An arctic blast and the best drinks in Ireland

 After my classes got out, I flew to Dublin, Ireland to meet Erin, Jillie, and Reva. The only problem was that all three of them were stuck in London a day later than usual because there was so much snow in England! While I waited for them to catch their flights, I had a day to explore the city by myself.

The first morning was a Sunday, and not much was open. I decided to walk around a little because I got in late the night before and just went to sleep. I walked along the river, and it was very cold with a little bit of snow on the ground. There were hardly any people out, but I saw some interesting buildings, and guess what? Everyone speaks English in Ireland! It was my first time out of France in 3 1/2 months, so it was kind of weird to be out of the francophone world. It was cool to take a short flight and be in what seemed like a completely different world from France. I'll be honest, the Irish accent was a little difficult for me to understand at first, something I wasn't really expecting to have trouble with.

Photo from my walk on the first morning in Dublin

 A down the river in the morning

 

 Buildings in Dublin through a hole in a modern bridge

The hostel I had stayed at the first night offered a free walking tour of the city. I wasn't really sure what else I could do, so it sounded like a good idea. It actually turned out to be a really interesting 3 hour tour where I made some Australian friends and learned quite a bit about history in Dublin. I learned about Ireland's oppression by Britain and poverty throughout its history. We walked by cathedrals, bridges, parks, lots of statues, Trinity College, and more as we learned about Dublin's interesting history. The tour guide was a student at Dublin's famous Trinity College.

In case anyone was wondering, Ireland is definitely not part of the UK. 

 Christ Church cathedral where a mummified cat and mouse were found in one of the organ pipes

The Sunday afternoon before Christmas is no quiet place in Dublin

 That night I walked to the B&B where I would be staying with my friends the rest of our time in Dublin. It was a very adorable family-owned place inside of what used to be a home. There was a Christmas tree and coffee and delicious tea available all the time. I talked to the owner for a while and I asked him about Gaelic because it is used on all of the road signs and other various things throughout the city. It is still spoken, and my tour guide from earlier that day said that she was a fluent speaker of Gaelic. Apparently Irish school children are required to take it throughout elementary school and high school, but it is really only spoken in small groups throughout Ireland. Not everyone in Ireland is fluent in Gaelic, but they are all fluent in English.

Erin and Jillie got in late on my second night in Dublin. In the morning while we waited for Reva to get in, we walked to the botanical garden just a few blocks from our B&B. It was freezing! We stopped by a bakery on the way back to the B&B and got some Irish soda bread scones and ate them with tea when we did get back. Mmmmm. I missed those French baguettes for under a euro though.

On the walk to the botanical garden. The buildings are so different than France!

 Botanical gardens in the winter = not too colorful, but still interesting.

Ceiling inside huge greenhouse

LOOK! I found a relative to my favorite tree! I was soooo happy to see a tree that is a close relative to arbutus menzeisii! Ireland is definitely too cold for a real one, but it was still cool. 

Door to our B&B

A nice snack after being outside when it started to snow

As we got back, it started to snow, and hard. This picture doesn't really do the snow justice. The news called it an "arctic blast" in Great Britain.

After Reva arrived, we caught the bus into downtown and walked around for a while and ate. In the evening, we went to a play that we had bought tickets for in advance. It was a really good Irish romantic comedy.

A Dublin street

The next day, we woke up and it was snowing pretty hard. In fact, it snowed pretty hard the entire day. All four of us had flights out of Dublin the next day, and we found out in the afternoon that the Dublin airport would be closed until 8am the next day.

Jillie and Reva catching many snowflakes in their mouths

One of the few moments it wasn't snowing in Dublin the third day

We went to the huge Guinness factory and museum that was several stories. At the top, there was a huge glass room, and it was snowing really hard outside. It was like a reverse snow globe. I think it was the best place to be when it was snowing that hard. The top floor was also a bar where I got a free pint of Guinness after going through the museum.

 Me sipping my pint with the landscape of snow behind me.

Snow on some angel statues in the middle of the city

While in Dublin, we also went to Trinity College and saw the Book of Kells and the library after which George Lucus modeled the Jedi Library after in one of his movies. It was the coolest library I have ever been in! We also went to a year-round market where I bought some photographs by a local artist.

