surrounded by water

Hello again! Sorry for the bit of the delay in blogging, I will get on with my adventure straight away!

My flatmates and I went on a whirlwind trip with 3 countries: Switzerland, France, and Spain. All of the cities had some body of water around it- something I'm noticing in most European cities. I'm not complaining, since I loveeee water landscapes! ^_^

02/10- I got to see Titus Andronicus at the Globe. So much fun (you were right Lisa)... I didn't even think about standing there for 3 hours! The actors came out into the yard so much, and I even got spit on by one of the actors. Titus looked just like Will Ferrell, so much so that I couldn't take him seriously during soliloquies. During some of the more graphic, bloody scenes, 30 people fainted!! WHAT?! Grey's Anatomy shows even more blood than that... I only got 3 hours of sleep because the next day...

03/10- We left for Geneva at 4:45 from our flat!!! It was so dark outside! We flew out of Gatwick Airport and had Mickey Ds for breakfast... SO GOOD. :) Basically all we did on the plane was sleep. Once we got into the city, we left our bags at the hostel and began exploring!!! Geneva's a pretty dead city, and what made our visit worse was the thunderstorms! We got soaked!! The air is really fresh and the city's pretty clean though. There are clocks everywhere, and the train times come to the MINUTE. The train was supposed to come at 15:22, and it DID. We wandered around for a bit, but to hide from the rain, we went into H&M. We played with a bunch of their accessories and wore funny hats. For dinner, I had my first kebab- meat from a spit that's put into a taco with MAYO of course, beets, and lettuce. SO GOOD and warm :) We went to the Britannia pub (how fitting right?) after dinner.

The Jet d'Eau- the tallest fountain in the world- basically like Old Faithful Fuzzy Hats! We sooo wanted to buy them

A swan! :) look how clear the water is!

The flower clock was dead! SO disappointing :(

04/10- So basically I've been dying to go the Callier-Nestle chocolate factory for a month, so today we trekked out there! :) On the train ride, we got to see Lake Geneva on a sunny day, which was sooooo pretty. The grass is SO GREEN there, it's amazing. At one of the stops, we got to walk around this small village called Bulle, which was so cute! It's like the Stars Hollow of Switzerland. Back on the train to BROC, where the chocolate factory was. For only 4 SFR, we got to take a tour of the chocolate factory. We ate hazlenuts, cocoa beans, almonds, and as many chocolate samples as you WANT! I'm not that crazy about chocolate, but this was SO GOOD. :) It felt like being in an episode of Unwrapped! ^_^ Needless to say, we ate until we felt sick. Next, we walked around the town for a bit and walked around some of the pastures and watched a cow pee for like 4 WHOLE minutes! O_O So it was back onto the train... we had to switch trains at this one station, but we took the WRONG train once we got there!! YIKES we were there for about 40 minutes in the middle of nowhere. We got to look around at this old cemetary though with real tombstones (ones that stick up out of the ground). So back to the train in the right direction towards Montreux. We didn't have enough time to visit this chateau, so we had dinner right by the lake instead! :) SO GORGEOUS!! the (French!) waiter smelled awful though. We even got to eat ice cream sundaes and dessert! I tried Creme Brulee Montbovon ice cream on the way home too.

Our first local friend... we wanted to take him home :(

The really pleasant train ride

Beautiful view from the train

Sundaes by the lake! (Europeans seem to enjoy a cookie or a biscuit with their ice cream)

pigging out at the chocolate factory

Fake jumping picture in the by the hills of Switzerland!

Swiss Trivia:

• They don't have their own language, they speak French, German, and Italian. The part where we were was French though. Thank God Phoebe could order us food!!
• They're famous for their cows, cheese, chocolate, and clocks. While we were there we also realized lots of other things come from Switzerland: K-Swiss shoes, Swatch, and Swiss Army Knives! LOL

05/10-We caught the morning train to Avignon at the buttcrack of dawn. It was still dark when we woke up again! It took sooo long for us to get to Lyon, so our train was really behind schedule. We finally made it out to Avignon... Provence!! When we got to our hostel, we started cracking up! It was a timeshare and looked exactly like a hotel place in Santa Barbara! We seriously felt like we were back in CA again! We walked along the HIGHWAY! since we didn't want to wait for the bus, and we're too poor. It's not that bad because you get to see the Rhone right next to you. Lots of truck drivers honked at us though, but like Shelley said, "If I had been driving all day and saw four girls, I would honk too." HAHA We ate at this really cheap sandwich cart (the best places to eat while you're out on holiday). I had Orangina for the first time! :) I'm definately gaining all my weight back- I had a chicken sandwich (poulet frite) with fries inside it! Greasy goodness... we went to all these little touristy shops. This region is famous for their lavender, so the stores all smelled so good! We saw the Palais des Papes (not sure if that's spelled right) and the Pont Sant-Bezenet (a bridge that doesn't go all the way across the Rhone). Also shopping at H&M, Etam, Zara, etc.! It felt so good to actually buy things that were reasonably priced. We bought dinner for ourselves at a market called Casino and watched First Knight in French. Richard Gere was soooo young! But he doesn't do it for me (neither does Patrick Dempsey).

Me with the dog at the hostel (Roxy!)

