August has arrived — and if you’re reading this from the USA, you’re probably gearing up for back-to-school season. Meanwhile, we are smack in the middle of France’s nationwide summer vacation. And we mean nationwide.
Where Did Everyone Go?
Paris empties out in August. Parisians flood the coast and the countryside, and the city exhales. Small restaurants and family-run shops across the country lock their doors, taping hand-written signs to the glass announcing their departure date and the day they’ll be back. Our own architect sent us a cheerful note at the end of July: don’t expect to hear from him until September.
Even the boulangeries play it smart — neighborhood bakeries coordinate their vacation schedules to guarantee that fresh bread stays available through the exodus. Crisis averted.
The Peak of French Slow-Living
This collective pause lands at exactly the right moment. The days are warm, long, and unhurried. Sunlight stretches toward bedtime. Pools, parks, and beaches fill up. The smell of barbecue drifts through the air, and outdoor dining spills into streets, squares, and vineyards across the country.
An August evening soirée in the vineyard of a nearby Château — this is what the season is made for.
This is French slow-living at its peak. And it is glorious.
Plan to Get Nothing Done — Seriously
So why are we telling you all this? Because this summer escape touches nearly every corner of French life, and if you’re new here, you need to be ready for it.
Visa issues, immigration paperwork, non-urgent medical appointments, language classes, banking questions, tax matters, legal consultations — almost everything slows to a crawl.
Our advice: plan to accomplish nothing in August. NOTHING.
When we first arrived from the USA mid-summer, this was genuinely hard to wrap our heads around. Back home, businesses stagger vacations to minimize disruption to consumers and the bottom line. The whole system felt inconvenient to me, the consumer. Jason’s visa renews every summer, and that first year we spent weeks anxiously checking the mailbox and refreshing our inbox.
The French Do Everything Together
A few summers in, we finally get it. Like French Sundays, like the sacred two-hour lunch, the French do things together, all at once. And it turns out, that’s kind of brilliant.
It creates a shared rhythm that makes spending time with the people you love feel natural and easy — something that always seems nearly impossible to coordinate back in the States.
Our Advice: Lean Into It
Embrace August as part of your new world. Plan for the pause. Use it.
Over the next two weeks — with family visits wrapped up — we’ll do some annual planning, hit the pool, maybe the lake, and catch the last of the summer night markets with friends. We won’t stress about Jason’s visa. It’ll get there when it gets there.
Baguettes and Butter 4ever, ❤️ Raina
