Snapshot Saturday: ending where I began

This is the last Snapshot Saturday.  WordPress has decided to discontinue its weekly photographic challenges.  I’m a bit sad about this.  It’s been fun tussling with choosing images for each week’s idea, and through it, I’ve ‘met’ fellow-bloggers and made virtual visits to all parts of the globe.

This week, we’ve been invited to bow out by posting our all-time favourite shots.  That’s far too difficult.  Instead, I’m taking you to the Ariège in France, where my blogging journey began when we lived there for some years, and offering you some favourite shots from there.

 

One super-dramatic sunset at Laroque d’Olmes.
Views from le Cap du Carmil in June. Still snowy on the peaks.
The summer solstice at Montségur.
A less snowy day near Foix.
Tabariane, near Mirepoix.
The Pyrenees viewed from Saint Julien de Gras-Capou.
Le lac de Montbel, our nearby water playground.
Another view from le Cap du Carmil.
The best of times. Picnicking at lunchtime on our regular Sunday walks. Shared food, shared wine, shared landscapes.
Snowy days near Montferrier.
Springtime in the Dolomies, near Foix.
Montségur one snowy March day.
Another much missed treat. Shared meals in the sunshine, with old friends and new. This is in Mirepoix.
Montségur, our nearby landmark and Cathar stronghold, one misty morning in July.
Walking in the Aude, there were vineyards, always vineyards.
Just outside Laroque d’Olmes, our home town.

Click on any image to view full size.

Author: margaret21

I'm retired and living in North Yorkshire, where I walk as often as I can, write, volunteer, and travel as often as I can.

35 thoughts on “Snapshot Saturday: ending where I began”

  1. Beautiful shots one and all. They say so much about the area and your time here. We are currently in Laroque, but unfortunately setting off for home soon. I am looking from our lounge window at the Pyrenees, a view I can never tire of, but have yet to discover all the locations in your pictures, guess we’ll just have to keep coming back…

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  3. Oh definitely! We hope to make a brief visit in September, incorporating it with other French visits and a trip to Barcelona to see Emily. Is your daughter still near Toulouse? And Lydia will have graduated by now, non?

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  5. ….and that is where we first met… beautiful. I, too, will miss the Weekly Photo Challenge. I always love seeing your photos and reading of your exploits – photo challenge or not.

    I’ve been overloaded the last several weeks and I’ve virtually disappeared from the blogosphere. I was looking forward to the weekly challenge to help me re-boot this summer. So, I’ll have to engage myself some other way on the blog. I did receive the book, Where the Poppies Blow and am looking forward to reading it. Have a wonderful weekend, one more day and summer break begins. Peace.

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    1. Clay, I’ve missed you. Sorry you’ve been overwhelmed, but the summer break is on its way. Not that you’ll do nothing …. I really hope you enjoy ‘Where Poppies Blow’. Now ….. relax.

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    2. @Clay – Just today I’ve been searching high and low for you – missed you too. But any silence, even prolonged, is understandable. Blogging is NOT life, it’s a wonderful pass-time and a means of finding/establishing/exchanging new/with friends. Most of them we meet online and hardly ever shall we meet one in person.
      All the very best to you – don’t get overworked. You only live once, 007’s statement is a lie! 🙂

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  6. Lovely photos and memories there Margaret. It is indeed a great shame the Weekly Photo Challenge is ending. I’ve discovered many interesting blogs via follows and likes from the challenge.

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  8. Margaret; I don’t know how many times I’ve opened your blog, meaning to really, truly read it and then to comment. It didn’t happen. But now I make an effort and shall do some surfing on the wave of your wonderfully documented life here and there.
    This collection of magnificent moments makes one understand why people flock to live in France. It is sad really that my experiences were so rudely thrown over since the time we live nr Paris. I am not complaining, it’s just that I liked France better when I was ‘only’ visiting, travelling, and only spent time in places like the ones you remember so fondly – many of the above I know personally and I loved them too. But it’s not in Mirepoix and Foix where HH’s skills were needed. And now we shall eventually return to our native Switzerland.
    WP is NOT much liked these times. I read about upset people everywhere (and rightly so). In a way I’m glad not to have my blog and ‘only’ commenting on some few I like. ‘My’ Flickr thingie with some amazing photographers on it also has been sold off to a ridiculously named company and I just wait how bad things are getting before they shut it down too…..
    Now I’ll need to get my wind-blown and naturally dried washing in and with a glass of wine and some French cheese I then shall continue to visit you, dear friend, never seen and yet ‘well known’.

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    1. Thank you. Your visits, comments and interest are part of what makes blogging so worthwhile for me. I hardly know Switzerland: perhaps a visit is due to make a new chapter in my blogging experiences. But I really appreciate the interest you have taken in my blog, and, I note, in others among my own blogging ‘friends’. I hope that wine and cheese were good!

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  9. I shall miss your Saturday posts Margaret. These pictures are terrific and remind me of a lovely holiday in the area. xxx

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    1. I’m going to try to replace the challenge: there are others about, and it was fun. Missing the Pyrenees having dug out all these photos ……

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  10. Pingback: All Time Favs – Le Plat Pays | What's (in) the Picture?

  11. Oh, these are great! I wasn’t following your blog when you lived in France so I haven’t seen most of these photos before–what a beautiful region!

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  12. I’m popping over from Making the Days Count, because I liked your comment there. LOVELY photos. I didn’t know they were doing Snapshot Saturdays, and am sad that they’re stopping that too. I used to do the Photo Challenges, sounds quiet similar to Snapshot Saturdays. I will miss it all. I wonder why they are dropping so many things that people love?

    Anyway, your photos are wonderful and certainly more than ‘snapshots!”

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    1. Yes, my Snapshot Saturday is what I call their Photo Challenge. Such a shame they’re stopping it. Thanks for popping over to see me!

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  14. I love the photos of shared food especially the long table shot. Whenever I see such photos of France, Italy or Spain I wonder why our street parties are invariably lesser affairs. I think probably tea and cake in an Open for Charity Garden is out best shot at outside eating.

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    1. Yes, you’re right. All those cakes from The Good Ladies of the Parish are excuses to forget any diet. But there still isn’t that element of sharing, and making new friendships which are such a feature of continental community meals. I really miss them.

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      1. Last Sunday we did have a ‘Big Lunch’ here in our street, Tim Smit’s idea to get to know your neighbours over shared food. As a newbie to the road I went along in the hope it would be more like those continental community meals, but despite the weather actually being great, and a few very sociable people making a big effort, it turned out to be the usual restrained English affair. And, I noticed that none of my immediate neighbours bothered to turn up and join in.

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  15. Hi Margaret my favourite of your Ariege favourites is the super-dramatic sunset at Laroque d’Olmes. Indeed a sad day tegarding the challenge and I hope you find alternatives to rebooting.

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  17. I have read quite a few disgruntled comments about WP and their doings! The challenges were good fun and an incentive to post for many.
    Your selection of photos are wonderful and I can see why you decided to live there and why the area still tugs at your heart-strings.

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  18. Lovely photos Margaret. I really enjoyed your retrospective. I am trying to pretend that I won’t miss the WPC, but your selection of photos make it clear that I will!

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