France and Spain Photo Album!

Because I suddenly have very little to do I thought I might spend hours downloading photos!(sounds like fun:) Together me and Dad have about 6,000 photos from our holiday!!! - but don't worry, I won't subject you to all of these, maybe just a couple of thousand (muahahaha!!)...It is soooooooooo hot today. I was coping okay until I went outside and almost died in 30 seconds. I think I will have to do this in stages (not dying - the photos) Oh and if you click on them they should get bigger. The photos start on the left then zigzag (so the second paragraph is for the first photo on the right) - is that a bit complicated? oh well.

Paris
(L) The Beginning; In the last leg of our plane trip to Paris... by now we had been on the plane for about 20 hours - we look suprisingly happy!

(R) And looking out at the Seine in Paris, from Ile de la Cité. (me and Emma).

(L) A book vending machine in Paris - I love it! Books at every hour!

(R) Ahhhh, the Seine - I have so many hundreds of photos of this river, I love it so much. I don't feel as if I'm in Paris if I can't see the Seine.

(L) Some cool french buskers playing near Notre Dame, there are really good buskers playing everywhere in France and Spain - especially in the metro. We bought a cd off a busker in Barcelona of classical guitar (and flute actually - we didn't realise this until we played it... gave us quite a shock).

(R) DADA! The exhibition wasn't open while I was in Paris:(

(L) My family (- me), I have quite a lot of photos of everyone else in my family as I was always the person taking the photos (damn!)


(R) Me, Laura and Emma on our way up the Eiffel Tower (a veeerrry long way to climb).



(L) The Eiffel Tower (from below) - it's a lot bigger than I thought it would be.

(R) The dodgy souvenir shop that we lived behind. It was so funny to sneak in there and go through a little door in the back to our apartment.

(L) The inside of Notre Dame, very beautiful (and very full of japanese tourists!)

(R) The inside of the Saint Chapelle, with gorgeous stained glass all around and filled with crazily dressed people that looked like spies from a 1950s film - one lady had this camera with an enormous lens, along with huge white boots and white hat.


(L) The cute little second-hand bookstalls that lined the Seine near our apartment.



(R) A family portrait (groan - so embarassing!) in the Paris Opera House - where the Phantom of the Opera lived...

(L) A very elaborate room in the Palais de Versailles - note the very cool secret door concealed behind the wall paper on the left... (I think it was used by Marie-Antoinette to escape the Parisian mobs)


Next time... Normandy and Mont Saint Michel

I"M HOME!!
This is just a blog to say that I'm home as I am so exhausted and fuzzy at the moment, it is so hot! Arggh (oh I got into Arts/Law at Canberra - what will it be??? Melbourne or canberra), I will catch up will you all tomorrow when i have slept.
love, kate
P.S YES! Darkfall and Darksong, i loved those books - oh and definitely on for memoirs of a geisha - if i am awake by then.

This is kate, not emma!
and today is our last day - todaay we will be leaving Paris :(
We have done so much and it has gone so quickly (especially these last few days). Oh, on other news I got into arts at Melbourne and fee paying law at melbourne (not sure if I will try and transfer from fee law - ouch, sooooo expensive - or from just arts, hmmm).

We has a rather embarrassing beginning to our last stay in Paris... We flew from Montpellier to Paris (it was actually cheaper than driving!) and unfortunately we didn't know that our plane was ready to board and leave. So we were sitting next to the check-in for the plane, totally oblivious and eating our lunch when we were called over the loudspeaker and told to board at once ! Oh the embarassment of being the last people on the plane - walking on with all those accusatory faces staring at us. It was quite amusing later but at the time it was mortifying!

So what have we done in Paris? Well apart from buying another bag to fit our expanding luggage we have gone shopping, visited the Sacre-Coeur, the Louvre (Mona Lisa!), walked in the steps of amelie, visited the paris flea markets, the Moulin Rouge, gone to a rather cool medieval musuem and eaten our last french patisseries - nooooooo

Our actual metro station (the one that is 10 metres from our door) - Lamark, is Amelie's metro station in the film - how exciting (well, i think it is). Every day we have taken the metro somewhere, it makes me feel so parisian, especially as i now know the stations as they go past, pigalle, abesses, notre dame, concorde, louve-rivoli.