 Reva outside the Dublin castle. It was snowing, of course.

Jillie and I having some Irish coffee (that was later followed by a Baily's coffee) at a pub in the famous Temple Bar district of Dublin. Mmmm, it was soooo good and warming, especially with all of the snow outside! The Irish pubs were really nice and cozy on a winter night leading up to Christmas!

Thankfully, we all got out on our flights on the right day. Jillie flew back to Spain, and then to the U.S., and Reva, Erin, and I made it to Rome. I really started to miss France and French by the end of being in Dublin! I couldn't get a fresh baguette or pain au chocolat at the bakeries. I did buy some delicious soda bread, digestives, and Irish tea from the grocery store though.

Lights in Lyon and a reminder of home

Hello everyone! I know it has been a while since I last wrote, but my computer died, making it a bit difficult to do lots of things on the internet. A few weeks ago I went to Lyon for the Fete des Lumieres (sorry, my keyboard doesn't have accents right now) which is an annual holiday event that is only in Lyon. During the day, the city was pretty normal looking, other than a few remnants of what would be happening in the evening. The friends I was with and I walked up to a cathedral on the hill and looked out over the city, and then continued to walk throughout the streets waiting for night when all of the events would take place.

View of the cathedral we walked up to

 

Tree at the restaurant near the cathedral

The nativity set up in the basement of the cathedral in preparation for Christmas

Ruins from when Lyon was inhabited by the Romans. We stopped there on the way down from the cathedral.

 

View of Lyon walking down from the cathedral. Lyon used to be the capitol of France before Paris. 

The crowded streets in Lyon, but not nearly as crowded as they would be 10 hours later.

A band playing music in the streets

A huge statue we stumbled upon while we were walking around.

You will see this later, but it will look different.

A building in Lyon. I like it because it is a new building that you can see the reflection of classical architecture on, so it is kind of new and old architecture.

A Salvation Army brass band playing Christmas tunes in the street. It was freezing out!

As it started to get colder out and the sun began to set, we made it to the Christmas market, much like the one in Grenoble. The stands looked a little different and some of them were selling different items. Of course, there was still vin chaud, roasted chestnuts, and crepes.

Something I found at the market. I'm not really sure what it is either.

Beautifully painted Russian dolls for sale at one of the stands.

Night settled in and the city began to transform into a festival of light, and with that, masses of people. The festival includes various light shows on buildings, fountains, and other pieces of architecture throughout the city. They all happened simultaneously, and we walked (or tried to...there were a ton of people everywhere) around to various shows. There were lit up windmills by the river, TPs, a street of black light where you could write on the wall with chalk, light shows on cathedrals, and so much more. The cathedral that we had visited earlier changed from green to red to blue to purple all evening. 

People in the lite up street just before the light shows began.

The same fountain that I posted a picture of above was completely different at night. The lights changed with the music that was playing. It was actually kind of creepy. The horses had neon green eyes and they would sometimes be engulfed by flames.

A picture of the light show I watched on a cathedral. It also had music, and the show was about the building and rebuilding of the church. Here it is as though there is a ton of ivy on it. I could barely move in the crowd, but it was probably my favorite light show that I saw that night.

Another light show inside a square. It was supposed to be jungle themed.

 Street ally with a black light and a box of chalk on the wall where you could draw or write your name, like I did. You can also see the ceiling of lite-up origami flowers at the end of the ally.

This exhibit was farther from the center and there were not a ton of people. It was also a little creepy. There was a loud audio recording of some man was reading something in what sounded like Latin with a church choir in the background.

The less crowded streets that weren't as central in town. People were selling vin chaud for 1 euro instead of 1.50, closer to the center, and 2 euro in the main square. I met some students playing instruments and selling vin chaud under "prix libre," meaning I could pay whatever I wanted.

  

As the evening came to an end and I was headed back to the bus to Grenoble, I saw a remnant of my home in the northwest United States in a window shop. It is an authentic Native American totem pole that was shipped from Vancouver Island, just north of the San Juan Islands. It was a bit shocking to find a piece of American art, especially from somewhere so close to where I live.

