Epic France Trip – Abbaye de Royaumont – Day 9

My Epic France Trip is winding down, but today turned out to be special.

It was a travel day. But then when I was looking at details, I realized that my two hotels were only an hour and a half apart, and the second hotel had a check-in time of 5:00 pm. What would I do all day?

And then I noticed that the Abbaye de Royaumont was right on the route between the two hotels!

Why was I excited about that? Well, that’s a story.

In 1998, I was living in Germany with my family, and I got to attend a retreat held by the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators at the Abbaye de Royaumont, outside Paris. I wrote about how important that retreat was in a Project 52 post. I made lifelong writing buddies and dear friends at that retreat. We formed an email critique group and corresponded regularly ever since.

In 2005, SCBWI was holding another conference there. And we got the group together! In fact, the four of us Sisters of Royaumont spent time in Paris together before and after the conference. But even more significant was that this Paris trip happened the week after my husband told me he wanted a divorce. And the morning after that happened, I decided I would pursue my Master’s in Library Science and become a librarian. (As well as still hoping to write.)

So that second trip to Abbaye de Royaumont happened at a terrible time in my life – but ended up full of hope and joy. My friends fattened me up, listened to my woes, made me laugh, and above all filled me with hope.

Last night I was working on the #Sonderbooks25 post about 2005, so I read all the Project 52 posts about 2005, including the one about Royaumont. Honestly, I’d nearly forgotten how utterly heartbroken and bewildered I was feeling at that time. But I hadn’t forgotten how much the Sisters of Royaumont sustained me!

I hadn’t forgotten my determination to become a librarian and to become a writer.

So it felt good to come back to Royaumont and say aloud to my past self, “Yeah, Sondy, that worked out!”

Becoming a librarian turned into being on the Newbery Committee, winning the Allie Beth Martin Award from the Public Library Association, serving on several more award committees, and above all getting a job I love as Youth Materials Selector for my public library system.

And writing? At this very moment, I have an agent, and she has sent my book proposal to one editor at a major publishing company and my full manuscript to another! (Not to mention 25 years of writing Sonderbooks!)

So it felt good to roam the Abbaye and just mark this full circle moment.

It was, however, much nicer weather when I was there in April and November! Today was HOT – high of 104 degrees.

It was pretty cool in the abbey, so I lingered maybe longer than I would have otherwise. And tried to stay in the shade.

I did load up in the gift shop, and couldn’t resist a puzzle of the cloister garden, even though it will mean I have to expand my suitcase. (But that sort of thing is precisely why I brought an expandable suitcase.) Unfortunately, the Tea Salon was booked with a group, so I settled for a Kind bar and water in the car. And soon after made a stop in a small town for an ice cream and a coke.

Next, I’d planned to do some hiking in a forest nearby. That didn’t sound fun on such a hot day, so I found a Creperie in the same area. But alas! When I put it into GPS, the machine consistently tried to make me go down a dirt road that led into a forest. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to turn around – it looked like a bridle trail. So I decided to go ahead and go to my next hotel early. It was actually a B&B, and they did let me in early.

By then I was pretty tired of narrow 30 kph roads – I’m not so proficient with stick shift that those don’t stress me out a little. But I decided that since going out to eat in France is always a good idea, I’d go to a different Creperie in the town of Chantilly recommended by the B&B. I had a delicious salad with smoked salmon and apples, followed by crepes with bananas, chocolate syrup, and ice cream. Delicious!

The B&B is not air-conditioned, alas, but it’s a downstairs room, and it is cooler than outside, so I’m hoping I’ll be able to sleep.

Oh, and the sunburn on my feet is still viciously bad, but the pain subsided somewhere in the middle of the day. I don’t think it’s actually turned the corner yet, and it’s still blistered, but walking around didn’t hurt as much as first getting out of bed in the morning had done.