1 Month to Go!

As of today I have 7 days until my summer traveling begins-- this time next week I will be in Paris and ending my first day of touring with Kevin. Also this time next week, I will only have 25 days left to explore until I come home to Chicago in June. Yikes. The last two weeks have gone by very quickly and it's hard to believe that in less than a month my study abroad experience will be over! I have finished the majority of my finals, except for one this week, and will have to begin saying goodbye to many of my friends here soon. Some are headed back home right away, while others have decided to explore more of Europe as well. In the spirit of wanting to live it up our final weeks and weekends a group of us decided to make one last trip together this past weekend. Destination: Collioure, France.

The front of the Castle!

It's been a while now since I decided I really wanted to visit Collioure. A couple of my friends had heard about this little beach town from their teacher a while ago, whereas I stumbled upon it in a Google search for "beach cities in Southern France"-- creative, I know. Either way, we  all had heard (or in my case read) only wonderful things. This little city is a two hour train ride Southwest and sits right on the Mediterranean about 40 minutes away from Spain's border (if not closer). Its location also makes it another city where Catalan is spoken and used in street signs, but French is much more widely heard. Collioure has a lot of history, with mention of a "fortified site" as early as the 7th century, though today it only has about three thousand residents. We were able to roam around this castle for a couple euro and saw some pretty incredible views of the city from its fortified walls. Even though it was small, it is easily one of my favorite cities, if not my favorite (aside from Montpellier, of course) that I have visited in France. Hopefully my photos will do it justice because it was absolutely charming and everything I pictured a Southern city in France to be like.

Once we arrived to the train station, we immediately started walking towards the city center to start exploring. We initially had hopes that it would be a beach vacation, but we have not been experienced as much summer weather as the South normally does this time of year. Nonetheless, it was still a nice day to walk around and when the sun broke through the clouds, we took full advantage and laid on the pebbled beach we found.

After walking around for a while and seeing the coast we headed into the streets of Collioure. I have come to really love the pedestrian centered streets in France and I think it's going to be weird to come home and to have the majority of streets filled with cars instead of people! We found a cute little restaurant that had something for everyone, though most of us got delicious hamburgers, and sat down for our long lunch hour.

We wrapped up our day by tracking down a bus that would get us to our hotel which was in Argeles Sur Mer about ten minutes away. Once we got checked in we were ready to celebrate Cinco de Mayo with delicious fajitas made by Adrienne while over looking our harbor-view from our hotel balcony. Perfect!

The overnight trip ended with us heading back to Collioure via a boat called "Barracuda", finding another delicious restaurant for lunch, followed by laying on the rocky beach again, and exploring a few more streets before ending back on the train and heading towards Montpellier. It was definitely a memorable trip and a great way to wrap up a semester together as a group!

In terms of finishing up my school experience here, my wonderful Phonetics and Grammar professor, Madame Thome, invited us to her home today to have a "petite dégustation" (little tasting) of traditional French foods. She also invited some other professors as well as their families. Together we all spent about 3 hours nibbling on everything and sipping on wine. She looked at this as an opportunity for those of us who did not live with a family to experience a bit of the French lifestyle, and we were all grateful for her thoughtfulness. This get together was definitely a great way to end my school experience in Montpellier.

In the next few weeks I'll be visiting Paris, London, Barcelona, Strasbourg and Munich, so expect more posts about each of those along the way! June 8th is just around the corner and while I am sad my time here is nearly done, I am still thrilled to get back home and to see everyone again.

Things I've Learned

• In the States, wine that comes in bags/boxes tend to be cheaper and not as high quality. Well, in France the bags/boxes do not indicate anything about quality-- only that the companies and vineyards producing them decided it would be more cost effective to do so.
• This may sound silly, but until today I did not realize that children and adults give the same greeting kisses to each other. For some reason I thought this greeting was reserved for adults and that children were exempt. Good to know now!
• I will never complain about doing laundry in the States again. I thought ISU's $1.25 was expensive for each washer and dryer. Well, the laundry here costs anywhere between 2 and 4 euros per load for washers (depending on size) and another nearly 2 euros for 30 minutes of drying time.
• A high school professor who works in Montpellier with some underprivileged kids informed us that the Gypsies in the area often name their children after American pop-culture. She has had a student named Bob Dylan, one named Sharon after Sharon Stone, and  a student who was named after Meredith Grey from Grey's Anatomy.