Chateau Hopping in the Loire

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Bonjour!

So my location is listed as Tours, but I'm actually sitting in an internet cafe in Amboise, which is just a little ways away from Tours, down the Loire River. I've been having a fantastic time here in France so far, and it's only been 2 days, so I still have plenty to go!

I met Josh and Kristin in London, and was very happy to see them. While I'm certainly able to entertain myself, especially in a place as busy as London, it's still infinitely better to enjoy with others - if only to have someone to constantly tell how cool everything is. Also, it allows for more dining options, as I generally avoided restaurants while I was by myself... just not as fun alone.

Once we had everything taken care of at the airport, we still had a few hours before our train left for Paris. I decided to try and give them as good of a "Welcome to Europe" day as I could. We hopped onto the Underground over to Westminster and they got to have the experience of walking up the station steps as Big Ben towers above you and Parliament and Westminster Abbey sit right across the streets. After some picture-taking, we grabbed some food and then went to the station to catch our train. Unfortunately... we didn't. We definitely missed our Eurostar train to Paris, because I wasn't expecting there to be so much security and such to go through. Luckily, we were able to get on the next train out, at no extra cost even. Phew.

We arrived in Paris around 9:20pm, and were still planning on making the most of their first day in Europe. We ran into a little trouble at first becoming acustomed to the metro system, and working everything in a foreign language. It's a new experience for me, to be in a country where I don't speak the language and neither do any of my companions (Liz knew a little German, plus had lived there all summer). It's definitely a little more exciting in my opinion - it just feels like more of an adventure. At any rate, once we got the machines figured out we took the metro to our hostel, made sure we weren't going to get stranded in Paris if we left, and then took off for the Eiffel Tower. For the second time in one day, we had a famous (I said the most famous in the world - to some argument) sight appear out of nowhere to us. We turn around the corner outside the stop and voila, there it is, lit up a deep blue color. It was amazing. And to top it all off, a couple minutes later the hour struck and the hourly light show began. White pinpoints flashed in and out all up and down the blue-lit tower... so cool. Hopefully it was a good first day in Europe for them.

The next day we took the train to Amboise, and got to really explore our first stop in France. The city is built around a chateau, which we visited and thoroughly enjoyed. Johnson shares my love of castles, and this was definitely a pretty cool one. Amboise was also the place da Vinci went to live out the last 3 years of his life, so his residence is tourable as well. I'm a huge Leonardo fan, so naturally we went there as well. It was interesting, although I think not as much for me because not too much of it was new. We did have fun in the gardens, though, where an exhibition was set up displaying models of all his inventions. It was a pretty relaxing day overall, and we ended it with sitting at a restaurant across the river from the chateau, with a perfect view of it lit up.

Today we furthered our chateau exploration by renting bicycles and biking the 15km or so over to Chenonceaux. It's built on top of a bridge spanning the Cher River, and is really a sight to see. The ride over was very hilly, but totally worth it. we wandered around there a few hours, biked back to Amboise, and now here we are in a great internet cafe that serves us sandwiches and drinks to go along with our computers.

A few more random thoughts before I'm done...
- I'm already in love with food here, and I haven't even eaten a true menu meal in a restaurant yet - pretty much just sandwiches, croissants and desserts. But they're all so good! The sandwich/bakery stores they have everywhere here might be one of my favorite things ever. Why can't America adapt a cafe culture?
- The traffic here is intense. Not that it's particularly heavy, just that everyone drives very fast, through very complicated intersections, and passes all the time. The passing is especially crazy to me. Cars will pass with oncoming traffic, just missing it by a few meters, and the oncoming car won't even hesitate. America must seem so easy to drive in to people in Europe.
- For some reason it's extremely rewarding to communicate successfully with someone when we don't share a language. Just now I bought some stamps from someone who didn't speak a word of English, and I felt so good afterwards. I'm able to fake my way through a few French words, and it's amazing what gestures and pointing can accomplish.

That's all for now, don't want to make this too long. We're heading back to Paris again pretty soon for the night, and then in the morning we're off to my lab co-workers' favorite sights, Mt. St. Michel. Hopefully they were right!

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Photos

La Tour Eiffel
A good "Welcome to Paris"

Amboise
The chateau in Amboise

Amboise
View of the Loire River from the chateau

Amboise
More chateau

Amboise
The gardens of the chateau

Amboise
La Clos Luce - the chateau da Vinci lived in for the end of his life

Amboise
Messing around in the da Vinci park

Amboise
The chateau at night

Chenonceaux
The promenade leading up to the chateau

Chenonceaux
The river-spanning chateau

Chenonceaux
Gardens outside the chateau

Chenonceaux
The other gardens outside the chateau

The Loire
Us biking back to Amboise. We climbed this ridiculous hill and had to take a break. Turns out we had a good view from there.

Comments

[Rachel]

Stamps?!
Wait!! You bought stamps?!?! Are you sending me something?! :) have fun in France Joshua!! :)

[Nana]

London & Germany
Dear Josh - I will start at the end of your earlier blog - we love them and hope they continue! In fact, one came today and I will save comments until later! I am sorry we have not written sooner but we have had company from MD, old neighbors who now live in Florida. They always wanted to see Story Ctiy and we toured (what there is!) completely, had dinner at the Cottage, etc. They were impressed with Ames and Iowa State and then saw Riverside camp also. We had a very good visit. We went out to the country and Carl took many pictures there. Your mom and Jeff joined us at the Cottage for dinner. Now - on to the first part of your trip. We hope to be better about responding in the future! It is all so interesting, and we are learning a lot from you. We have been to many of the same places - one place you enjoyed so much we never have seen and that is Prague. Hope to visit there some time - everyone seems impressed with it. London is also fascinating! Aunt Thel and i enjoyed it and then at at earlier time, Grandpa and I had been there. I loved going to Shakespeare's birthplace and his area. There is so much to see in london and we were amazed at how friendly the British were - and helpful as Aunt Thel and I looked lost. We did see a play in the Globe Theater! The atmosphere in London was great - and we enjoyed the theater in London also. When we were in Germany, we stayed with IBM friends and they took us to great places to eat, a tour of the Rhine River, and much more. This is all for now - and I will comment on your lates Blog next time I write. Sorry to wait so long - we think of you and Rachel often - and I wrote her a letter yesterday! We will look forward to your blogs wheneever you have time to write. You have been great about keeping us informed so far! Miss you and Love you, Nana and Grandpa P.S. - Aunt Thel and I had fun shopping (looking) at the department store, Harolds! We had tea there also, which many visitors do!