The sales started the day we arrived in Paris (in france the whole counrty has a set period for sales), and we made it to Zara (again!) where we bought some cute skirts and t shirts - so know the number of things we have bought from Zara comes to 8, hmmmmmmm... I do love that store. Mama bought a huge warm, padded coat from Galeries Lafayette. We also did a little walking tour of the old arcades in Paris - very cute, there was one shop which was all doll house furniture, it was so gorgeous! They even had little french tarts - i was tempted to buy one but figured I could buy a real tart for the same cost and (as an added bonus) actually be able to eat it.

I have had hot chocolate in Amelie's cafe and seen too many paintings to mention. I have even seen the beautiful Lady and the Unicorn Tapestries in the medievl;a museum (Heidi and Loren - do you remember them in that novel with the sisters, one blind with red hair and the other tall with blond hair - i cant remember the name)

Oh, sorry, I have to go - we are leaving for the airport ( 24 hours!!! of plane),

See you soon,
love kate

Hey everyone, this is Emma (kates sister!)
Since Kate is being lazy i'm going to post re Montpellier! It turns out we didn't have internet at all in Montpellier so its been almost a week since the last post, so here goes...
Well, you know that 'possibly odd' French party? Slight understatement! Was it odd! The thing is, French teenagers (most of these ones 18 or so) seem to have 0% selfconciousness - yeah, weird! Even the least selfconcious person at an Australian party is ten times as selfconcious as these guys. Well, us three and Alice (Australian exchange student from our school staying with Chloe in Montpellier) took up valuable couch space for most of the evening while the French people, even the surprise birthday girl on crutches, worked off every single patisserie they'd ever eaten on the living room floor, making up their own odd dancing techniques from scratch. The SURPRISE was a little unsuprising for us because a) she already knew and b) instead of shouting 'surprise' when she arrived everyone started singing 'joyeuse anniversaire'... odd. Also, via french custom, everyone kissed everyone 3 times on the cheeks, so we got kisses from the birthday girls boyfriend (!) and, naturally, the birthday girl herself, though I am quite sure she had absolutely no idea who we were. Anyway, odd yet fun party and strange shaped couch was all good for a Saturday night.

Yummy pain au chocolat for breaky before going home to our actual apartment (from Chloes house) which was tres cool! Run by a random englishman with 2 gorgeous labradores, its in one of the centremost squares in montpellier and has a view of the post office, not to mention is above a chocolatier (see picture above - our apartment is the 2 windows just above the chocolate shop, those french exchange people will probably remember this place...mmm) and around the corner from Gilbert and Joseph and La Brioche Doree. For the next 3 days in Montpellier we were constantly in and out of there shopping and dropping off purchases, having lunch and sleeping. We ate out with Chloe, Marie-Odile and Guy on the third night, after they'd hosted us at their house on the second (on the first they'd taken Mum and Dad to a restauramt in a tower Guy - architect - designed). They were lots of fun with Guy talking at dad in french (did he understand...?) and occasionally at mum (when not understanding, smile or laugh!) and Marie-Odile talking constantly, swapping from english to french depending on who the audience was.

The shopping in Montpellier is amazing!! There's the Tintin shop, the random gifts shop Trait, the postcard shop, the toyshop (clockwork mouse!!!) countless patisseries and the chocolate shop (real hot chocolate). In the polygone there's even The Body Shop (there's one here in Paris too). So as you can imagine us three had a great time shopping down the cute streets and through the crowded squares of central montpellier while parentals...washed clothes in a Autolavage with a window missing and crossed most of the town between Post Offices trying to cash travellers cheques...

just some of the things we bought include:
2 clockwork mice
a piece of wrapping paper to be used as a poster
a rock each painted with a random face (From left, Gerard, Buddy, Pierre 2 and Pierre 1) presents from Marie-Odile
mini childrens books
a new luggage bag for everything we've bought...

