My friend, Said, lived in Le Mans for many many years! So the first thing he did on my first full day here is to give me a grand tour of Le Mans and surroundings. As in my other cities, there is a nice mix of old and new. What I gathered from my friend’s comments is that Le Mans has grown rapidly in the last few years due to its proximity to Paris and reasonable real estate market. Le Mans is connected to Paris by fast trains (TGV) and other slower one and off a good highway system. In some way it is like northern New Jersey and New York. So people work in Paris and live in Le Mans! They have a big university and other technical schools, plus the famous Formula One race track…
In addition to my friend Said and his wife, who i knew from my early college years, another high school friend, Ramdane, who lives two hours away from Le Mans, drove into town and joined me there. So all in all it was a mini reunion in Le Mans!!! This is exactly what I envisioned for this trip.. an out of the box, unpredictable destinations and reunions!!! Here are some pics from Le Mans!!