We were finally able to sleep in this morning! It's a great feeling knowing we are on our own time schedule now. No airports to rush to to get to our next stop. And it was a good thing because we were all dead this morning. We had planned on getting up and eating breakfast at 8:30 but 9:20 is close enough, right? We went down and ate the complimentary breakfast before packing up our stuff and heading out to pick up our rental car.
We took a taxi which was a smart choice. It saved us time and money. We got to the car rental place and Liz and I let the boys figure everything out. Once they got everything settled, we had to walk down the street a bit to the garage to get the car. And here she is:
Logan commented that it looks like a happy car; it's smiling at you. It must know it's about to tour Europe with us!
We got in and were off to the beach! We parked and first went searching for some towels. Liz and Logan didn't bring any to save room in their bags on the planes and had planned on buying some in Barcelona since we'll have a car the rest of the trip and don't have to worry about luggage size for planes. We stopped in this little store, the type of stores that line the streets in Mexico, and found some decent towels. Tom and I ended up buying one as well to have a beach towel so we don't have to has our shower towels. I also bought a little drawstring bag since I didn't think about bringing one. So now I don't have to carry around my water bottle and don't have to rely on just my pockets for things. I was fine without one in Iceland and London because the jacket I brought had awesome big pockets. But now I won't be wearing the jacket, so a little bag was needed.
After we made our purchases, we walked down to the beach.
The water was a little chilly at first, but once I got all the way in it was perfect. It felt so good to just hang out in the water jumping over the waves coming at us. Nothing like swimming in the Mediterranean Sea!
We got out of the water to lay out and dry. This became prime people watching time. Spotted a few topless women, some women who were wearing bikinis but shouldn't be, men in speedos, and lots of people smoking. It didn't make for the most enjoyable day on the beach. Welcome to Europe where everyone smokes and it's allowed pretty much anywhere! So gross.
Once we were all dry, we headed back to the car. I quickly grabbed my phone and took one last picture before we drove off.
We went searching for a place to eat some lunch and needed somewhere with a bathroom so we could change. There was no way we were going to drive for five hours in our suits. So we ended up at McDonald's. We are very good at choosing authentic type restaurants... It was a pretty fancy McDonald's though. And it had wifi. One thing that is always an added bonus at any place we happen to be at so Tom and I can get Internet. Liz and Logan have data due to their phone provider which has been very helpful with GPS and searching for things when wifi is not available.
We got back in the car and started our journey towards Marseille, France. I don't even think I can describe how beautiful the drive was. Everywhere you looked was green; mountains, fields, etc. So. Much. Green! I took a few pictures but they don't do it justice at all! Plus pictures taken in a moving car don't come out the greatest either.
I was bummed because I wanted to take a picture of the sign welcoming us to France, but we missed it! It came up on us so fast! we were just asking Tom how close we were to crossing the border, he responded not quite yet but soon, and then two seconds later it was there. Tom was quick and did a picture, but it was blurry.
One thing we weren't planning on were toll roads. That put a damper on our plans. But we can't do too much about it. At one toll stop in France, we couldn't figure out what it was asking. We put in our cards and none were working. We tried to call for assistance and couldn't communicate with the language barrier. There were a line of cars behind us and after about five minutes of sitting there trying to figure it out, the guy in the car right behind us got out and paid our toll! He was pissed we were taking so long. Must've been in a hurry. We aren't complaining though, he saved us €14.20. Thank you pissed off Frenchman!
We made a stop in a little city called Carcassonne. This place was beautiful. It had a castle, The Château Comtal, that reminded me a little of the Hogwarts castle.
We walked up towards it thinking it was just going to be this cool castle to walk around and were surprised to find out there is a little town inside of it! There were all these little shops and cafes along the small streets. So fun! We had only planned on stopping in this city and moving on to Marseille. But of course we stayed way longer than expected because it turned out way cooler than we had imagined.
We went into this candy shop and had to buy some. I took a little of everything that looked good. There were these caramel balls that were sooo good! I wish I had bought more.
We finally realized the time and knew we should get some dinner and get back on the road. We still had a three hour drive ahead of us and it was getting late.
We ran into some sister missionaries on the way back to the car. One was from Finland and the other from Sweden. They spoke perfect English so it was fun to talk to them for a bit. The church makes the world seem a lot smaller!
On the drive to find a place to eat, we stopped at this intersection with a fun view of the sunset and a Ferris wheel.
We found a little pizza place for dinner and once again struggled with the language barrier. Reading a menu in French was hard. But we finally figured some stuff out and waited for them to make the pizzas right in front of us. Not the quickest choice for the hurry we were in since it took an hour, but once they were made we paid and ate in the car.
For most of the car ride, I wrote this blog post and read Enders Game on the nook Marcie let me borrow. I didn't participate in much of the conversations because the other three have been really good friends for years so they have a lot of things and people they talk about that I can't contribute to the convo anyway. But I don't mind. I'm used to that sort of thing and am totally fine reading a book.
We took another detour to a city called Arles to see this Roman colosseum, Arles Arena, Tom was told to go see. It was quite the adventure trying to get to it. The city is full of tiny one way streets and our GPS kept telling us to drive down streets that we couldn't. But we finally found it and were a little too lazy and tired to get out and walk around it. Tom was the only to get out and take a picture.
The adventure then continued when we tried to get out of the city and back on the highway. These streets were tiny!! It was crazy. We came to a street that we thought there was no way we could get through it. But we had no choice unless we wanted to attempt backing up the way we came. So we went for it and somehow made it through. I kept thinking of movies with car chases in international cities and there is no way some of those scenes are possible! We finally found our way out of the maze to normal streets and got back on the highway to Marseille. We arrived at our hostel around 1:30 a.m. I spotted three rats as we parked our car on the street. Yeah, it's a little sketchy part of the city. Our room in the hostel is decent enough though. And luckily it's just the four of us in a room. No more sharing with strangers!
So far this trip has been so great! Granted, it would be better if I had someone special to share it with. It's cute watching Liz and Logan (who are married) be all couple-y. And then there's Tom who talks to and about his fiancé (practically, not literally) at home any chance he gets. And then there's me.. But I'm still having the time of my life! I mean, I'm in Europe right now! Life is good.
No comments:
Post a Comment