Hotel Victoria Calais

Hé hé !

L'Amérique latine, nous voici nous voilà très très bientôt !!!
Plus que quelques heures avant le décollage...
L'excitation et l'appréhension sont 2 émotions qui se battent en duel en ce moment.

Le départ est prévu à 20h ce lundi 7 décembre de Paris CDG et l'atterrisage le mardi 8 décembre à Buenos Aires.
Nous en avons rêvé et ce projet va enfin devenir réalité.

Nous partons tout équipés : les 2 v ...

I just arrived in Lille just over an hour ago by TGV (in right around an hour from Paris, super fast). I got a bit lost arriving to my new host's house, but here I am, safe and warm. I'll stay here till Friday, when we carpool (two groups in two cars) to a big CS weekend meeting in Rotterdam. There I should be able to meet up with my host in Hague (about 20 or 30 minutes away).

The last few days were ...

... else trying to find out if they're British as well (hey, that's me!), and look quite defensive when somebody else sits next to them (hey, that's me as well!). They then get out an English book and try to look very superior because they speak another language. (I do that sometimes.)
A lot of French people, particularly early in the morning, sit down and close their eyes and somehow magically wake up when it's their stop and run off the train. I don't know how they can do that ...

... therefore imagine how disturbing it was to see this torture machine in real-life!
Parts of the exhibition were very interesting, and the artist takes inspiration from contemporary society and when explained, some of his works make a lot of sense, but some of them are incredibly strange!

Yesterday I took a trip to Dunkirk with two other English girls, my guide-book says that Dunkirk is the most interesting of Nord-Pas-de-Calais ...

... lesson, which was with a teacher that I still hadn't met. Fortunately she was very nice, and the students in her first class were interested and motivated.
The next class however was a different story, and frustrated and upset me a lot, perhaps it was due to it being their final class of the day (at 4.30pm), but the students were easily distracted and chatty, they were rude and they were not afraid of causing offence. One of them did get sent ...

Spend a long day travelling and our campsite provides overnight accommodation ahead of our crossing tomorrow. The weather is really blustery, wild winds interspersed with showers. We arrive to late to use the onsite swimming pool but have a lovely French meal in a restaurant right next to ...

Sunday 22nd March Literally spent all day in the flat. It's amazing how tiring doing absolutely nothing can be. Did hear from Bob that the 6 Nations rugby ended up a close run thing between N.Ireland and Wales but I can't help feeling that it would have just a bit too exciting for the Eglington household. Monday 23rd March Decided to go for broke and travel home today. True to form, the German weather was dull and a drab grey as I set off ...

... have visited such as San Marino, Andorra, and Monaco - the only one I have left to visit is Lichtenstein. It has taken a different path to most of the others in that it hosts many administrative units of the EU. I spend a few hours there looking at the Palace of the Grand dukes, Viaduct, Europe Square, European Parliament but I don't have time to look through the Bock casemates - what is left of the original fortifications of the city - 3 fortified rings with 24 forts, and ...

... I am also used to Spanish being the only foreign language being spoken so my automatic response when I don't understand what's being said to me is to speak in Spanish. I am surprised at how dirty the streets are. There are trash bins everywhere but there's just as much **** right next to bin as in it. So after driving through the "Moulin-Rogue" district for what seemed like hours, I started to get a little nervous that our hotel would be nuzzled between two ...

... I'd spend close to that on Internet fees at a café somewhere. It was about 1600 when I checked in, so I hauled my **** up to my room, then wandered the city for another 3 hours or so. The city isn't quite what I expected it to be, but it certainly is nice. It's a good intro to France, for sure. Tomorrow I'm going to head into Cologne, a day early. JUST to make sure I get snarreled up in Frances damn drug enforcement agency again.