France Trivia Advent Calendar day twenty-two, Gustave Eiffel

Advent Day 23, Biere Brune and Côtes de Thau rosé

Advent day twenty-two, Tuesday 22^nd December 2020

I may not have got my solstice sunrise yesterday, but today, the first day of lengthening daylight hours, I did, and as a bonus the sun was streaming into my yoga nook during this morning’s class. I can’t tell you how much better I felt for this.

 

The weather stayed favourable, so this afternoon we set off on bike ride searching for open skies and covered picnic tables. We are still hoping for a Christmas Day ride with picnic, but the forecast isn’t looking as good as the weather we had last year. It could be that wind will be more of an issue than rain, so somewhere sheltered to open the hamper would be nice. Our thirty-five kilometres this afternoon was a great way of blowing the cobwebs away and left me feeling full of life, even if we failed in our quest for covered tables.

 

Tonight will be Ed’s last night here for a while, as tomorrow he is off to Pearl’s family for Christmas. As a break in the routine, I have cast aside our Tuesday norm of lasagne and replaced it with our family celebration meal of choice, homemade meatballs in a spicy tomato sauce. To add to the celebratory mood, we will also be opening our family Christmas gifts this evening.

The Eiffel bridge in Voulon

 

France Trivia advent calendar, day twenty-two, Gustave Eiffel (1832-1923)

One of the world's leading specialists in the field of metal construction, Gustave Eiffel left his legacy all over France, and not just in the form of the tower in Paris named after him. We have often come across bridges and viaducts designed by him as we’ve toured France by car and bike, including the rather small and seemingly unloved one in Voulon near Poitiers. We think this is our closest Eiffel construction, but happy to be corrected on this. 

The Eiffel Tower, or la dame de fer, (the iron lady), was built for the Paris exhibition in 1889 and despite her many early critics, she became an official historical monument in 1964. Gustave also developed the framework for another impressive dame, the Statue of Liberty.