Elephants and Giraffes and cheetahs... Oh My!


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Europe » France » Rhône-Alpes » Lyon
July 19th 2004
Published: July 19th 2004
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Ahhh... Lyon, so peaceful and relaxing, and so insanely hot it istne even funny. Seriouisly, I am dying here. Though it is a nice switch from the cold rain in Scotland and England, I am not used to it being so hot. Sweltering.... "Im melting, melting! oh what a world!!!!"
Yeah, so thats the weather here. Very hot - if you didnt get that before...- We left PAris yesterday, sigh.... but we had an awesome timle there and I got rto see the eiffel tower which was something I had been wanting to do for years and years, so I am satisfied. We took a train to Lyon, it was a tgv, Trains de grandes vitesses or in english "a very fast train" It livved up to its name as it was indeed very fast. I would have been quite dissapointed if it was slow. I finished my book in the train station and am now somewhat diheartened by the fact that I have nothing to read on the long train rides around europe, as well as on the plane ride home. Oh well. I might steal rob roy off of Jackie when she is done it.... we will see. Anyway, the train was good however, Jackie accidently got us a smoking car, not knowing she did so, so we both suffoicated in the smokey atmosphere for about 2 hours until we finally got out into fresh air.. whew.... on the plus side, there was a man who brought his kitten on board and so I got to oggle at the cuteness of teh kitty while gasping for air... it evened out i suppose.
So we got off the train in Lyon and were happy that the metro was alot smaller than that of Paris and not even close to as intimidating. it had like " lines in comparison to Paris' 986 lines. Big improvement. We got to our station and took this thing called a ferniculaire;;;; at least I think that's what it is called... hmmm i dunno. Anyway, what it is is this train whose job is basically to drag lazy people like Jackie and I up a great big hill so we dont have to trudge up it ourselves. An excellent Idea in my opinion and am thinking that more hills around the world should offer the same courtesy. We got to our hostel, whiwh is nice... i mean its nothing spectacular.... but it is good, clean and the people are nice. We decided to do Laundry. Now there was an unexpected challange. It seriously took us like 4 hours to do all of our laundry... We first had toi wait until the people in front of us were done, as there is only one washer and likewise, only one dryer. So we waited and finally the wash was done but the owner of the clother was no where to be seen. JAckie actually ended up taking thier clothes out, much to her dismay, so that we could get started. We got out clothes in and started. Jackie went to have a shower, and I, having already had one went and sat on the patio outside where I met a vert confused Frenchman and a loud obnoxious Irishman whose name I wont even mention beccause I know that even mentioning his presence will make him swell up with a very unearned pride. He was a bit of a dick.... said something about canadiens being a people that other countries dont care about... yeesh. Anyway, so Jackie came out of the shower, and waited even more for our laundry? Finally it was doen, but the dryer wasnt free and it would take another 45 minutes until it would be. It was 10 30 ish.... and this option was less than favourable as we were both very tired. However, we hadnt much of a choice as we were wearing our skirts and our PJ's were all wet. So we waited.... and waited... and I massacred Jackie at crib.... again.... and finally we got ours in, and we waited some more until like 12 00 then it was done and we took it out and lo and behlod, our clothes were still wet. a waste of our bloody time if you ask me.... we just said screw it and went to bed.
Sleep was good, save being right next to the loudest street inthe universe and what seemed to be a rooster farm which housed the loudest and most obnoxious roosters in the world....needless to say, more earplugs have been purchased...
Today, we got up and went to this park which has seriously everything a park should, and it was all free! It had botanical gardens, a zoo, a lake benches and the most appaling bathrooms I have ever seen.... they were holes in the ground.... htere was nothing there but holes in the ground....it was very disturbing and we felt that walking the extra half a mile or so was worth it to get to a normal washroom... really really gross...
We also wanted to rent this bike thing which resembled a golf cart only you pedaled it... however, the legal age to drive it is over 25... somewhow, being able to buy alcohol, to vote, to gamble and to dive an actuall car does not make us qualified to ride an oversized bike... hmmm....
SO we walked everywhere.. went and saw elephants who we graciously dubbed Martha, Andrew and Gladys, as well as giraffes, cheetahs monkeys and a whole bunc of birds... lots of fun.
Then we went to find an internet cafe which took FOREVER, but as you can see we found one. Anyway, tomorrow, we are getting up early and we are headed to the beach!!!!! yay! maybe there is hope to tan my legs yet! we shal see...
Anyway, this is Sarah, signing of while trying not to die of the heat! Miss everyone lots!!!!!!

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