Tours around Tours and the Return to Nantes

Hello friends!  Well, the other students and I have returned to Nantes* after a 3 1/2 day orientation in Tours, a city in the Loire Valley that is close to many chateaux.  In all, we visited 5:

• Loche: A mideaval chateau overlooking an adorable little city.
• Chenonceau:  Had a lot of beautiful grounds but we were given entirely way too much time to explore.
• Blois:  Completed during different epochs and so it has different architectural styles all around it and right next to each other in the same building (all of which I know nothing about, but for an architecturally-inclined person, I'm sure it's even more fascinating).
• Chambord:  A very large chateau that housed the Mona Lisa and some other paintings/cultural artifacts ("les otages de guerre") during World War II to protect them from the Nazis.  The historical, cultural, and human consequences are almost too much, positively and negatively, and a cause for contradiction of the heart (saving paintings over people?).
• Usse':  We only visited here for about 15 minutes and didn't go in because it was on our way home but it was the inspiration for the Sleeping Beauty castle! (shown below)

Here

Hey everyone--just a quick note that I am here finally and missing you!  (Unless I don't like you, in which case, I'm glad we've got an ocean between us....I jest.)  Travel here went really smoothly and I didn't get lost at the train station (mostly because I followed some other IESers that I found).  Probably the worst thing was that I ate a soggy sandwich at Au Bon Pain in Philadelphia.  Au Bon Pain, as the name suggests, had some really good-looking bread that I was thinking I should buy (it's hard to resist a good-looking baguette) but I stopped myself with the knowledge that I would have the real thing when I got to France.  Which I did.  Which was delicious (tomato and mozzarella sandwich-yum).  After a little while, my host mother came to pick me up and I got to meet part of my host family when I got to their house (three live at home and the three older kids live outside the home).  It was kind of difficult with everyone coming at me in French at the speed of light, especially because I was a little off from the flight, but not too jet-lagged (I'm mostly just a little fatigued and every so often I feel a little nauscious [sp?] but nothing too bad).  Then we had dinner--soup with chunks of ham in it, lasagne with spinach and salmon (which I must get the recipe for), and an apple crumble for dessert.  It was yummy :)  We actually had a quiche for the first course tonight at dinner that was spinach and salmon, too.  I'm hoping that this combination is a trend!  Now we are in the city of Tours just a couple hours away where we'll have some orientation and visit some of the castles of the Loire Valley, which should be pretty.

Until next time!

Once again...

Hey everyone. So it's time to open up the rusty old blog again because I'm going to France for the Spring. More specifically, I'll be in Nantes. "Where is that?" you ask. Well, let me show you:

I'm leaving this Tuesday and should get to Paris on Wednesday morning and then I'll take the train to Nantes. Stay tuned to see if I, in fact, make it to my destination (assuming I do, I'll go with the other American students to Tours in the Loire Valley for an orientation) and how I fare using my terribly mis-pronounced French.

Reflection of Summer

"Farewell, Season!  You were very beautiful and rich.  No other summer can compare with you.  Today I recognize this even though there have been times when you made me terribly unhappy and sad.  As something to remember me by, I leave you my adventures, littered all over the park and the lanes and gardens.  I can't take my age [twenty] back with me, that will have to stay behind here for good.  Now you're sinking amont the shades, and down to the underworld along with you goes all this [...]"

-Bruno Shulz, Autumn