Monday, September 24, 2012

antwerp.


Life is too short to have negative feelings about anything—get over it.

Today, I did a whole lot of not much. A lot of people went to Disneyland Paris so there weren’t many people to go out and do things with anyway. I’ve seen all that my professors have asked me to see so now I can do more of what I want!

Soo today that consisted of sleeping in, going to the grocery store to pick up a baguette from the bakery, running to the Latin Quarter and picking up last minute souvenirs for my sisters and walking around Notre Dame again, just because I could, look up technical details for my Thanksgiving week trip to Ireland, getting distracted by youtubing (that’s a word right? I feel like it’s used enough that I can get away with it) Celtic Thunder, taking a nap, and in between it all, checking the constantly busy laundry room to use the hotel washing machine for all my clothes (which isn’t saying much because I brought a whole lot of nothing). I find it annoying when people post pictures about what they just ate.



But look what I had for breakfast! I couldn’t resist. That pastry is a begniot, I believe it's spelled. Basically a doughnut with raspberry filling. Soo good.

Seeing as that is basically all I did today, I will inform you of what is about to happen just in case I don’t have a whole lot of time to keep this page going for the next two weeks.

This Wednesday, we will begin the travelling portion of our program. We will be in a bus for a looong time. Can you tell I’m just so excited for it? It’ll be a party. Anyway, Wednesday, the 26th, we will be heading to Chartres, France just for one night and a tour of the area. Thursday, the 27th, we will be headed to Amboise, France for three nights where we will go on a tour of the Loire Valley and either Chateau d’Amboise or Leonardo da Vinci’s home depending on what we as students individually choose. Sunday, the 30th, we will head through Mont St. Michel for one night to Bayeux for two nights where we will have a tour of the Normandy beaches and visit a tapestry museum. That next Wednesday, October 3rd, we will travel to Rouen to see the Claude Monet Gardens and another site related to Monet that I’m not sure about. Later that day we will arrive in Abbeville for the night.
Salt and pepper shakers at a souvenir shop! I thought they were adorable, in a kind of extremely creepy way.

Getting bored yet? Sorry, it’s almost done! October 4th we will be visiting the battlefields of the Battle of the Somme and then travelling to Kortrijk, Belgium for the night. Try pronouncing that place, that’ll be entertaining for the next five minutes. It was for me at least. The 6th, we will be making our way to Ghent to see the Duke’s Castle, Cathedral, and a Van Eyck painting. That night we will have made our way to Leiderdorp, in the Netherlands to stay for three nights. Now you’re going to be saying that one out loud to entertain yourself for even longer.
During these days, we will be visiting museums in Amsterdam and seeing other sites in the area. On the 9th, we’re going to be travelling to Antwerp (also fun to say), visiting the Hague and Delft along the way. October 10th we will visit Brussels and on the 11th we will make the last stretch to LONDON!

Via Eurostar, in case you were curious. We will be residing at the BYU London Center, at 27 Palace Court. After using Googlemaps earlier today, I found that it is within blocks of Hyde Park and Portabello Road, which is going to be so awesome!

Anyway…that was really exciting, I know. I haven’t been having much luck in uploading videos on this thing so…here are some more random pictures that have been taken while in Paris.
Being serenaded on the metro. This happens more often than you'd think.

At the Opera house with Handel. We go way back.

Showing off how buff I am at La Conciergerie, with the lovely prison cell windows behind me.
 Just another room in Chateau de Versailles. Really though, there were probably seven rooms in a row just like this one.
Crowns and other headdresses in the Opera House.
Did I tell the story about the Lock bridge? I don't know exactly what it's called but that is what tour guide Sam called it. Couples come and put a lock of some sort on the bridge, usually with initials or something cute written on it and throw the key into the river underneath, symbolizing commitment or whatever. Cute, yeah? Except that the state has a job just for someone to come every two months to cut all the locks off. Some commitment, right?
There ya go.

No comments:

Post a Comment