France {Chateau d'Esclimont}

my eight year old at Chateau d'Esclimont this past summer

On our last trip to France with the children we were only in Paris.  This time, we just travelled through.  We were with family in the southwest of France, then spent one night in Bordeaux, and two nights outside of Versailles to see the palace.  For the Versailles part of the trip, I found a castle-hotel online (a little over 30 minutes away) that looked interesting.  It turned out to be one of the most memorable, magical places we've stayed: Chateau d'Esclimont.

We had two rooms in one of the outer buildings next to the castle, where we had dinner one of the evenings.

Not long after we returned home, I read that Phillipe Cousteau, Jr had his wedding ceremony at the chateau in September.  My daughter had just been working on a project about Jacques Cousteau in 5th grade and we had made a detour on our way to Bordeaux in order to visit his birthplace, St. Andre de Cubzac.  It was fun to find out that his grandson was married at this place where we stayed shortly thereafter.

Here are some photos:

our rooms

dinner outside

the mosquitos were pesky, so they moved us indoors

walking back to our rooms after dinner

Turns out my son's new wand from Harry Potter in Leavesden works well at castles.

black swan by the moat

Upon entering the town of St Andre de Cubzac is this statue of a leaping dolphin holding Jacques Cousteau's red watch cap:

I'll post a few pictures from Versailles and Bordeaux before moving on to Denmark, where we spent most of our time.  Also, a few shopping/OOTD posts.  Have been doing quite a bit of shopping with all these sales.

xoxo