We have arrived and have slept our first night at La Maison de la Vieille Vigne in Villers-La-Faye, slightly north of Beaune.

The flight was uneventful (might have something to do with the 2 glasses of wine I had in the lounge before boarding and the 2 sleeping pills I swallowed before we took off).  I barely stayed awake for dinner, then slept all the way across the Atlantic.  That was the best flight I’ve ever had!  Getting our luggage, and getting through customs (where we were asked NO questions!) took about half an hour, but finding the Avis location was an adventure in itself.  Let’s just say that the Paris airport could use better signage!  We ended up leaving the airport about an hour after we thought we would. C’est la vie!

Villers-la-Faye is an approximately 3.5 hour drive from Charles de Gaulle airport, but it took slightly longer to arrive at our little cottage, as we stopped in a lovely little restaurant in Auxerre for lunch where poor Steve tried to get a “proper” coffee to keep him awake (more on that later).  We took the autoroute all the way because we just wanted to get there and get settled.  We had put the village coordinates into our GPS and, even though we had very specific directions to the cottage, when we arrived in the village we had to put the actual address into the GPS to find the house because the street is so small it looks like someone’s driveway!  We would make this mistake many times over the next 2 weeks.

But once we figured it out, the house, was immediately recognizable from the pictures.  It is a renovated wine maker’s cottage from the 1600’s, and the inside is compact, well equipped, an adorable mix of authentic and modern, clean, and very satisfactory.  We have a lovely home away from home, which was a relief, as this was the first time we booked accommodation over the internet from someone other than a major hotel.

   

   

   

   

We got unpacked and then had a nap, because regular traveling is so tiring, never mind overnight flights.  Later, we headed into Beaune for dinner and ate outside at the Brasserie Carnot in the older part of town.  Food and ambiance (and company) was fabulous – a great place to people watch.

   

The old part of Beaune is a maze of narrow streets and narrower alleys, neither of which run in straight lines.

    

It was such an adventure to find our car – no, we did not drink too much wine – we made plans right then and there to tag our car on our GPS in future and carry it (the GPS) with us so we could more easily get back to the car!