Goodbye Friends, Hello Bed

Day 29, June 26th: Today we woke up at the crack of dawn to send off our new found group of friends on their trip home. Lots of hugs were exchanged and it was sad to see such great people leave. It's seemed like the week flew by in a mere number of seconds. Now its just the two of us again, but luckily we're best friends so nothing can ever be too gloomy. To restart our duo trip, our first order of business was more sleep! We slept for a long time then enjoyed a delicious breakfast at the classy 4 star hotel. It was fun to hear all the Australian accents, which makes sense since the hotel is right next door to the Australian embassy. We took a Taxi back home and enjoyed ourselves with a nice chill day to catch up on sleep after many early mornings and late nights and just relax.

A day to remember

Day 28, June 25th: Today we went to Normandy! We stopped for fifteen minutes at the German cemetery, then to Omaha beach where the American forces arrived on D-Day for WWII. After, we drove to the American Cemetery. The sight of it all was extremely impactful and awe-inspiring. Seeing it in person really hits home just how many lives were lost and puts all the things you learn in history class into perspective and it suddenly all becomes more human and real. We spent a good amount of time wandering there. We stopped for lunch in a small town along the coast. A big group of us sat outside at a café. Ali got a free meal because in the time it took for everyone else's meals to arrive and be eaten, she still had not received her dish. Quite frustrating. It had been nearly forty minutes of waiting and we only had an hour for lunch because we had to be back on the tour bus to take us to see a memorial film. So Ali ended up with a free meal to-go! We drove down the road a bit to see a film documenting the events of D-Day using actual real footage from the time at a 360 degree cinema. A great way to end such an impactful day in Normandy. We then proceeded to drive back to Paris. Our hotel this night was right next to the Eiffel Tower! We dropped our bags off and raced to dinner where we had a starter of ravioli, main dish of beef and mashed potatoes, and a molten caramel cake with vanilla ice cream for dessert. Yum! Directly from dinner, we walked to the Seine where we boarded our river cruise. The nighttime boatride along the Seine was truly magical and a great way to wrap up the school trip! There was definitely some sadness felt as this was our last night of fun with all our schoolmates. The school trip was an amazing experience and it was great meeting new people and getting to know some great friends.

German Cemetary

Omaha Beach

American Cemetery

American cemetery

Caramel Cake

Boat Tour

Boat Tour

Boat Tour

St.Michel&Malo

Day 27, June 24th: Being out in the countryside is much more pleasant because we can do one main or two main things with a bus ride to take us around instead of running to twenty different places in Paris. Alors, today we took a 5 hour bus ride to Mont St. Michel. The bus ride seems like nothing though after the 13 hour plane ride. It was a nice time to catch up on journaling, nap, and enjoy watching Mlle Downs serenade Madame Boaz. Maddie also did a shout out to the bus driver, having them play 500 miles by The Proclaimers which is probably equal to how many miles he's driven us around. At Mont St. Michel we adored the glorious Abbey. It is truly a miraculous gem of architecture making up its own little hill village. We made our way up the many many many many stair cases. The Abbey is something of beauty with all the beautiful windows showing the beach. The tide was out today so you could see lots of people trekking through the quick sand, calves deep in mud. We opted out of that. We then hopped back onto the bus and went to the adorable city of St. Malo where the streets rang with the beautiful music of street performers. Our Hotel was quaint and comfy with a beautiful overview of the pedestrian streets and beautiful rooftops. We went out to dinner at Le Chateaubriand, a delightful restaurant which was once the house of Chateaubriand. We agreed that having your house turned into a restaurant is a great idea for a famous person after they pass because, in a way, you have people still living there and are happy, not mournful. Anyways the dinner was delectable! We started off with a vegetable platter, we tried to get Patricia to eat her beets but it didn't go down too well. Next we had the most amazing cut of pork which had been cooking for 7 hours and was cut from the bone right in front of our eyes. Maddie, a connoisseur of pork was lucky enough to get seconds. Then, for dessert a huge meringue covered ice-cream cake was delivered with sparklers sticking out of it. Mlle downs enjoyed her cake and the cute waiter who delivered it. Afterwards Patricia Rowen, and us went out and explored the splendid city of St. Malo with its cute nautical shops and amazing crepes. Then the four of us went back to the hotel to enjoy some tea time until we were ready for bed. 

Mont St. Michel

Us on top

Clergy of St. Michel

St. Malo Hotel View

Crazy Good Pork

Ice Cream Cake!

Castles Cubed

Day 26, June 23rd:Today we toured the sparkling Loire Valley and visited two of the many chateaux in this region. First up was Chambord, Francois the First's hunting lodge. We were able to explore a bit more of this chateau than at Versailles, so that was really fun. Also, we got from level to level using the double helix staircase. After exploring to our hearts content, the group met back up with Servane, who had purchased our authentic regional picnic that we were to have for lunch. We sat out in the lawn of Chambord while she explained to us what each item was, from the many cheeses, breads, sausages, pates, fresh fruits, juices, and waters. It was delicious! Everyone was so full after feasting on all the French goodies. We then piled on the bus and began the long bus ride to our next chateau, Chenonceau. We made a stop in Amboise, an adorable town on the way, where we got to wander the streets a bit. Maddie did some shopping and Ali bought an ice cream. Chenonceau was beautiful, of course. We headed straight for the labyrinth, which ended up being kind of tiny, but still fun to run through. Chenonceau housed the mistress and wife of Henry II. This one was really cool because of the Loire River running beneath the castle, and we got to see all the people rafting and kayaking down the river. It was a perfectly beautiful sunny day. We went back to Blois for dinner where we ate at a rather upscale looking restaurant where our appetizer was a tomato filled with salmon cream cheese mixture, main course of chicken, potatoes and vegetables, and an amazing lemon meringue pie for dessert! After eating, we went to the chateau of Blois to watch a lightshow they project on the chateau walls while telling a story. The lights were insanely cool, but the story was entirely in French and we were much too tired at this point to translate much of it. Our French is okay, but not nearly that comprehensive! Another eventful day, and thus headed straight for bed once back at our hotel.

