City Beauvais

... trop fatigué pour m'aimer, mais c'est pas grave... Anne Laure travaille à l'aéroport et me raconte tout le fonctionnement et les mésaventures que l'on peut rencontrer en temps que voyageur ou encore comme salarié de "Ryanair" (ou presque). Une mine d'informations partagées devant une bonne tartiflette... que du bonheur... surtout que j'ai été reçu comme un roi... une fois encore vive couchsurfing et merci à toi Anne Laure!

... at 2, so we decided to get a coffee and walk around. We found a lot of shops, and the cathedral, but we were dragging around our luggage, so we couldn't do much. Then we walked back to the train station to catch the bus at the airport. Once we were at the airport, more waiting. We had to wait to check in, and then we had to wait to board the plane. We flew Ryanair, and there are no assigned seats, so we were first in line and got seats in the front of ...

... dined" us as if we were favorite old friends. They shared 20 year old wine with us! (In the US, we buy wine and drink it that night. The French buy wine and save it for a later date.) I was speechless that they were willing to share such a treasure with us. We enjoyed a very special afternoon with them. Before we left they shared some ...

... took the train to Versailles, which is about 40 minutes southwest of Paris. There was a little town nearby (Versailles) that I went into first because I had read there was a really neat market there on Fridays so I went. It was neat to see all the old people rushng around for their produce. I also went iinto a little shop to buy a smaller umbrella and found one I liked so I then headed to Versailles. I happened to be wearing the wrong ...

... paintings in France (after the Louvre), with a library stocked with rare and precious books and manuscripts...to pop this little bubble, unfortunately a lot of them are copies, while the originals lay in the Louvre, or well hidden and preserved in one of France's prestigious libraries. I wasn't too impressed with all of the statues of dogs (the Orleans family was big into hunting), but the chapel was amazing...unfortunately I had to run in and run out of the chapel because my tour ...

... In the afternoon we went for a drive to Chantilly, on the way we stopped to see Le Chateau de la Reine Blanche, a beautiful unused and small castle structure by a lake. So picturesque in the middle of the forest and apparently built just as a resting place for the royal family to enjoy refreshments when out hunting. We saw the great castle at Chantilly which wasn't open, but we wandered the lovely narrow streets, with all the old ...

I have always been interested in France. Also in the most beautiful villages of France. One of them is Gerberoy. Close (300 km./180 miles) to my home we went to visit it. It was desolated and abandonned until Henri-Eugene le Sidaner decided to reside there. He was a painter and other artists came and restored the village to its beauty it is now.

... as if afraid it was going to collapse. Construction scaffolding was covering the first few meters of the façade, but we were able to observe the gargoyles and the details of the elegant spires as we drew nearer.  Faces, some frightened and others placid, emerged from the stonework as well as flowers and vines. 157 ...

... we arrived in Paris!!! ...People were very tired and there were a few in the group ready to go home at this point. I think it was also partially triggered by the fact that we got to our rooms and they were TINY!!!! Imagine the size of a room at DT at BYU, now cut that in half, put two twin beds and the a third bed stretching across those two but about three feet up in there. The bathroom is a circleish oval thing that is ...

... fro a cruise on the Seine, go to the Louvre and see the Mona Lisa, and do the one thing I didn't do last time, which was see the Moulin Rouge all lit up at night. After Paris we headed into the Loire valley where we visited the beautiful castle in Chenonceaux and then headed on a rather uncomfortable and noisy overnight train to Annecy in the Alps, arriving at about 6am.