This time I mixed my work trip to France with a little extra and treated myself to the small gift that I missed because of that storm Doris which stuck me to Amsterdam airport in February. I had to attend a seminar in La Roche sur Yon and before planning my trip I just in case checked the possible flights from Nantes to Dublin. I was lucky to find that exactly on my departure day there were also straight flights to Dublin – wow that was a sign, so I booked a flight, took a week off and here I am – just on St Partick’s Day.

As I didn’t come so early to see the St Partick’s Day parade, I just left that for some other better time and didn’t think about it. Of course, one day I would like to be here at the right time to see the parade but I would prefer to get a sunny day for that. This year’s St Partick’s Day was rainy, grey and didn’t feel like a day that you would like to spend outdoors, so I was happy to get a bus and get straight to home where for my big surprise I found exactly the same St Valentine’s Days decorations waiting for me with 2 cards for both Days 🙂

What about France? France was really wonderful – sunny, warm, and full of nice friendly people, delicious dinners, picturesque sights and of course the seminar that was the main reason for my trip. We spent 3 days with nice colleagues from different countries of Europe and enjoyed the kindly welcome of our French partner school. Our 4 students started to work at their placement restaurants, our cooking teacher started her practice at the school restaurant and I signed the contract for future partnership with the other schools. But the best part was the feeling that my trip to Dublin was ahead and you were waiting for me there and we can celebrate our birthdays together.