Two weeks

So it's been a little while since I left Washington on September 25th, but I'm finally getting this up and started. Since leaving two weeks ago, I landed in London's Heathrow Airport and immediately up north to stay with Michelle for about five days. Traveling from PDX to Stockton-on-Tees took about 23hours from start to finish. It took me about 3 days to get over my jet lag!



The first real day in northern England, Michelle and her friends Angela and Rachel took me to Newcastle to visit with and go out with three more of their friends. We wandered Newcastle a bit, had lunch and visited Newcastle's castle as well as a contemporary art museum; both of witch were great.

[On the top of Newcastle's Castle]


[We went out later that night in Newcastle.]




On the following Monday, Michelle, Angela and Rachel took me to York. It was like no other place I've been before. The streets are so small and lead you all over the place. I would get lost so fast if I didn't have Michelle to guide me. There was a lot of shopping, and the city was very well kept. We went to York's Castle, and Michelle and I went to York's Minister.

[On York's Castle]


We climbed the Minister's tower, which was a lot harder than I originally thought. The woman selling us our ticket looked at us very gravely and said "are you sure?"

[Half way up the tower. We had to walk along part of a roof to get to the second half of the staircase. Behind me is the tower I was trying to get to the top of. I know you can't see all of it. I wish I would have gotten a better picture.]


We later had tea at Betty's



And we went back to Michelle's for dinner where the girls made Shepard's Pie. The rest of my time with Michelle consisted of Durham and Middlesbro. Durham was lovely. We went to the cathedral in Durham which was the most beautiful church I've seen..so far.

[We weren't allowed to take photos inside, but here is it's outside]


Part of the first Harry Potter was filmed in one of the corridors I walked through at the cathedral.

[cobblestone!]


On Wednesday, October 1st, I went back south to London to see Clare before going to Paris. It was lovely to be able to visit with her, and very kind for her and her family to let me stay. Clare was very busy getting ready to move to Manchester. We went to a contemporary art museum in London; Tate Modern. It was large, but quite interesting. Friday afternoon, Clare and I went for burgers at a gourmet burger place. The first and last burger I've had since leaving home.




Saturday morning, I left Clare's for my early Coach which would take me to Paris! I arrived in Paris at 5:30pm-ish and took their underground to my home stay. It's at 10 rue de la Procession in the 15eme district of Paris. The family I'm with has five sons, the youngest of whom has moved out last summer. I assume since their house was empty is why they wanted to take in foreign students. They are Lucile and Gille and a very lovely couple. They speak English, but in order to better learn the language, we use French only. Except when we really don't understand, and it's something they really want us to know. We have our own rooms, and the internet. Many of the other students in the program can't say the same, so I feel very fortunate. From the balcony out side of Lauren and my bedrooms, we can see the top of the Eiffel Tower. I didn't think much of it at first, but the fact that we can see it is incredible. It's really only visible from right near to it, and we are almost two miles away in a second floor flat.

[my room]


[Eiffel Tower from my balcony. Poor quality I'm sorry. It was hard to get the photo at night.]


Most of the past week has been just settling in. We've finished our first week of classes, and have gone on one class field trip. Our class is closer into the center of Paris across from Saint Germain des Pres. Classes have been ok, but I have a feeling that they will be terribly slow moving and almost painful; from the way that lectures seem to be structured. on October 8th, I met up with Aunt Kandy and Brent who too were in Paris. It was great to see them while abroad. Their trip seemed to be going well. We had dinner and visited till midnight.




Yesterday October 9th, our class had a field trip to Paris's Opera, Paris's Passages and dinner at Chartier. It was a long, but neat day running around Paris.

[Opera'a ceiling (I might put a video look at the Opera on my YouTube)]


[one of the 7 passages we saw]


[The resturant Charteir where all 27 of us ate dinner]



And that catches me up to today!!! Today Lauren and I are going all around Paris to get more familiar with the city, and get all the tourist stuff out of the way. More to come!

À bientôt!