Let's see since my last entry I have....
*Traveled to Normandy/Bretagne for a week with my friend Alla
The trip was a roller coaster or wonderful experiences/adventures, combined with freak out moments, such as missing out 6:30 am train to Nantes by literally 30 SECONDS, or on the final night when we were heading towards an unknown city, not sure where we would be sleeping...
We started off my traversing the entire country to Nantes. We spent the afternoon in Nantes & had a lovely picnic in a park.
What could be better than bread & cheese in the park?
That afternoon we headed to St. Nazaire, an industrial city in Bretagne. The city itself wouldn't have been that exciting, but we stayed with a great couchsurfer named Julie who took us all around and showed us where german submarines landed during WW2, as well as showing us some beautiful beaches and a cool medieval walled in city in the surrounding area. Without Julie, it would've been a really dull place, but it really helps to get to know some locals :)
The next day we headed off for Le Croisic, a small fishing town near St. Nazaire. We figured that we would just spend the morning there & then move on, but (albeit partially due to the train schedule) we ended up staying the whole day because we just completely fell in love with the place. Alla & rented bikes for the day, and with our huge bags strapped to our backs, we rode around the whole peninsula. It was so warm that Alla changed into shorts, I wasn't feeling quite the gutsy, but it was a nice change from Strasbourg's cold/windy ickiness. We also sampled some local cuisine (crepes!), since Bretagne is their place of origin after all.
Paradise
That night we headed for Rennes, where we couchsurfed again with this great couple. They reminded Alla & I of Portlanders a lot, which made us feel right at home :) The next day we headed off for Le Mont St. Michel. We took a (extremely touristy) bus from Rennes to Le M S M, along with a ton of other tourists. It was interesting to hear all the different languages on the bus- french, Japanese, English, German, quite the melange. Le M S M was without a doubt extraordinarily beautiful, even despite the strong presence of tourism. We explored the whole castle/Abby/surrounding area. Several flocks of sheep graze near the area. I learned that the grass there is naturally salted from the ocean water, so the sheep become naturally salted by eating this grass. Supposedly they're a delicacy of the area, but I opted not to try any - they were just too darn cute! From there, Alla & decided to walk the 9 km to where we needed to take the bus - it was without a doubt far, but all in all a great walk through the french country side.
Sheeeeep!
That night we stayed in St. Malo a gorgeous seaside walled in village west of Le M S M. The city really charmed us, we took long walks on the beach, made a delicious dinner at our youth hostel, chatted up some of the other travelers and just explored the city in all of its medieval glory.
Problems arose when we realized that as charming as St. Malo is, it is incredibly hard to leave it because its just not very well connected to the rest of the railways. In fact, this was our major discovery of the trip. It was entirely a result of poor planning, but we realized at the last second that the trains in NW France are not well connected AT ALL. Argh. In the end, everything worked out fine. We just ended up having to do a lot of backtracking, so it took a long time to get where we wanted to go. On the plus side, we did back track to Paris where we had a 1.5 hour layover, which was just enough time to take the metro to the Eiffel Tour, take a picture in front of it, before sprinting back to the train station.
At this point in the trip Alla & I had tentatively planned on going to Etretat, the famous cliffs in Normandy that numerous Impressionists (like Monet) painted. However, we had been so rushed when we were planning the trip we hadn't worked out the detail of where we would be staying, and when we were at our youth hostel in St. Malo we had still not planned this crucial detail out. We were pressed for time because we had to catch our train, so we we ended up sending out 7 frantic couchsurfing requests 8 hours before we would be arriving in Le Havre (the city closest to Etretat). Generally with couchsurfing, you're supposed to give people a few days heads up, but we really had no other choice, because much to our dismay we had discovered that Le Havre doesn't have any youth hostels - even though we had been told otherwise. So in sum - we were taking a huge risk. We asked for anyone who could host us to send us a text letting us know (since we would be on the train & would have no Internet access), and maybe its because we're two pretty girls, but 5 out of those 7 people responded within 3 hours!! It was just incredible. I really don't know what we would've done if nobody responded.People are so generous in France! Needless to say, I have learned by lesson about the "oh, I'm sure it'll all work out fine" attitude when traveling.
The next day Alla & I headed off for Etretat for what was probably one of the best days of my life. Now I've been to some pretty breath takingly beautiful places in my life - the grand canyon, New Zealand, etc. but Etretat is definitely in the top 2! I thought it would be one cliff, that was medium sized, but the cliffs are huge & they just keep going on forever! Alla and I took a ton of pictures & hiked up to the top of the cliffs, where we got some pretty fantastic views. No wonder this place inspired so many french impressionists. Well I'll let these pictures speak for themselves...