So Montpellier was lots of fun and we were sad to say goodbye to Guy, Marie-Odile, Chloe and Montpellier at the airport (after an amusing encounter with the Renault car cleaner...) but we were getting excited about Paris (though not the imminent Metro trip with all ourselves and our luggage to our apartment in Montmatre, but that's for next time)...

To all those Amelie lovers; see you tomorrow when we hope to have hot chocolate in Amelie's own cafe and walk some of her favourite streets (not to mention step outside our front door and straight into her very own Metro station, Lamarck).

Bye for now.

Today was bizarre building day. First thing in the morning we set off for the Sagrada Familial - a church that has been in construction for something like 130 years, which was designed by Gaudi. We caught the metro there, a slightly interesting experience. It is another holiday day in Barcelona today so the streets were deserted and everything was closed. Only the turists (like us) were walking around - so we got to watch some english tourits try and fail to buy tickets and then say "bugger that, I'm walking". We actually conquered the tcket system and before long were at the cathedral.

The first thing we did was visit the museumy place underneath (mainly because it was warm), that had all these drawings and models of what the church will look like when it's eventually finished. We saw a 20 minute film english - unfortunately I slept through half of it, due to the comfy chairs and heating and darkness - mmm, it was a wrench leaving that seat to wander around the actual historically significant bit. The cathedral currently only has three sides (the last one hasn't been built yet), and two of them are entrances representing life and death. The death one was quite cool. It was all dark and angular with what looked like a sudoku carved into the wall (maybe it has some odd religious significance). Inside the cathedral the pillers were amazing, they were sculpted to look like trees and at the top they had branches. that joined together at the roof. We decided to climb up the towers, a dizzying excercise as it was hundreds of metres of spiral staircases. At the top we had a nice view of the rest of the church, especially the little spires with all this carved fruit at the top (I told you it was odd).

After a rather frugal lunch (as all the shops were closed) we walked to the second of our bizarre buildings, a house designed by Gaudi. It was ridicualously expensive to get in, but we figured it was worth it as the inside was amazing! Everything was warped and curved, the windows, the roof, the staircases. It was like a giant mushroom, or the inside of a fish or soemthing our of Alice in Wonderland. My favourite room was the drawing room which had huge windows with stained glass opening out onto the street. We climbed up through the house until we reached the attics, that were like being inside a whale, all white curves like a backbone, then the roof with its strange mosaic chimneys.

So that was some of what we did today, tomorrow we leave Barcelona for Montpellier for 4 nights, to see Chloe! On saturday night Chloe is taking me, emma and laura to a french party - should be interesting... I may have internet in Montpellier and then we go to Paris where we do have internet - and then home!

adios for know, kate

Hello all (oh and I forgot to say happy new year last time soooooo HAPPY NEW YEAR!)

This is just a short blog as I am tired and have to go to bed soon. This morning it was raining so we decided to something indoorish, ie. visiting the Picasso museum in Barcelona. There were so many hundreds of thousands of painting and drawings and I looked at them all! My favourites were the little semi-normal paintings he did at the beginning, before he followed cubism. However, I did have some exceptions like this painting of his wife Jacqueline which I think is rather cool.

After a lunch of baguettes and little creamy pastries we went for a rambling walk (it was still raining) to try to discover some of the modernist architecture (you know, the weird, mushroomy buildings). We went to one of them, designed by Gaudi. It was like something out of willy wonka or disneyland - a bit warped (I loved the crazy windows). Then we went to another building and (as an excuse) went into a free Rembrandt exhibition to see the inside.

