Southern France with the Fam

I had an absolutely fabulous weekend with my family this week! I really appreciated seeing them, being able to joke around with them, and just feeling overall comfortable and happy with my own family. I'd been feeling a bit lonely and homesick lately, so their visit couldn't have come at a better time. It was fun to do the whole family vacation squished in the car thing. 

We went to La Ciotat, had quite an adventure fining our hotel/apartment, but it finally all worked out when some nice people helped us with directions.

Our hotel was near the ocean, so we took a lovely walk along the rocky shore. It was a bit chilly and windy, but nice and sunny, with the sunbeams sparkling on the water. We had a big adventure through the huge Carrefour grocery store, so the fam got to experience that lovely new aspect of French culture. We had dinner at an adorable little place where we had a big hors d'oeuvre platter of typical provencal

In the morning, we drove through La Camargue Nature Reserve, where we saw flamingos, gulls, gulls, white horses, etc. It was absolutely gorgeous and such neat ecosystem.



We drove through Arles and Avignon a bit, which were very cute little areas. We made our way to Marseille, which was pretty cool to see but super packed more than usual because it was Easter Sunday. We drove past the pretty marina with all the boats, a smaller version of the Arc de Triomphe type thing, lots of fountains (with creepster dauphin things still ... I think they're following me!), and the beautiful train station in Marseille. We could see the basilica, but never got a chance to park and actually go in, but oh well. We saw another lovely sunset and cooked our own fun pasta dinner in the apartment/hotel. We had family fun night huddling around the portable DVD player to watch a movie together.



Monday, we said our goodbyes to the ocean and went through the lovely Aix-en-Provence. I absolutely adored this city, which is so typically French (in my opinion). We walked through the colorful flower, fruit, and clothing markets, little cobblestone streets, patiseries, etc. There were several pretty churches, shutters of all different colors (my new obsession) which really capture the beauty of the light in the South, and fountains. I can definitely see how so many artists throughout history have gotten their inspiration from the lighting and loveliness of the Provence region. Love it, love it, love it!




We stopped at the Chateau de la Barben randomly on our way back to Grenoble... and it was such a great find! I really felt like we were walking into the story of Beauty and the Beast. First we drove through the tiny village with adorable houses and farms (♬ Little town, it's a quite village: every day like the one before! Little town full of little people waking up to say, "Bonjour!" ♬), then came upon the chateau hidden away in the forest. It had fabulous intricate gardens, a big drawbrigdge, turrets/towers to watch out for invaders, and a big mote wrapping around the backside cutting it off from the creepy forest.



It was sad to send them off on the TGV to Paris, but then it was great to see all their pictures and hear their stories when they came back!



We spend Friday doing a tour of Grenoble, seeing all the main areas of the centre ville, the fountains, churches, Victor Hugo, etc. We got fresh fruit at the St. Claire market and went up to the Bastille for a nice view of the city. We had dinner with my host brothers and some of their friends at the house, so that was quite a fun evening of franglais! My brain just absolutely hurt afterwards from so much exhausting translating, but it was lots of fun! Everything went really well the whole week and I was very sad to see them leave :(

Southern France with the Fam

Grenoble with the Fam

Let's Go Take a Hike, Up to the Highest Height!

It was yet another day of great adventures in Grenoble. We headed out west of Grenoble and walked through the cutest little village until we came upon the trails up into the mountains.


The trails were super steep, so it was quite a good workout and we felt very proud at the top!

I guess I was too busy trying to breathe on the way up to remember to take pictures of how steep it was. I only have pictures of us coming down the mountain. Haha oh well.


Another perfect day :)

I Love Grenoble

Today has been yet another fabulous day in Grenoble. I woke up to sunshine beaming in through my window and a view of our gorgeous mountains. My jaw still drops at their grandeur some days, even after being here and seeing them everyday for two months.

Here's a view of the mountains from Echirolles.

I met Gita and some of the other girls in town to go up to the Musée de Dauphinois, a museum of the history of the Dauphinois region that we live in.

