From Lyon to the Dordogne

We had two days in Lyon, there was lots to see and do. We went up to Ste Foy, saw our house, which brought back great memories. We walked through Ste Foy, got breakfast, and took the bus back down to Bellcour. We spent the afernoon at Parc Tete d'Or -
saw the animals and layed in the sun next to the lake. After some shopping we took the Funicular up to Fourviere. That was a scary experience - we started up the mountain, and the tram jerked then started falling backwards, everyone was yelling, but it stopped. They wouldn't let us off (unfortunatley) but they worked on it for a while, then started it up again. We were thankful to make it to the top! We had dinner (salad Lyonaise) in vieux Lyon.
Sunday we caught an early train to Toulouse where we had a couple hour layover. Then up to Gourdon where we were picked up for our painting holiday. We a nice afternoon and evening, that included a great dinner with the family and another couple who are here to paint. We have a cute place that we are staying, and it's nice to be out in the quite countryside, a nice change from the city.
This morning we were served breakfast, then headed to Domme to pick out the place that we will be painting. It was so much fun going back to Domme after 10 years. We saw the house that we stayed in for a week, hasn't changed much. >
The town seems to have become more touristy, but it was still quaint and very very gorgeous. We then got to site see a little, we went to le Roque Gageac. We got home and were served Foie Gras for lunch - it was very good.
We have the afternoon free, so we are going to go swimming in the pool.

Lyon

We are settled into our second hotel here in Lyon. We were so thanful, the first one we stayed at was about as close to the train station as p[ossible. It was a nice hotel though, and we were thankful to have a nice place to relax. We switched hotels this afteroon, now we're just a couple blocks from Bellcour. Lyon is as good as I remembeed. It's so much slower and relaxed than Paris, but the buildings are just as pretty. I am so thankful to be here, and loving every minute. We ate dinner at Pizza Pino last night, which was fun. The weather is HOT, so we are going to head over to Parc de Tete d'Or.

Au revoir

I wrote this yesterday on the train:
Last night Kirby and Laura left for Germany. Kate, Monique and I decided to celbrate our last night. On our way out our landlord (who doesn't speak a word of English) asked if we what time we were going to leave, she said we needed to be out by 11:00 because somebody was going to come later that afternoon and she had to clean it. We said we had school and asked if we could leave our bags there while we were at school, then pick them up at 1:30. She agreed, and we were happy we didn't have to haul them with us. We went out for a nice dinner at a sushi restaurant.We took our time walking home (with gelato of course!) When we entered the courtyard, Kirby and Laura were back. They not only missed their train, but Kirby was pickpocketed - her credit card was in there and 300 euros in cash - so sad!. So we had another evening together wich was nice for us, but sad for them. They left extra early this morning to make sure they made it.
Monique and I cleaned and put our bags in the corner, so that she would be able to clean, then we headed off to school, Kate was going to stay till 11, then head out till 1:30. Unfortunatley, our class got out late, then eveyone asked to take pictures, then we had to wash the dishes (we take turns washing everyone's tea/coffee cups). So we didn't get out till 1:20. We ran the whole way home and were about 5 minutes late. We walked in the courtyard and the landlady was standing there, she said you're late. I said, yeah, I'm sorry, 5 minutes. She said, no... I was supposed to clean at 11. What happened was that she didn't have an extra key to get in to clean. I thought she would have told us, since I said we would be at school, or Kate would have let her in, since she would be there till 11. She was not very happy, I felt really bad. But she gave us back our deposit, so that made things better on our side.
We headed out with Kate (and our couple hundred pounds of luggage), it was a huge ordeal walking through the metro stations. But we were thankful our bags held together up and down the flights of stairs. I was surprised that nobody asked to help us carry our bags. Through all our metro changes and stairs only one girl asked if she could help (I gladly accepted). Poor Monique, she has two bags (one full of shoes, and her other one is breaking apart, but she did great!) But at the same time I don't know if I would have felt comfortable with sketching guys helping out. We found Kate's hotel, and got stayed with her for a little while. Monique and I wanted to make the 17:00 train to Lyon, so we headed back across town. While in the States we bought a 6 day train pass to use within a month. Today was our first time to use it, so we had to get it validated. We arrived at Gare de Lyon and started looking for a ticket window that could validate our ticket. Everything was closed down, we looked everywhere and couldn't find anybody to ask - there were only security guards with big machine guns standing around. Monique asked an older gentelman for help. He was very nice, I learned a new word from him - grave (not sure if that's how you spell it) means strike. I guess that's an important word to know in France. So he pointed us in the right direction. We're sitting on the train (without our ticket validated) but I am hoping that the ticket collecter will understand!
I am really excited to get to Lyon! We are starting a list of places we want to see.