 

Overall, the festival was a bit bizarre, but it reconfirmed my love for France and French culture. 

Tonight is Christmas Eve, so Merry Christmas everyone!

Snowboarding the Alps

As a last minute decision, I decided to go snowboarding with a few friends from class. All of the costs are subsidized for students, so it is a lot cheaper than it could be. It turned out to be an awesome adventure as it was a perfectly beautiful day in the French Alps. The day started at 7 when we caught one of the many student buses heading to Les Deux Alps ski station. With all of the snow that the region has gotten recently, the drive up was really beautiful as the sun rose over the valleys. We drove through lots of small French villages with snow frosted churches, alpine homes with huge icicles, and a fresh fountain.

View from the 1 1/2 hour bus ride up

The sun rising in the Alps

Frosty lake near the top of the mountain

We reached the resort town, rented gear, got our ski passes, and practiced a little bit of snowboarding. I have only done it twice in my life, and it was three years ago, so it took a fair amount of the day just practicing the basics. I am proud to say that I didn't face plant as much as I thought I would.

First glimpse of the resort town on a chilly, but perfectly blue Saturday morning

Near the rental area and where I picked up my ski pass

The beautiful mountains

Me taking a break from the slopes

View of the little hill I practiced on for a while

After a few too many runs on the boring hill, two friends and I decided to take a chance and go up the huge télépherique that was carrying people out of view over the top of one of the mountains. We didn't really know where it went, but we thought it could bring us an interesting adventure with our refreshed interest in skiing and snowboarding. I wasn't really sure what I was getting myself into, and as the télépherique rose higher, I knew that my only choice to make it down the mountain was, of course, to snowboard after half a day's practice. We got past the first face of a mountain and found out that the télepherique was taking us way farther than we thought! We went over a shaded valley in the soft blue mountains and were thus introduced to a sort of winter wonderland. There were hundreds of people the size of ants skiing and snowboarding around the valley, ski lifts, and a little restaurant of some sort perched on the other mountain we were heading towards. I wouldn't say it was crowded because it was such a huge valley. I didn't think a picture would do the scene justice. I felt like I was inside a snowglobe because it was so beautiful. And the télépherique continued. I watched all of the slopes and thought about how I was going to have to snowboard all of that, this after the little hill I had been practicing on.

The tétépheriques bringing people up the mountain

The ride up on the télépherique as I realize there is no turning back.

Finally, we got off at the top of a mountain. As soon as I stepped off the télépherique, someone was being rolled in a stretcher by some paramedics; it looked like the person had broken his leg. It was a little ominous after taking up a télépherique that we weren't sure where it was headed. But, like I said, the only way back to the resort town was to snowboard.

There was another restaurant at the top of the mountain we were dropped off at blasting rock music down the steep hill as people glided (or face planted) down. It was the start of our adventure in the snow globe.

I don't know if I can describe how amazing that snowboard ride down was. I am no skier or snowboarder, but I have never seen runs like the ones I saw today. The space was just so huge, chilly, and blue. At the top, the wind blew a soft layer of snow, like mist, across the white ground I was gliding over. But don't get the wrong impression, I wasn't gliding the whole time. My face got to know quite a few snow banks, but I feel like I could have done a lot worse.

There was a problem that arose about half way (well, we weren't really sure at the time) through the way down that we were in a time crunch because the buses would be leaving considerably shortly. If we missed the buses, we weren't really sure what would happen, so we just continued to go down. With 20 minutes until the bus was to leave, a bit of mountain, and us needing to return our equipment, we decided to go down the more advanced hill. I think I went down half of that part just sliding after I fell. At the bottom, I took off the board and walked very quickly to the rental place so I could return what I had rented. I didn't know where the other two guys were, but I thought we could all figure out how to get back to the center without trouble. The three of us met up at the rental place, and tried to figure out where the buses were that were supposed to leave in 5 minutes. We literally ran to the buses and made it with no time to spare. The Christmas lights in the town all began to light up as we pulled away.

Near where we got off the télépherique

One of the ski lifts in the valley

The télépherique takes people to various ski lifts throughout the nearby mountains. I didn't take too many pictures while I was on the run because I was considerably preoccupied.