Weekend in Lourdes!

Why do I keep getting the back seat!
The amazing church along the river.
This church was built completely underground and constructed to appear as if it was the bottom of a boat. Mass is held in four languages and the seating can hold 25,000 people.
This is the famous sight of the appearance of the Virgin Mary.

Drinking from the famous healing springs of the cave located below the Virgin Mary sighting. Speaking of sightings, I feel for the sighting the young boy behind me got after getting his drink of water. Luckily, he was able to wash his eyes with the healing water and was saved from going blind.

This past weekend, Mr. Feral invited us roomies to Lourdes to visit his hometown and his family. Emanuel and I made the journey by car to Lourdes and Mr. Feral was our personal chaffeur within the small city. Lourdes is an amazing place steeped in Christian history. The city was made famous by the sighting of an apparition of the Virgin Mary to a peasant girl named Bernadette in a cave 150 years ago. The city is celebrating the sighting anniversary for the entire year with special events. This week was the festival of music with famous orchestra's from around France performing nightly. We received special invitation passes and were able to attend a classical concert in one of the famous churches by the Orchestra Champagne-Ardennes. The event was incredible and the sounds that adorned my ears for the first time in my life were amazing. Latin was the language of the classical vocalists and the orchestra consited of 30 or more players. Superb! It lasted until almost 12:30 that night. No story of mine would be complete without passing my compliments to Mrs. Feral, the chef for our weekend, who adorned her table with Spanish specialities from her native Spain. Menu highlights included duck leg confit, champignons de paris, etoki cheese from the Basque region of Spain, saucisson, and dessert pastries from a local patisserie! Even Mr. Feral chipped in a couple..........I mean four bottles of Spanish wine from his personal cellar under the house for our meals.