Every year we decide to make resolutions, but we do not respect them necessarily because a part of us, living being, doesn’t find the strength to hold them up to the end. With the aim of avoiding taking a no respect resolution, I decided to release the pressure and to travel. I don’t speak of going round the world, even if it is my biggest dream. But simply to leave as soon as I have the opportunity of it, the small weekend a month, in a place where I was never or where I like quite particularly.
For this 2018’s resolution, I was able to make my first small weekend for Étretat, in the North from Havre to Normandy. I wanted to take a good breath of air, to feel the sea air and the wind which bangs cheeks. This fishermen’s town is on the coast of Manche and gives a majestic view with its cliffs of white chalk and the small pebbles, on along the beach.
Living in Brussels, I realized that sometimes, we need to empty the spirit and that the best solution is to leave. When I was small, my parents wanted to leave Belgium. Thus we had visited houses in Normandy, and I had a vague memory of childhood of Étretat. I had so felt need to return to it and to take advantage of this sea air.
Once arrived, I remembered that no matter the geolocation, the outside time, the period of the year, the sea always stayed my favorite destination. Étretat is for me a city of legend in which we are out of breath by these cliffs and these arcs. But it is at the top of the arc, in the middle of the sea, in the face of England that we realize that we are small beings in the face of the beauty of the nature. In spite of the wet cold which is felt and this strong wintry light, my only desire was to remain seated of the hours on pebbles or at the top of the cliff to listen to the noise of waves in low waters, under the attentive eye of gulls. This sound such a soft melancholy made me dream about my new adventures. I was proud to have taken this resolution and I shall hold her up to the end of my days.
“The sea is a rigorous space and of freedom” – Victor Hugo
Still having some time in front of me during my weekend, I took the car on Sundays at about 2 pm to go on “Les Planches”, to Deauville. I wanted to rediscover her history and have a walk on this mythical beach of the XXth century which had an important role during the Second World War. By walking on the fine sand, we felt a kind of melancholy in spite of the period of very quiet winter.
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