Today the kids and I stayed home in the morning. We made plans to meet Nic at 2:30PM near the cathedral to do something together. So we had a leisurely morning. I think I managed some laundry and the kids watched Ice Age II again (thanks Veronique!). It seemed like the time to leave crept up on us fast and we had a bit of a rush at the end to get the kids to eat something and be out the door by 2PM. We did it however and were at the cathedral just before the arranged time. So Ethan, Gwyneth, and I had a chance to sit down and ponder the cathedral before Nic arrived shortly thereafter. We had decided to tour the cathedral and take the optional "tour" of the tour which was only offered at 3PM and 4:30PM during the week. However, our plans were thwarted when we were told that the 3PM tour was cancelled that "peut-etre" or perhaps there would be one at 4:30PM. So we decided to abort plan but first we did step inside briefly. (To enter the cathedral is free). We discovered all of these school children participating in some kind of program and perhaps this was why the tour was cancelled.
So our second choice of activity was a boat ride on the canals through the Hortillonnages. Stealing from a web-page: "The Hortillonnages extend for some 300 hectares. Dating back to Gallo-Roman times, the gardens surrounded by water are still used for market-gardening. The gardens are made up of numerous plots of land, criss-crossed by canals, the “rieux”, which are navigable by flat-bottomed boats known as “barques à cornets"." We arrived, but not before Ethan had to go potty and conveniently there was a public toilet just outside. Nic took him in so I cannot comment on the accommodations, so to speak. We bought our tickets and were given a number "cinquante-sept" (or 57) that we had to listen for. The picture shows Gwyneth and Ethan in the waiting area. Luckily they didn't say too much else over the loud speaker when they were announcing the numbers so it was easily for us to tell when it was our turn. 
Here we are at the end of boat ride but we can pretend that it was the beginning. Now that I am looking at the picture I can see that Gwyneth is holding Ethan's 1 euro binoculars that I bought him that the equivalent of a dollar-store. Unfortunately I think we lost them shortly there-after because now we can't find them and we didn't have them yesterday for our trip to Paris. (Sorry I'm a few days behind on the blog!) Anyway, the boat ride lasted about an hour through a dizzying (a word?) maze of canals that connected small plots of land. Most of them are now used for flower gardens and or summer cabin/shacks for the weekend. A few people still produce vegetables but not many. We saw lots of pretty flowers, caught a glimpse of a water rat, and saw some immature grebes. Otherwise we mostly listened to the guide who spoke in French but occasionally would say something to us in English. It was a pleasant afternoon.
We hit the trail for home because it was now around 5PM and Fabien was picking us up at 6:30PM for dinner at his house. It was probably a 30 minute walk from where we were and we had to shop for a small baby gift on the way home. Fabien has a 6 week old baby! We got home with about 1/2 an hour to spare - almost enough time to rest and Fabien was there. He took us to his house which is in the photo. He and his wife (Crystal) had it built a year ago - and new construction is unusual for Amiens. It is some sort of German design that is Uber-efficient. It has no heat source, but has things like triple pane windows and some sort of air circulation system that can somehow help to regulate the temperature. And the roof is designed to collect rain water which they use to flush toilets. The house was neat/cool to look at on the inside, but it also seems like it is a bit of work in progress. (They had a shower, but no walls were up on it yet, for example). Fabien also had a huge garden planted out back with lots and lots of ..... potatoes.
We had a DELICIOUS dinner. It was so nice to taste good food. Here I am about to eat an escargot. Gwyneth ate a couple too - Ethan wasn't interested. We had a cheese from the region called Maroille and some delicious sausage Andouiette. The sausage almost tasted like pulled pork in sausage form. I will resist saying it tasted better so as not to insult my husband. Oh, and the meal started with some sort of meat and carrots inside of a gelatin casing .... that was tasty too. We of course had wine, and the meal ended with more cheese and then followed by what Fabien claimed was the best tasting yogurt that you can buy in the grocery store. The name escapes me now .... hopefully I will remember when I see it in the grocery store. The yogurt came in all sorts of flavors .. I got the caramel and it was good. 
In between dinner and eating there was some "football" playing. Ethan's pants are proof that he enjoyed himself - they were dirty! He also took a soccer ball to the face off a shot from Gwyneth when we was goalie. It was funny to see his strategy for the next shot - just put his hands up in front of his face and closed his eyes. A good strategy for protecting his face but not a good strategy for protecting the goal. The strategy for preventing goals got better when he pushed the 2 blues chairs that you see in the picture completely together. I think we left Fabien's around 10:30PM. It would have been fun to stay longer but we had decided to go to Paris the next day and thought some rest was best.
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