Paris, and a bit of Southern France

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Hi everyone,

I'm sorry I have not updated the blog in a while. My internet was down for a while and school work all of a sudden built up. I keep forgetting I am here to study...
But in the past few weeks I've gotten to see a few nice things including Paris and a little city in the south of France called Bayonne.
I traveled to Paris with Erika and we got there at night and once we made our way out of the crazy metro, we walked out to find the pyramids of the Louvre Museum lit up and overwhelming us with what all those movies had told us would be a gorgeous city. We stayed with some friends who are currently studying there and they showed us around to some of the main site. We got to see the Louvre including the Mona Lisa (which is actually very small in size). Also saw the Eiffel Tower, the Notre Dame Cathedral, the Arc de Triumph, and some lively night life in the Latin Quarters and Bastille districts of the city. All the sights were amazing and blew me away. And it was strange being in a big city. I had not realized I had grown accustomed to the slower pace of Bilbao. We also found that all the stereotypes about the people in Paris were pretty much true. Not exactly the warmest people, and it was also alot more difficult to get around with the language barrier. I was expecting alot more people to know english, but maybe that was a bit american of me.
The following weekend the program took us to the little town of Bayonne in the south of France. It was a short 2 hour drive from Bilbao which makes me want to visit it again. It was a quaint, and quiet town that looked just like the town from Beauty and the Beast. They had amazing chocolates there, and we were lucky enough to have amazing weather and catch a flea market that was right along the river. Afterward we headed back to Spain where we had lunch at a cidreria. It seems like cider is a big part of the Basque culture so they have these big celebrations at these cider houses. They have HUGE barrels in the walls with a tiny spout that the cider comes out from. You have to catch the cider with your cup. It's a fun process...but the cider didn't taste too good :/ After the cider we went to the town of Hondarribia, a medieval town still surrounded by a fortress. It was neat being somewhere where the history is still so intact. Apparently during the summer, the population nearly triples due to tourism.
This has been the latest of my travels, and tomorrow I take off to London, and on Saturday I'm off to Istanbul before I meet my family in Madrid 😊 but I hope everyone is well and hopefully the next time I update this blog I will have awesome pictures to show you all 😊
lots of love
agur !
-angelica

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Photos

the Pyramids!
The Pyramids in front of the Louvre, the first sight we had of Paris

All the cheese
This market we walked around for a good hour

Accordion man
It seemed very appropriate

The city
The view from the top of the Eiffel Tower

From the river
a big reason it's a gorgeous city

The river
at night. These boats go by that you can dinner on

John the Baptist and Friends
Some of the sculptures from Notre dame

The Cathedral
Is huge.and beautiful

Our first view of the Eiffel Tower
and it's definetly worth it :)

Notre Dame
lit up at night

The Cathedral in Bayonne
In case you like Gothic churches

The architecture
is nice I think. I guess during the French Revolution they took off all the gargoyles

Inside
The alter inside the cathedrea

The River
running through bayonne

The Houses
They're all clean and quaint

Chocolate maker
Inside a chocolate shop. It was amazing chocolat

The Cidreria
The huge barrels I was talking about

The main bridge into the city
The road that leads you into the fortress city,Hondarribia

Me and Erika
In the big entrance way

Comments

[Ruben]

wow. nice pictures. next time you're at a cathedral say a prayer for me please :P .