Chambord

Double helix stairs

Chambourd

Picnic with Servane

Amboise

Chenonceau

The Ladies

The Chaperone Ladies

Loire Valley

Amazing Lemon Meringue!

Cookies and Castles!

Day 25, June 22nd: Today we had to leave our amazing hotel bright and early so we could catch Versailles before it got too crowded. We got there and you could immediately see Louis the 13th extravagant taste. Everything is covered in gold leaf. While the Castle was large and extravagant in itself what I believe we both found even more breath taking were the gardens. They're ginormous! We had an hour to explore. For the first half hour we rented a row boat and rowed in the Versailles lake with Rowen and Patricia, how cool is that!? It felt like we were in a Disney movie. Swans on either side, floating water fall at the end, sun in the sky! Amazing! Although we for sure are not the most graceful rowers, and ironically Rowan was probably the least skilled at rowin'. Our half an hour ran up before we knew it so we grabbed some lunch to eat on the go and explored Versailles's mazes worthy of being in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Too soon our time ran out and we had to leave. But, no worries! We still had so much more beauty to see. Next on the list was the Chartres Cathedral. The Cathedral is evidentally surrounded with tons of conspiracy due to it's location, labrynth inside, and a remnant of Virgin Mary's veil. But what we found the most disturbing and alarming was the 264 feet deep well in the crypts where they used to throw people down in the olden days. We were lucky enough to sneak into the all French tour of the Crypts just as it was beginning. Afterwards we explored the adorable city of Chartres. We met up with the Lovely Mrs. Boaz to check out  an absolutely adorable cookie shop and sit down for some tea. Then it was back to the Bus where we made our way to the Loire valley for some dinner and rest. 

Golden!

Hall of Mirrors

Classy Garden

Suspended Waterfall

Row Row Row

Your Boat

Chartres

Cookies!

Tea for our Cookies!

A little bit of that

Day 24, June 21st: This morning, we woke up bright and early to ride an hour on the tour bus to Giverny to visit Monet's house and gardens. It was absolutely beautiful and quite refreshing to get out of the city for the first time in 3 weeks! After we hopped back on the tour bus (so nice to have our transportation already sorted out for us), and went to Montmartre. We climbed all the way up to Sacre Coeur, nearly the same path we had took just a few days earlier on our independent journey there. It was nice hearing Servane's commentary, as she had lived in Montmartre for 7 years. She guided us to the bakery with the best baguette where we bought lunch and ate it in the park housing Le Mur des Je t'aime. Once finished with our Montmartre trek, we hopped on the Metro and booked it to our French cooking lesson we were already late for! We arrived and they already had everything set up for us to dive in and start cooking. They had several different dishes for us to prepare, one of which was chocolate soufflé which we headed directly to. There were also options to make crunchy on the outside melty on the inside camembert, chicken, beef, veal, and potatoes, and chocolate fondue with fruit. It was a nice afternoon of eating fresh made French confections! Then we left and walked all the way to the Eiffel Tower where we had to wait in enormously long lines and go through two security checks. We took the elevator all the way up and enjoyed the crazy view from the top. After, we got to have dinner at the iconic restaurant, Chartier. The inside of this place is like stepping back in time or into a movie. A truly unique dining experience. Maddie ordered the entrecote and then prunes with vanilla ice cream for dessert, while Ali got the steak hache and then a mont blanc with espresso for dessert. We sat with Mademoiselle Downs and our friends Rowan and Patricia, so we enjoyed lively talks about studying abroad and learned of Mademoiselle's passion for sorority life! A fun night!

Monet's Pond

Monet's Garden

Monet's flowers :3

Monet's flowers :3

Monet's House

Makin' Meat

Fruit Fondue

Chocolate Soufflé

Crusted melty Camembert

Eiffel Tower

View from the Top

Us on the top

Dinner at Chartier

A little bit of this

Day 23, July 20th: To start off the day we took a bus tour early in the morning to see Paris's most monumental attractions. We stopped at Les invalides and Trocadero for 15 minutes. Luckily we had already been to both so we didn't feel any rush. Then we ended the tour at Notre Dame and scoped out the area around there with Patricia and Rowen. Afterward the group met back up for a super cool drawing lesson on Ile saint Louis where we did 4 drawings. 1) draw the surrounding without picking up your pencil, 2) Draw the bridge made out of one shape repeated, 3) color a postcard using only colored pencils of the view across the Seine, 4) every one stand in a line where you have 1 minute to draw then you pass your notebook to the right and draw on the next one until yours makes it back to you. After that Servanne, our tour instructor showed us where we can pick up some delicious Berthillion ice-cream despite it being late july when most shops close. Maddie got an amazing grilled pineapple basil sorbet and Ali got one yummy scoop of Manderine and one of raspberry. After That crazy long day we made it out to the louvre, this being Maddie's 3rd time and Ali's fourth. Then after being exhausted from the long day we went out to dinner by the opulent Opera house. We had quiche and salade as a starter, Chicken and potatoes for our entre, and a delicious Crème Brulee for dessert! 

Bus Tour: ferris wheel at end of Champs Elysees

Bus Tour: Eiffel Tower from Trocadero

Bus Tour

Bus Tour: Les Invalides

Notre Dame art depiction of heaven and hell

Louvre