France

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June 12th 2008

Published: June 12th 2008

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Xuan and Adrian

Nice Beach

Ok from now on we are only going to write one blog per country - this is due to a mixture of spending far too much time on the internet writing this up when we're supposed to be travelling, and also our attempt to curb some spending at internet cafes. The latter doesn't apply here because we are in Paris staying at a relative's place so internet is free!! yay!!

So France has been pretty awesome. Once again time has flown and we find ourselves wishing we had stayed longer in Paris. Nice was our first stop in France, where the weather was warm and we could relax away from the crowds of Rome. The city is so beautiful and so easy to walk on foot, very flat and pedestrian friendly. The famous beach was nice but probably not our cup of tea because of the pebbles. That didn't stop a whole lot of topless sunbathers though (us excluded of course). We met up with Astrid and Gareth for a four day mad drive up to Paris via the Alps and some little country towns that now escape my memory. The first night was spent driving around until about 11.30pm

One of our many self made baguettes

looking for accommodation, and finally settling for a hotel in Lyon, whilst the other two nights were spent camping in a cute campsite somewhere miles from nowhere, but run by a very nice dutch woman who didn't speak much french (but thankfully her english was better).

Then came Paris..... yes, Paris... with our limited french, we still managed to find our way around after a lot of hand gestures and random names thrown into the conversations which probably sound much like broken french, or bad english. The people are friendly, though I think a few of them may have told us off but we didn't understand and just said 'merci!' 😊 The city is absolutely beautiful... there's so much to see everywhere you go, and don't even get me started on the baguettes and crossiants!!! We spent some time with my family whom I had never met before, and it was interesting finding out about the culture differences here. For example, they have a 35 hour week, with 5 weeks annual leave a year, but since they work until 8 or 9 in the evening, they can often have 7 weeks off a year!

The family we are

View from balcony in Monte Carlo

staying with are really welcoming to the point where every time I mention a dish I like, the lady makes it the next day!!! Even when we told her how much we loved the crossaints and that we were having it practically every day for breakfast, she went to the bakery and bought them for us before we got up, until I had to tell her to stop! Anyway, overall Paris has been fantasic, to all the girls out there - make sure you visit Galleries LaFayette, we probably spent about 5 hours there looking at all the designer gears, from womens and mens clothes/accessories to books and homewares.

It feels like we needed to stay longer though, so Paris is definitely a place we would return to if we had the chance. Anyway onto the next stage - tomorrow is Amsterdam and the train leaves at 8.30am so I better get to bed. Photos don't seem to be uploading properly so I will have to do them later. By the way, thanks everyone for the birthday wishes - it was cool to have spent my 25th in Paris 😊

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