Weekend at the safari park!

I mentioned last year that we as a family have now decided to give experiences rather than gifts to everyone at Christmas in future (except for the littles, of course), so while I was trying to come up with some ideas Jen asked if I wanted to go in with them on a joint two-night stay at the Parc Animalier d'Auvergne. It got me off the hook so they bought tickets for everyone and I paid for the Airbnb. We ended up being seven adults, two five year olds and two littles, so it was quite a challenge to find somewhere that would accommodate all of us. I left that bit to Jen as she's a real ferret when it comes to finding these places and I just whipped out my bank card at the appropriate time. The house was not nearly as nice as the place where we stayed at the polar park, but very interesting in its own way in that had formerly been two houses which were knocked into one and the whole place was a bit Harry Potterish, with stairs everywhere, so not at all suitable for anyone with limited mobility!

There were four floors with two large bedrooms in the attic with what I considered to be pretty dangerous access stairs, but my two boys and their wife/gf plus the babies offered to stay up there, Charlie and his friend Milan had a double room with two single beds, Jen's mom and her partner had another double room and I had a double to myself. I had been dealing with the daughter while booking the place, but when she arrived to hand over the keys she came with her mom, who I found a bit "snippy" - maybe because she was worried about having such a large party in the house, or maybe because she'd already had bad experiences with other guests - but other than that feeling, the beds were clean and comfortable and the shower was hot so we were pretty happy with the place. Wherever we've stayed previously we've always left the place spotless, but I also took the precaution of taking pictures of every room before we left and accompanying the owner round on the final walk through, so I'm pleased to say everyone was happy in the end. I only mention this because a colleague of mine had once rented an Airbnb, had left the place spotless, and then the owner tried to say that they'd left it in a filthy state and would have to pay extra for a clean. Luckily she'd taken pictures before they left so the owner didn't get any more money out of them and my friend reported them to Airbnb! In the end, everything was fine for us but I just had a bad feeling about this lady - or maybe she was just having an off day when she let us in!

We'd arranged between us to take pretty much all food and drink with us, rather than paying park prices, although a few drinks and ice creams were bought inside the park all the same. It was a scorching hot and while the kids enjoyed seeing the animals, I think they probably enjoyed the rides more. Either way, it was a huge success!

At the entrance - there were loads of people
pouring in when we got there but the park
was big enough that it didn't have that
"Disney" feel to it!

Charlie and Milan probably enjoyed
the cooling stations the most!

After we'd checked out I thought we were just going to go straight home but Jen had other ideas and wanted us to stop off at what turned out to be a lovely medieval town called Cluny. It was way too hot for me so I sat it out listening to one of the guides by the church, Jen's mom went window shopping, and the kids followed a circuit that would take them to all the main features of the old town in about an hour. I probably would have enjoyed it too but searing heat and frizzy hair just weren't doing it for me that day!

Cluny!

I sat by the church to wait it out!

Since we didn't get back till late I missed our village fête which by all accounts was a roaring success as usual. The police have now taken to blocking off the main access roads into the village so you end up driving half way up the mountain just to get home, but if it keeps traffic away from revellers dancing in the street so much the better!

And finally, I was talking to my sister after I got back and she was saying that she'd started ordering in a few meals for my brother from a local farm shop. It's not a contract kind of think like Hallo Fresh, but they apparently make good meals and it will give her a break from always worrying about him. He's independent enough in that he worked all his life and has lived on his own since mom and dad died, but being quite severely autistic, he tends not to take the initiative and rarely does anything (like maintenance or cleaning) unless she specifically asks/tells him to. Anyway they were over at his place recently and noticed that the floor was looking a little the worse for wear, so they decided to get him one of those robot vacuum cleaners, show him how to work it, and hopefully that would put an end to her having to tell him to clean the floors. Well the other day he called her to say that the vacuum wasn't working - it had only cleaned the living room/dining room but not the bedrooms so she and my long-suffering BIL drove over there to find out how he'd buggered it up already. They set it off and it was indeed working correctly so they were perplexed at what was going wrong - that is until she asked him "Roy, was the living room door open"? His response "ohhhhh"! My poor sister, she has the patience of a saint!