A Cold Day for a Christmas Market...

Bl**dy freezing actually! And it seemed just as cold inside the building as outside (until I actually went outside later - and then I scuttled quickly back inside!).

When I got up this morning it was still dark - I hate that! But it did mean I caught some spectacular photos of the frosty morning as the sun rose.
The market had lots of exhibitors - both inside the hall and outside, despite the bitter weather and, as for visitors, they came in their droves! Especially in the afternoon it was as if they were arriving on coaches - 50 at a time - and they hall was so packed they actually didn't have a chance to look at the stalls really. It didn't look as if they were buying much, other than food (which is the norm) although Sandra and Jamie sold lots of fingerless gloves (I wonder why?) and (strangely enough) little bracelets (the French do seem to love jewellery).
There were stalls selling patchwork goodies, toys, wine, oysters, chocolates, jewellery, knitted items, stained glass, miscellaneous gifty stuff, cushions, Christmas decorations, cotton heart garlands, tiny fairies made from acorns, cards, pictures - you name it - it was probably there, but I think a lot of it went home with the exhibitors too!
Shortly after the opening the town band came in to play some jolly music - though I was surprised that none of it was Christmassy!
I was happy that I covered my stand costs and made a little bit extra and it WAS an education being next to an obese, rude, badly-dressed Frenchman with the loudest voice ever, selling escargots! The snails were in shells made of something like ice cream wafers, topped with garlic butter, so you could eat the whole thing. He microwaved samples at regular intervals so we had the smell of garlic from 9 am to 6pm. I think you can imagine what that was like. He had also positioned a large table behind the stand, expressly for the purpose of displaying his A-board, which meant we could not get in or out of our stand without having to squeeze (and I mean s-q-u-e-e-z-e) past him. Obviously it was the only way he could get another (?) human being to press themself against him - and who could be surprised - with all that garlic!