26-28 septembre 2014

WEEKEND IN BORDEAUX -- NOT (to be explained later)! I was pretty excited for this weekend excursion, and not just because I got to miss a day of school. However, it wasn't as fun as I expected it to be. I showed up 15mn early to the train station, which required me to wake up at 7h (I am a college student; this is never okay). What they didn't tell us was that they had told us to meet an hour and 15mn before our train departed just in case. As you can imagine, I was not pleased. Whatever, I got over it. It was my first time riding a train so I was very excited! Unfortunately, I slept like 99% of the 3 hour trip because I had to wake up so early (okay, maybe I'm not over it).

Day 1 - 26 Septembre 2014

Once we got to Bordeaux, we dropped our stuff off at the hotel, grabbed a quick lunch (we all ended up eating at the same restaurant somehow haha), and got a tour of the city!

View from the hotel

We went on a walking tour and of course we saw fancy churches

We also went to a museum of local/regional history. Wine from Bordeaux has been renowned for centuries! The English actually invented barrels specifically to export it back to the UK... Hence the barrels and other nautical things.

They had a bunch of scale models of ships. It's like a ship in a bottle except the bottle. And it's a lot bigger...

Please note just how awful French architects were... The bottom arch is not centered. This actually happens quite often lol

I love these small European streets.

I mean, just look at them!

Um... no significance to this building, really. I just thought it looked nice haha

Justine and I went out for dinner and then met up with her friend, Vincent, and his girlfriend, Mao. They were really cool and I'm glad I went out with them!

We also saw a cool street performer... I didn't catch it on video but she's really good with the crowd haha

Day 2 - 27 Septembre 2014

Rendez-vous was bright and early. Instead of being able to explore Bordeaux more, we were shipped off to Arcachon for a 2.5 hour walking tour. As beautiful as it was, I was tired and the tour was really long...

This city is split into 4 neighborhoods named after the seasons. These are some houses in Summer.

Our tour guide and lots of greens.

We walked up this huge hill and this is the view! Wow!

There's also this huge metal tower that was designed by, you guessed it, Gustave Eiffel (this was before he was cool, wow Arcachon how hipster of you). It's known as the "Eiffel Tower [of Arcachon]." How misleading...

The view from the top!

The view from the top!

Me at the top!

...I'm really bad at taking panoramas haha...

Once our tour FINALLY ended, we had an AMAZING lunch by the beach. This was salmon and risotto.

As much as I love salmon, the dessert was what made this lunch great. So. Good.

After lunch, I just chilled on the beach and, unfortunately, reattained my farmer's tan that I worked so hard all summer to get rid of :( The sun here must be really strong or something because it's usually impossible for me to tan... Anyways, men in speedos, girls in bikinis, women with bare breasts. You know. European beaches. Yay...

We finally got back to Bordeaux and we went out for dinner.

Steak (which was just whatever) and unlimited fries.

UNLIMITED FRIES. (also derp)

Day 3 - 28 Septembre 2014

This really was The Trip of THE WORST PLANNING EVER. Met up bright and early -- again -- to go to Saint-Emilion. Very charming city but giving us two hours to explore this tiny city and then taking us on a walking tour of it was probably not the best idea...

You know what else wasn't the best idea? Wine tasting at 10AM on a Sunday morning. Yea. That happened.

Luckily (or maybe not so), we only got three glasses with this much wine.

AKA three sips of wine for me (just to be polite). Everyone was super disappointed because they were expecting some fancy Napa Valley stuff. I'm pretty sure this was free because most wineries give free dégustations (in less bougie terms: samples).

I got a stomach ache from drinking wine on an empty stomach -_- so I ate. I always eat.

And this cute kid sat next to us. Look how stylish he is!

Then we tried le canelé which this region is known for. It was... gross.

So here are some streets...

And wine cellars...

So cute!

Yea everything is about wine basically.

Oh and this church.

It was built into a monolith...

Strange art gallery where I got in trouble for taking pictures. This cat makes me think of Miyazaki's "The Cat Returns"!

Funny? Sassy? Creepy? Imagine if these were all weeping angels...

Here's a view of the city! (or village? I'm not sure what's the right word...)

And right outside the city limits are some vineyards!

Yaaay vineyards (read: Yaaay wine)

This was my first weekend excursion with ACCENT. I didn't enjoy it as much as I had hoped because there were too many tours and too many places (we barely spent any time in Bordeaux itself!) but I guess I can't complain because France. Yes, France. Just France.