Provence Blog by ProvenceBeyond

Dauphine Libere Criterium info needed

Beyond blog reader "Travel Hunter" has asked:

The Dauphine' Libere Criterium for 2006 starts June 4, 2006. Anyone know the stage dates and the start/finish towns? I am looking for stages to watch, particularly Mont Ventoux if it is in this year's race.

If anyone has any info about this could you please comment this post or email me. Thanks

Summer Day-Care in Provence?

I am planning to bring my 7-yr-old daughter to Provence this summer (mid-June - mid-July). I am trying to find day camps to enroll her in so she can meet and play with other children. We have not yet picked our base village so we're still very open to locations (altho we're more interested in Provence than Cote d'Azur). She loves horseback riding, sports, arts and crafts - typical kid stuff. I am not having much luck finding resources online or in guide books I've perused. Can you make any recommendations?

Thanks!
Gin Wallace

Boxing Bicycles for Train

Hi there!
I am organizing a bike trip for September 2006 for 10 people.  We will be coming from Canada, each with our own bike.  Upon arrival into France (probably Paris), we will be renting a couple of vans and heading south to Provence.  I would like to arrange for us to fly back to Paris from somewhere in the south, say Marseille, or even Lyons, to avoid the long drive back.  My question is, are there any bike shops that will box up a bike?  My experience is that most airlines cannot be relied on to provide bike boxes at the airport, much less for 10 people.  Here in Canada, with prearrangement, bike shops will provide a box and box up one's bike for travel.  Do you know if such a service exists in France?  I have not been able to find anything on the net about this.  Any info you could provide me would be great!
Thanks!
Betsy

Pierrefeux Vieux Village

[Stephanie sent this as an email to Beyond, 18 Sept 05]
My name is Stephanie and I used to attend Summer camp in Pierrefeu Vieux Village. I am amazed at how the village looks today. It seems updated yet it has kept the beautiful "old world" quality that it had back in the early Eighties.
I would love to contact anyone from those days- Gianni, Elizabeth, Anne, Michael, or any of the past students of Langues Vivantes et Adventures.   Anyone out there?

[Russ]

Do you like 2-window Beyond?

Beyond is designed so that, while you're browsing any Beyond information page, when you click on a map, it opens in a 2nd Map-Window, allowing you to look at the map while you have the original window open beside it. If, from the map, you click on an information point (a village name, for example), it opens the village page in a separate Beyond-Window, still allowing you to have the Map-Window and the Beyond-Window open at the same time.

It seem that now many browsers (especially Explorer on Windows) has one window open and filling the screen, and any 2nd window gets hidden completely behind the 1st window. And this can be confusing for the reader. In Firefox, if you're on an information page (Beyond-Window) and you click on a map, if the Map-Window is already open but behind the info-page, the Map-Window stays hidden behind the current page.

What I want to know is: do any of you (our readers) use, or like, our 2-window design? Are any of you confused by the 2-window design (having the info-window hidden when you click on a map)?

If  we don't  get a clear response saying the 2-window design is useful, we'll be changing Beyond over to a single-window design.

Thanks for your help,
Russ - Beyond

French Lessons Needed

A Beyond reader asked us:
   "We are a family of 4 staying in the Cap d'Antibes from August 6-27.  I was wondering if you knew of someone that could come to the home that we rented and give us french lessons 3-4 times a week.  We are all at very different levels of french and would probably need one-on-one."

If you know of any solutions, would you please email us at Beyond (provence@provencebeyond.com).

Thanks,
Russ - Beyond