Last Day Together

Monday night we went out for dinner in the Latin Quarter, we all tried escargot! We really enjoyed the Fete de la Music - there were some great bands. There were tons of musicians, and all of Paris came out to listen.
Yesterday Monique and I stopped by the market again as they were closing up and got some melons and cherries for a good price. Kate and Laura headed off to school. We spent the afternoon with Kirby. We walked back to the Jardin de Luxembourg, and sat out and talked for awhile. It was a gorgeous day! We then walked over to Musee Rodin. We weren't able to spend long there, since they were closing early. But we did a quick walk through and like it. Unfortunately we weren't able to see the gardens. We got back just in time for Kate and Laura to get back. We made mozzarella/tomato sandwiches with sauteed onions and garlic for dinner. At about 8, we walked to the Eiffel Tower. The first time we went up, we only climbed to the 2nd floor - we wanted to save the top for a clear day. We were really fortunate that our last night together was clear, so it was perfect. It was such a beautiful night, we were able to get up to the top by about 10:30, so by then everything was lit up. We walked back to the Champs Elysees, got ice cream, then took the metro home.
Kirby and Laura are leaving tonight on the train, so Kate, Monique and I are going out for our last night. We are starting to pack up - 1 month has gone too fast!

Fete de la Musique

Today, Monday the 21st of June, is the annual music festival around France. Musicians come out onto the street and perform. Two girls from school (Harmony and Natlaie), and Monique and I had lunch together at our place, then walked around listening to music. Not too much is happening yet, but a lot of bands are setting up. We are planning on going out later to listen more - it's a fun atmosphere.
Friday night after dinner we went up to Sacre Coeur on Montmarte.
It was gorgeous, the church was lit up, we set on the steps and had wine and looked out over the city. Saturday morning we got up early and headed out to the flea markets (with better luck than last weekend). It was almost overwhelming, so many people and so many clothes. I was the only one who bought anything - got a pair of leather boots. Sunday we went to Notre Dame for church. We were planning on going to an American Church, but a couple of the girls thought we should take advantage of the fact that we live close by, and that it was our last Sunday in Paris. Sunday afternoon we walked around - Place Vendrome, le Madeleine, l'Opera, Palais Royal, etc.

It's been really nice that we have been walking all over the place - but I definitley won't be sad to get home to my car! Morgan - like you said in your email, I'm ready to get home and workout with you! Too much white bread and too many pastries.
Kirby came in this morning. So tonight we'll be all around town I'm sure!

Catching up

We've had some nice evenings out this week. Wednesday we went out for drinks and ate Mexican food - good, but not the real deal. Last night we went out to the Latin Quarter and ate at an Italian restaurant. Our afternoons are busy with sightseeing, although we took the afternoon off today and deep cleaned our apartment and did laundry. Time is flying and there's still places to see and lots of sketching to do. We have a list that still needs check marks. We are planning on going to the Louvre again tonight (me and Monique's 3rd time). There's still expositions there that we haven't seen yet.
Our professor has kept school interesting - we feel that we've learned a lot. Almost everyday we play some sort of game. A few days ago we played a game like Taboo, we all had to write down a celebrity, an object, a place, and something else. Then we each had 30 secs to try to get our team to guess as many as possible. Yesterday we set up a murder case, we got with partners, had 5 minutes to write up an alibi with details from the night before. Then we spent a couple hours interrogating each other as to who had the weakest alibi. Today we had a list of 20 past tense sentences. We had to mark whether they were correct or not, if they were incorrect, we had to correct them. Then we bid (from 10 to 100) on how sure we were of our answer, if we were right, then we got double the score we bid, if we were wrong we had to subtract triple that amount. The next game, we had a chart with different subjects - a verb, a French town, French celebrity, anatomy, adjective, food item, etc., she picked a letter and we had 30 secs to fill it out.

Seeing Paris

Monday after school we went to Les Halles with Heather Morse. It was fun to do some more shopping.
Tuesday afternoon was nice and sunny. Monique and I covered a lot of ground. We walked to Sainte Chapelle, Saint Germain de Pres, St. Sulpics, The Sorbonne Church and the Jardin du Luxembourg. The gardens there were beautiful. It felt almost like a tropical resort there. We sat down by the water, there were palm trees and light granite paths, it was great. Looking forward to going back there for an afternoon. When we got home we got ready with Kate and Laura and headed to Trocadero. It's a park across the river from the Eiffel Tower where they are showing the soccer games. It took longer than we an anticipated - 1 and a half hours to walk there, so we got there by half time. By the time it was over it was dark, and the tower was lit up. We took our time walking home, we walked down the Champs Elysees and stopped at the Louve, it was lit up beautifully. There was a man in the entrance playing his trumbone, it was gorgeous to listen to as it echoed through the courtyard. We made it home a little after midnight - we definitly want to go out late again, what a beautiful city!