Literally and emotionally, I’ve already said goodbye to Mulhouse. Or as the title suggests, I’ve at least said ‘see you soon’ because I’m sure I’ll be back in the not-so-distant future (the benefits of only being 1500 km away and not 8000 km!). However, I’m lingering in France on the blog for a little while longer. My last two weeks before leaving were packed with trips and fun things so let me catch you up one final time!

First up, two weeks before leaving, I headed to Paris for a girls trip with my university flatmates. Since leaving Edinburgh two years ago, we’ve kept in touch and see each other in smaller groups where we can but it’s more difficult since we’ve been spread between Edinburgh, Bristol, London, Paris and Mulhouse at various points. We did manage a group trip to Croatia last year and wanted to repeat the feat this year. Seeing as three out of the five of us have ‘big boy jobs’ (traditional 9-5s), we arrived in dribs and drabs to Paris. I got there on Thursday with Georgia and found our Airbnb in Boulogne-Billancourt, a suburb in the west of Paris near where one of our number, Lizzie, was working as an au pair. We had a chill night in our apartment with raclette for dinner before we were joined by Pippa who got in just after midnight.

Because of the aforementioned big boy jobs, Friday was a work day but still more fun in each other’s company. I wasn’t working but I kept myself busy while the others worked from home. We popped over the road to a small restaurant called Ma Cuisine Privée for some delicious Chinese food for lunch. My yuxiang pork took me right back to being in China. Once the work day was done we headed out to a nearby bar for a couple of drinks. We were actually in the same area where I went to Rock en Seine last year and the bar we went to was one that I passed every day walking to the festival grounds. After a couple of drinks we headed back to the apartment to cook dinner again and were eventually joined by Dina, completing the group!

With everyone together, we were ready to start the weekend for real! However, that was slightly foiled by the fact that Lizzie had to work on Saturday morning. The rest of us still made the most of the glorious day by heading into the centre of Paris. We wandered around Notre Dame and the Hôtel de Ville and along the Seine, stopping at a little Italian place for some lunch. We enjoyed the sun by sitting in the Tuileries playing cards for a while before walking further along the Seine. After that, it was time to go home and chill a bit before a big night on the town.

Lizzie had chosen one of her favourite restaurants for dinner, Le Petit Bouillon Vavin in the Latin Quarter. A bouillon is a traditional Parisian restaurant that serves quick, simple French food. In general, our meal was great and our server was lovely. We headed further into the Latin Quarter to find a bar after our meal but a few drinks at Café des Arts turned into a few more and some dancing at nearby Le Violon Dingue and eventually saw us make our way to a club called La Rotonde in the north of Paris. If you want to impress a Parisian, apparently telling them you’ve been to La Rotonde will do the trick. It was a super fun, if slightly unexpected, series of events that saw us getting some of the first metros home for a few hours of sleep before checking out of our Airbnb!

The damage of the night before meant that none of us were up to much on our final morning together. We managed to pull it together enough to get brunch at a place called Cafe Mericourt before wandering around the Marché des Enfants Rouges, a bustling flea market, and locating a Ladurée shop for some macaron souvenirs. We were all really tired so we found a cafe to sit down in for a while and then said goodbye to Pippa. It was a lovely day again so Dina, Georgia and I settled in a park next to the Saint-Martin Canal.

At this point it was time for me to leave but not back to Mulhouse, not just yet! I was heading over to Rouen to visit my friend Anna. She has been over to Mulhouse a few times in the past few months so it was my turn to return the favour. I had already been to Rouen last year and I felt like I’d seen the city enough so we planned a few trips nearby instead. We started off with another round of raclette with some of Anna’s friends and then an early night to catch up on my lack of sleep!

I had two requests of Anna while I was visiting, one of which was something that she had also been wanting to do for a while. I wanted to go to Giverny, home to the house and gardens of the one and only Claude Monet! The famous impressionist painter lived and worked here for 43 years until his death in 1926. From Rouen it was only 40 minutes by train and would only be 55 minutes from Paris. From the train station in Vernon-Giverny, there is a shuttle bus that will take you to and from the gardens for €10. The gardens are only open from April to October and cost €11. We didn’t buy tickets in advance but it was a gloomy, random Monday so we only had to wait in line for a few minutes. I can definitely imagine that this wouldn’t be the case on a nicer day, in the height of summer or at the weekend so consider buying tickets online in advance.

The gardens were glorious. Even in the grey weather it was beautiful. It was more on the wild side but that’s what I like in a garden. There are two main sections to the gardens, the one with the house and the lily garden on the other side of an underpass. The lily garden is where Monet took inspiration for many of his most famous paintings like The Japanese Footbridge and Water Lilies. It was quite cramped walking around the pond which made me glad that we weren’t there at a busier time. It was raining a little but that was actually quite atmospheric. After we had seen the garden, we went through the house where you can see a few original Monet paintings as well as paintings by some of his friends like Cézanne, Renoir and Manet. We had a great time but got stuck in Vernon train station for a while on the way home.

