Hey der!


soooooo......
after paris i headed north to belgium for some awesome times with my friend anna hutchinson! (shes been in Germany and such) we decided that since they have waffles, the country warranted a visit. he he
we bumped into each other in the brussels train station which was great, and then had the same train together to bruges; a perfectly preserved gorgeous medival belgian city. it was great! full of canals and churches and lots and lots of stone (go figure).

we cozied and caught up in our hostel there and did lots of exploring, eating waffles and laughing at everything in dutch. suchhh a funny language, and the signage provided endless entertainment! he ha
we rented bikes and biked all over the city, as well as spent a day biking all the way to holland. possibly the best. all through the countryside along canals, farm fields, windmills, sheep, horses, tree alleys, and baically endless dutch cliches. we went through so many cute old little villages.

holland was great. we stayed long enough to have some great gloden (!) beer, and see some more windmills...and, miracle of miracles, we managed to make it to holland and back without getting lost, or being too lazy... ha ha. i did manage to drop the bike on my ankle and severly bruise it... win... definately called for a cookie (helped a bit). he he.

after bruges, we both headed to brussels on the train, then anna on to germany.. sad! got into brussels and was in an great hostel there.. my room looked like a space ship lol. the city is so awesome, and at night it is gorgeous and sparkly with all of the palaces and castles lit up and shinny. and of course, this place had waffles too... win!

lucky to be there for a saturday night, and met some great canadians (woot woot!) to make the most of the crazy bars there. i also stayed long enough to see a whole bunch of the city and tourist it up at all the churches and art galleries and old buildings, as well as enjoy the awesome fact that they put french fries in their shwarmas here... (!?!?!??! yes!) and of course to see the little peeing fountain that is so famous...hmmm.

next i headed to the south of france for some WWOOFing (volunteering in exchange for room and board on farms; emma and i did this in chile as well on a goat cheese farm) on a vineyard in provence. crazy train and bus day, but made it to teh vineyard and it was absolutely awesome! stayed in a big old house, and the surrounding area was all vineyars, lavender fields, old castels, churches, orchards, olives, and basically all the provence cliches rolled into one. he he
worked in the grape rows every day replacing wires and attatchements and such. and trudging in between the rows in huge rubber boots. i got stuck in the mud a few times and had to be rescued. lol. fail. toured the wine factory, sampled more wines than i could name, and biked all over the countryside (sore bummm! lol). the family i stayed with was really awesome, they were super nice and i had such a great time! and the last day they took me all over the countryside to see the little villages and castles and such

after that i headed to avignon, if you know of the nursery rhyme... thats the place he he. there i had my first couchsurfing experience, which is where you crash for free on someones couch.. win!m and it was really awesome because i also hitched a ride from the vineyard into avignon with the same person, double win!
so happy because i just figured out how to switch the keyboard from french to english, which has made typing ever so much more easy, for some reason the french have rearranged half of the letters on the keyboard just to make life confusing...
avignon was postcard pretty, and especially twinkly at night. pretty small though, so i didnt stay there long, just enough to see it all and eat a lot of chocolate croissants lol.
next i took the train to marseilles. a lot of people had been telling me to go, or not to go (cuz its not safe), so i figured that i would check it out. if you know the conte of monte cristo, thats the place. it was really cool because the place looked nothing like any of the rest of france ive seen, and it had real character. it was so awesome because i went down to the port to get a boat to go to the chateau d'ife (in the movie slash book too) and ended up on a boat to a different island because of construction. it was great though, because for some reason the capitains decided that of all the people on the boat, i should be the one to drive is there. AHAH. it was SO AWESOME! except that, no joke, i almost crashed into a sail boat, ah ah and at that point they resumed driving. haha. it was a really big boat though, and with just a little button you could make it go every which way! he he. so much fun! i hiked all around the island and it was so awesome! all sparlky and blue mediterranean and big cliffs and caves and soo cool! youll see the picts, its was so great! he he. you you could also hike up to this huge church up on the cliffs towering over the city and you could see all of the city, and the bay and port and islands. wooooww. today i headed on to Nice. the train followed all along the sea and it was all sunny and pink and beautiful! (for IB people, it looked like that drive into Sorrento which was so awesome). havnt seen much of nice yet, but the beach and the sunset and it was all sunny and pink and gorgeous! and my hostel is rated #1 in europe... so well see haha. so far ive met some legit people. im here for a week before meeting my mom in italy, and basically just doing day trips from here to monaco, cannes, menton etc....
love love you!
xo S h