Danielle walking across the highway

06/10- We took the train to Portbou, this really small costal town right on the border of France and Spain. It was soooo beautiful! I can't believe I got to stick my toes in the Mediterranean! :) There were houses on the side of the hill right off the coast, and the streets in the town were windy and empty since everyone was on siesta. We had lunch at this little cafe- I got a spanish omlette sandwich. In Spain I ordered things that I didn't even know, but each dish was a nice surprise. At dinner I got Fruita del Mar (which means it had fish in it), but my Spanish is so malo that I didn't know this! But I was still happy anyways because Barcelona is famous for their anchovies and seafood. We stayed at Phoebe's friend's (Alyssa-the funniest person ALIVE!) place, which was right NEXT to la Sagrada Familia (Guadi's masterpiece). It's a temple that has been under construction since 1882 and still isn't finished yet! O_O We had boxed sangria (classy, right) and walked along the beach. At one of the bars, Phoebe met this boy she had a crush on in 7th grade! What a coinkydink!!! Apparently he aged well too. Charlie, one of Alyssa's friends, lives in the coolest place. We got off the metro (which is AMAZING btw, so clean, has air conditioning, and TVs!! way better than Paris's) and take a few windy alleyways and BOOM there's his apartment door. They live in the coolest parts of Barcelona! They also get decorations and paintings on the walls... at that point we were kicking ourselves for having picked the most expensive city in Europe to live in and for having the ugliest flats ever. :(

07/10- Woke up bright and early to go to the Sagrada Familia. It's soooo mindblowing- Gaudi, the famous architect, tried to put all these symbols and details in the facade. There was the navitity scene in the front, while the newer part featured the Passion. Luckily I brought along a guidebook so Danielle and I could figure out what each part meant. It was like playing Where's Waldo! We paid 2 euro to get inside to the top! We got to see all the houses and even the ocean! :) Then we walked to Las Ramblas where we got stopped by a parade! There were soooo many people out on the street. They sell all sorts of animals on the street too- chinchillas, parakeets, turkeys, chickens, pidgeons, chameleons, ferrets, fish, and lizards. CRAZY! We also went to the Boquiera Market and saw loads of produce, fish, nuts, and goodies. Afterwards, we went to the Museo Picasso and looked around. He was SO talented- I have a new respect for him. More shopping afterwards... Zara is SO CHEAP in Spain! ^_^I had the most exspensive dinner of my life that night too. We had tapas (SO GOOD!), paella, and a pitcher of sangria. I ate sooo much! The funniest part was when we were on Las Ramblas again at night (Spanish time is 2-3 later than everything else), and these drunk kids threw water on us. Alyssa said in Spanish, "We don't need to be watered! We're not PLANTS!" well... it was funny at the time ^_^ It started raining on us, so we didn't get to clubbing with Phoebe's middle school friends. Apparently that club is also really dressy too, and you can't wear flip flops!

On top of Sagrada Familia!

One of the parades we ran into! :)

Paella and sangria- delicioso!!

Anything you want, they have it at Boquiera

close up of la sagrada familia

Every city seems to need a phallic symbol (this is just like London's Gherkin!)

08/10- Woke up bright and early to go to Parc Guell, another one of Gaudi's famous landmarks. He tried to design a place where the rich people in Barcelona could live. Sadly, no one liked his crazy style and only two houses were built- one of which was his! There were mosaics everywhere! We also took the metro to Barcelonta one of the beaches right in Barcelona. They have fake sand! It was a little sad, since the weather wasn't cooperating, but we enjoyed the beach anyways. Barcelona is PDA central! O_O Thankfully, it wasn't too sunny, otherwise there would have been topless sunbathers too. It was sooooo SCARY because we missed our train to Reus, this teeny tiny airport that's 70 miles away from Barcelona. Phoebe was like "Uhh, Uhh..." The best thing we could to was go to the train station, where they had buses that left for the airport. We didn't know when the buses left though, so on the metro, I was praying to myself "Please don't let us miss the bus... please don't let us miss the bus" When we got to the bus station, I used my HORRIBLE Spanish (yo busco un bus por aeropuerto?!) to get us on the bus, which was loading while we were running there!! That was enough Amazing Race for me... we got onto the bus (THANK GOD), and rode out to the airport. It was soooo ghetto! They didn't use PA systems or computers... their "organizer" was an old costco-sized kitkat box! O_O We even had to run out to the airplane to get our seats... it was madness since everyone wanted the best seats. We made it back to London and were VERY happy to be back home.

On top of Parc Guell

On the runway at the airport! WTH?

10/10- So the holiday's over, but yesterday, I took Enqin out to see Mary Poppins (one of my favorite movies!!!)! She's Vanessa's lovely friend who picked me up from Heathrow my first day in London. And she didn't even meet me before coming here! It was SO CUTE! The sets were amazing, and the special effects were so cool! I couldn't stop smiling :) The only thing was that was a bit sad was that the songs were all out of order, and they changed the story a little. But it was still a fun night!! ^_^

Enqin and I having a jolly ol' time at Mary Poppins! (once again, let down by people who can't take decent pictures)

WHEW that was a long entry... I'm pretty tuckered out after our long trip. I survived on my one backpack! Now onto midterms and papers! EEK!