*The day after returning from our trip, we were fortunate enough to have the opportunity to hear President Obama speak in Strasbourg! He spoke in an auditorium of 3000 people, mostly comprised of French, American & German students. The security was really tight - no purses & a limit on the amount of metal "things" you could have on your body. Despite the craziness, I really enjoyed his speech & I thought it was especially cool that he took questions straight from the audience. Yeah Obama!
Ah, the power of zoom.
The next day (which was a Saturday), I decided to get my Village Project out of the way. Village Project is an assignment I have for my French Civilisation class where we have to pick a village in Alsace & travel there to study some aspect of the culture, language, commerce, etc. The main point of the assignment is to get us talking to locals & establishing personal contacts. I decided that I needed to be original (numerous students have done their projects in the past on cheese or wine, because they're pretty easy, blasé topics), but of course I had to be different. I decided that I wanted to do something involving yarn/organic agriculture. So after much google searching I found a family in the small village of Linthal in southern Alsace who own a farm & raise Alpaca sheep & make their own yarn. I sent them a handwritten letter in the mail (because I couldn't find an email address, and I wasn't brave enough to call), and much to my surprise they responded instantly through email. I arranged to meet them at the nearest train station, since the only way to get to Linthal is really by car.
I was a little bit worried that it would be awkward/weird situation, but as it turned out I had a lot of fun & they were unbelievably generous with me. The first night there I had dinner with the whole family & they gave me a room all to myself. I was expecting the next morning to get a tour of the town & then be out the door by early afternoon, but instead I had a leisurely morning. They told me to just "go for a walk and relax until lunch." So I did! At lunchtime their older son came over with his girlfriend & we had a nice meal together. Then eventually mid afternoon they showed me the animals & their workshop for making yarn. It was super interesting to see the entire process & all the various machines involved. I think they were amused that I was so interested in something that for them is so ordinary. Even after my tour, I still stuck around for awhile because they wanted to go on a mid afternoon walk & then they wanted to introduce me to a fellow merchant friend of theirs who owns a vineyard. Well, twist my arm, I guess I can stay longer to drink amazing Alsatian wine with you :) So, all in all it was a positive experience & I now have plenty to talk about in my report/presentation.
The following weekend was the PARIS trip! The program has several organized excursions, and the Paris trip was our final one. Not only did I get to go to Paris though, I got to go on my 21st Birthday! We of course saw all the major sites...Eiffel Tour, Arc de Triumph, The Louvre, Le Musée d'Orsay, the Paris Opera house, the Moulin Rouge, Notre Dame, Sacre Coeur, etc.
The three highlights for me were:
1. My amazing birthday dinner- We went out for Indian food & although I love french food, I must admit it is way to bland for me, so I was very pleased to be eating flavorful food on my b-day. The food wasn't spicy in the hot sense, but in the flavorful sense. What really enhanced the experience however was at a table of 7 wine drinkers, we were served 6 bottles of wine - yes, that's right, almost a bottle per person. All of which were paid for by the program. Needless to say, going out for birthday drinks wasn't really necessary because we had all had enough by that point :) Beth (my program leader) also surprised me with a delicious birthday cake. In fact, t was also Kendra's birthday, so there were actually 2 birthday cakes to share. Admittedly, it was a little anti climatic to turn 21 in France where the drinking age is so young, but my friend's did their best to make it a special day for me :)
2. Notre Dame, Easter Sunday service - The morning after my birthday, those of us who were interested got up from 9 am easter service at the Notre Dame Cathedral. The Notre Dame is, of course, breath takingly beautiful, but I must say that the service felt more like a spectacle than a religious celebration. First of all the place was packed- we actually had to be ushered in, in order to find a place to stand. Then during the ceremony, the building stayed open to people who just wanted to see the church, not the service, so the entire time there were people circling around the whole building with the flashes from their cameras going non-stop. The speakers/priest were also being broadcast on tv screens throughout the church. However, it was cool to see all the traditional catholic practices like sprinkling people with holy water. I also really enjoyed the Gregorian Chant music - so beautiful!
3. The art- I've taken Art History the last three semesters, so it was really cool to finally see some of the art I've been studying for so long up close & personal. The Louvre was amazing, but I didn't like the way it was organized, it was too cluttered. I much prefer the Musée d'Orsay, which is part of an old train station & houses the works of some of my favorite artists, like Monet, Manet, Renoir, etc.
The final highlight of the past month was that my Mom & Matt came & visited last week. I only got to see them for about 4 days, and I had class during some of the time, but it was so great to see them. I enjoyed showing off my city/my french to them. We even all managed to have dinner with my host mom, who doesn't really speak English, but can understand the basics. I was sad to see them go, because well the whole trip made me a wee bit homesick, but I only have about a month left of classes, which both thrills & frightens me...
AHH we were in NANTES and LE CROISIC except we thought it was tres boring... love you!
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