clock. Egad! It drives well though and the french equivalent of our Roadworthy was pretty clean. So WHO KNOWS how long it will last me, at worst I can just ditch it, for 1000 Euros I guess you can't get much, so fingers crossed it lasts my time here! It is super being mobile again........so Brittany countryside, here I come!
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