My second request was to go to the coast, anywhere, I just wanted to see the sea. Anna proposed a few places like Honfleur or Deauville but I ended up choosing Etretat, a small town known for its impressive cliffs. Getting to Etretat involved a 30 minute train to Beauté-Breville and then a bus to Etretat. Public transport seems to vary depending on the day and there was only one bus in and one bus back on the day that we wanted to go. When we arrived we walked straight to the boardwalk and the view was just incredible. The beach is pebbly but beautiful and sandwiched on either side by the great white cliffs. Taking the strategy of divide and conquer, we decided to head up the cliffs on the right first, a steep but relatively short climb. We wandered along for a bit, just taking it all in and then headed down to find somewhere for lunch. 

We settled on a restaurant on the esplanade along with other retirees enjoying the blazing sunshine. It wasn’t very French of me but I had fish and chips (although I did accompany it with a pichet, or pitcher, of white wine so it’s all about balance). We walked it off after by dragging ourselves up the other side of the cliffs, a still steep but longer climb than before. After another little wander, a nap on the beach and a coke in a cafe, it was time to get our bus back to the train station and home to Rouen. Etretat was gorgeous and we couldn’t have had better weather for it but I think that the seven hours we had there, dictated by the bus times, was a bit long. It’s only a small place!

It was finally time to go home to Mulhouse, the last time that I could say that. So began my final week in Mulhouse. There was obviously a lot of packing and cleaning to be done but I managed to fit in a few nice goodbyes. For example, my first evening back I had one of my last water polo training sessions. The water polo team in Mulhouse has been such a big part of my two years here. I remember getting in contact with them in my first week and they’ve been a constant throughout my whole time there. After training, we had a little apéro in the meeting room at the pool, a few drinks, some snacks and some chat. Funnily enough, the girls that had organised it wanted it to be a surprise for me but had accidentally added me to the WhatsApp group!

For my final weekend I met with a few friends at Gambrinus, my favourite bar in Mulhouse that also has my favourite tarte flambée. I also bumped into a few colleagues there as well! I saw another colleague and friend the following evening at Shamrock, the Irish pub near my apartment. That brought me to my final day in Mulhouse. I had a few errands to run, the final bits and pieces of packing to do but I also wanted to get out and do some of my favourite things. It was a nice sunny day so I headed into Mulhouse’s centre ville which I think is cute even on a grey day but you can’t beat it when the sun is out. I walked around and got my errands done and then headed to my favourite spot – the terrace of Omnino, my favourite coffee shop. My usual order is a flat white because I’ve found that even though France doesn’t always do milky coffees as well, Omnino has cracked the flat white. However, it was rapidly approaching mid-20s in temperature so I opted for a cold brew while I finished off the first French book that I’ve read since uni. It’s ironic timing that I’m finishing it right as I leave France but it has taken me a while to get over the association of reading in French with university work. This book was ‘La Tresse‘ by Laetitia Colombani and it was a lovely reintroduction. I bumped into a friend there and had a little chat before heading home to tackle the last bit of cleaning with the welcome interruption of another friend popping by for a last minute goodbye.

My final evening was one to remember. I headed to Astronome, Mulhouse’s one and only rooftop bar, for an apéro with my flatmates and colleague-turned-bestie Aine. Despite Astronome having my favourite cocktail in the world, their pineapple mojito, I opted for my favourite French spritz, a Hugo. After a couple of drinks in the sunshine there, Aine and I headed over to Tandem, a restaurant that I’ve been wanting to try since I moved to Mulhouse! Tandem is a wine bar and restaurant whose menus are locally sourced, seasonal and change frequently. There was a selection of smaller plates so we got a few to share between us. We were brave enough to try bone marrow for the first time (verdict – very fatty, glad I tried it but not something I’ll be jumping to order again). The star of the show was the special, beef tongue with curry gnocchi. It was absolutely delicious, so tender and tasted just like fancy kebab meat! We had a selection of local wines alongside the meal and I even drank a glass of pinot noir by choice (I’m not normally a red wine drinker). As I expected, it was the perfect way to end my last day.

And that was it. After a 3am wake up call, I was back in Scotland for 9am, picked up by my sister and unpacking at home before lunchtime. When I first got home it just felt like I was back in Scotland for a holiday but I think it’s starting to sink in now that this is it. But as I said, it really is just à bientôt, not au revoir because I’ll be back in Mulhouse sooner or later!