The Californienne

A pain de campagne fresh from the boulangerie + some tapenade A pain aux céréales + rillettes (a rillette is similar to a paté, but it’s shredded pork or duck) Olives+ cornichons + caviar d’aubergines (eggplant dip) + paté – Cheese to cut in slivers: Comté, Tomme, Beaufort, Tête de Moine, etc. a bottle of freshly squeezed juice from the market Check out my recipe for French Toast aka “Pain Perdu”

The wonderful town of Arcachon is a starting point of the bay and your visit. From there you can take a boat across the bay to Cap Ferret, there are numerous beaches, oyster beds, sea salt harvesting ponds, wooded nature preserves, and to the south lies the dreamy Dune de Pilat. The bay is wonderful for a boat tour or oyster farm tour and the ocean side of the peninsula is has excellent surfing and wonderful sunshine for lying out. It’s a wonderful 50 mile bike ride from Arcachon to Cap Ferret, under the pines, past salt harvesting marshes and oyster farms.

But even my American friends without any pet experience will similarly love to browse photos on Instagram and ask to pet a dog on the street. It’s important to remember that people that live in this area may have kids that have grown and left the house or they valued things like their careers over parenthood. Many people need a little thing to spoil and a dog is a natural companion. You shouldn’t approach someone and ask to pet their dog, you might get met with some odd looks.

According to legend, Mormon pioneers considered the limbs of the Joshua trees to resemble the up-stretched arms of Joshua- leading them to the promised land. Took a 15 min walk down one of the self-guided trails and went off the path towards some of the many monzogranite rock formations. It’s an AMAZING place for any kind of climbing, while driving out we saw some pros top-roping. I say “food” instead of “snack” because it should be a good source of energy (trailmix, sandwich, granola bar) and WATER Exposure is real, don’t get caught in a bad way.