There was a terrace with a breath-taking view of the city and mountains where we all hung out and had a nice “franglais” chat in the sun of the afternoon.


We walked a bit farther up toward the bastille again and spent several hours basking in the warm sun and just having a peaceful lovely afternoon. I’m so happy right now :)

Happiness in Signs of Spring

Some of the first buds of Spring are here!  

This is what I see every day on my way home: 

I love walking past all the flower shops.  They smell so wonderful and never get old to me! 

The weather's getting nicer and I'm hoping to get one of these sometime soon :)  

My friends and I had quite the adventure finding a movie theatre the other day.  We finally did get there just in time to see Juno.  It was definitely interesting seeing an American movie in a French theatre.  People don't really heartily laugh out loud much here, so we had to restrain ourselves a little haha.  I laughed.  I cried.  Overall a good film.  

When I came back to my host family's house, there was a dinner party with two taxi driver family friends.  That was lots of fun.  One of the guys was named Michel, so he kept joking to me about having the same name.  I was able to hold my own in conversation and they even complimented me on my French (probably just being nice, but oh well!)  

Last night we went to see La Traviata, put on by one of the university choirs.  The music was absolutely fabulous!

Onward and Upward!

Yesterday was a gorgeous day with a beautiful clear blue sky. Christine, Elizabeth, and I met at one of the markets in town to enjoy the day. The French love to use the phrase, "profiter du soleil" (to take advantage of, to benefit from the sun,) so we thought we'd be French and do just that! We perused aisles upon aisles of fragrant pears, clementines, raspberries, cheeses, beans, apples, mushrooms, flowers, and butchers’ stands with lovely looking fresh cuts of meat.

Delicious clementines with their stems still attached!

With our market-fresh lunches packed, we headed across the bridge to begin our first climb up to the Bastille. Here's the link to a website with some great pictures of the Bastille. (You can click the English version in the upper right hand corner.)

It was quite the hike! There is a rather steep incline and it took us about an hour to get to the top. We ate our lunches as we looked down at the city, trying to point out our neighborhoods, the university, and buildings we know downtown.

The view of the city was incredible and it was nice to get some exercise and breathe in some fresh mountain air.

Happy Hikers at the top of the Bastille!

My First Week in Grenoble

This past week has been quite a blur of activities. I am finally starting to fall into the schedule of things and I am incredibly happy to be here. Grenoble is an amazing city, the CUEF seems like a great school, and I really like the campus environment in general.

I am living with a host family in Echirolles, another city just outside of Grenoble. They are very kind to me and we're starting to get to know each other a bit more. It's been a bit difficult being outgoing with them at times. They have a tendency of looking at me like an alien sometimes when they cannot understand a word of my muddled French. I'm getting a bit better though (I hope!) Every night I watch a comedy show and the news with them. I'm finding that I really don't have a problem understanding the news stories anymore- just in a few days!

Last weekend, I went with my host family up into the top of la Chartreuse, one of the three chains of the Alps here. We drove super fast up the winding roads and watched as the green grass slowly began to be covered with snow. As we reached the top, we passed several ski resorts and lodges. We then spent basically all of Saturday afternoon lounging around at one of the outdoor cafes, watching people snowboard and ski. We walked along one of the paths a bit and I enjoyed listening to some French 5 year olds fighting over who would be the lucky one to use the red sled next.

We took our placement tests on Monday and I am happy with my placement for now. B1.6, whatever that means! We had our first language class today and it seemed extremely easy, which I'm sure was just because it was the first day. I made friends with Kyriaki, a girl from Cyprus, and we met up with some other students for lunch in town. We returned just in time for our Art History seminar, which was so interesting! The professor seemed very knowledgeable, understanding, and had a funny dry sense of humor. I'm very excited for that course.

Tomorrow I have a language lab and then Culture et Societe. After dinner, I'm meeting our group downtown, from where we will depart for our overnight journey to Venice just in time for Carnival. It should be quite beautiful and exciting!