La preparation/Planning

The title of the blog refers to the national dish of Portugal called bacalhau or salted codfish and the dish that is famous in the south-west of France called cassoulet which is a stew of duck, beans and sausages. The intention is that when we are there we try both dishes.

We had decided that we would do another trip to Europe in 2017 when we saw some relatively cheap fares come up for travel to the UK.  I still had my Gold Elite membership of Air New Zealand which makes it easier to get upgrades and they can be bought for a reasonable price as well.

We bought tickets to London via Singapore and back through Los Angeles.  The return leg was done before Donald Trump was elected and we may have made a different decision about the route if we had known the outcome of the election.

In our initial planning we thought we would go to France and it was a toss up between Berlin and perhaps Portugual (Porto and Lisbon) with Portugal winning out as an additional part of trip (I suspect it was the food and wine that tipped the balance).  We finalised our trip in January and that meant a flurry of activity booking flights and accommodation.  Initially I had thought we would book a car in Bordeaux and drive to Portugal but it is around 1000 kilometres so flying was the best option. Most of our accommodation is at AirBnB places. 

I love the preparation and planning stages as it is fun to figure out an itinerary; find the best value way of travelling and looking up AirBnB places to stay and selecting on both price and what the reviews of the hosts.  Our plans were dictated to some extent by a concert in Agen (France) where a favourite jazz chanteuse is giving a concert.  One of the places I am looking forward to going to is the AirBnB in Agen as I don’t think the host speaks French, so I will have a chance practice my French with her.

Despite having weeks to prepare for going away it was a last minute rush to pack my bag and do all the things that one has to do before departing.  The biggest decision was about whether I should take my warm jacket.  It is more weight and bulk and up until the last moment I was undecided.  In the end I decided to risk it and instead I have a whole lot of layers which hopefully will enable me deal with slightly cooler weather. 

So as the French say “on y va”, let’s go.