At night a crowd started to build along the streets and we wondered what they were there for, sowe went home and looked up on the internet. We found out that it was a parade for the 3 kings (I assume the same ones who brought presents to Jesus, but I may stand corrected). It sounded interesting so me, emma and laura went and waited with the excited crowd (a lot of children). Finally the parade started - it was sooooooo sweet, very arabic. Just like that one in Aladdin, "Prince Alliiiiii, fabulous he, ali ababa..." only on a slighlty smaller scale (no live elephants much to laura's disappointment, but a very cool fake one!). There was giant floats, guys in massive turbans, hundreds of people in those aladdine pants and scarves carrying odd twiddly things. There were even a trail of camels (looking very bored with the whole thing). We soon received flags and little crowns (whoo hoo) and then began ducking because the people in the parade were throwing lollies. Not nice overhand throws but lethal thousands of miles an hour type throws. One hit me on the head and nrealy knocked me out. It was funny watching people shielding themselves. We saw the three kings of course, sitting on top of big cushions (all round and fat - as arabic sultans should be) and we waved our flags and shouted hurrah whenever they said anything. It was in Spanish, but we didn't let that deter us. Too soon, however, it was over.

so, tomorrow is another day - i think we are going to visit some more bizarre buildings and maybe do some shopping.

adios, kate

Hola everyone!

I'm in Barcelona now, just left Granada, and I only have 2 weeks to go till the lloooooooong flight home (25 hours!). The good thing is that our apartment here in Barcelona has internet so I will be able to put lots of photos and things up.

Granada was really beautiful, it is built in the mountains and at the centre there is this huge Arabian Palace called the Alhambra. On Saturday I was woken up by Dad yelling "why isn't kate up yet!" because he had gone to buy tickets to the Alhambra and they only have a half hour slot in which you can enter the palace. So I leaped out of bed, got dressed in a few seconds ate a banana and then we sprinted up thoseee (right) long stairs (this is only a portion) to the Alhambra. It was sooooooooo beautiful, all intricate stone carvings and tiles, and elegant arches and pillers - definitely something out of Arabian Nights. It was slightly spoilt by hoardes of Asian tourists walking past at a thousand miles an hour, but still gorgeous. My favourite area was this huge courtyard (above left) with a still pool in the middle that reflected the buildings. Unfortunately in our great rush that morning I had left my scarf at the apartment and had not put on thermals - therefore I shivered my way through one of the most beautiful muslim palaces existing! hehe We also explored some very cool terraced gardens and little garden rooms surrounded by perfectly flat hedges (Mum spent quite some time pondering how they achieved this desired flatness - we only discovered the answer a few days later when we saw a kind of tractor with a long flat saw fixed at a set height).

That night was New Years Eve, we went to the main square in Granada and joined the massive crowds - clutching our little packets of grapes. In Spain they have a custom of eating 12 grapes, one at each strike of the bell at midnight - it is supposed to bring happiness. So we joined the grape holding crowd (thats us - right) and anxiously waited for the clock to strike. Unfortunately due to our lack of spanish lknowledge I started a few grapes late (while emma started early), so I still had a few grapes left at the end! quel horreur! I dont know if this cancels my happiness or maybe the happiness increases with each grape. I think I would be happy with a 10 grape year - but I am determined to have a great year no matter how many grapes I fail to et (what a tongue twister) -then lots of fireworks went off - straight over our heads!

Soo, that was fun. Our other days in Granada we spent exploring the little old quarter with its tea shops (lots of tea smoking places!) and little markets (see left) and churches. I got my name written in Arabic (which looks very cool - I am a bit suspicious however, it could say anything and I would have no idea... hmmm). We saw the tomb of Queen Isabel and King Ferdinand - the monarchs who restored Spain to christianity, we actually saw the tombs on the day that they celebrated the king and queen taking back Spain from the Muslims - there was a public holiday for the anniversay, this meant we saw very embarassed and funny looking policeman riding about the city on horses with plumes on their hats.

We soon left Granada (too soon - i loved it) and I developed a cold (belugh) and travelled to Barcelona - here - through beautiful mountains with snow and green hills. Today (our first day in Barcelona) we walked to the main market street Les Ramblasand explored around there. Barcelona is so random! On every corner there are people dressed up in weird clothes or costumes, playing snake charming instruments or being invisible, all to try to extract money from passers by. We saw a very cool guy dressed up as Zorro, a flower guy, a robot Don Quixote (a bit strange that one), An invisible man (well okay - not see - hard to explain), a few angels, a skeleton, a man in chains and a honky tonk band (with their own piano in the middle of a square). Ohhhh and there are milions of antique stalls just a hundred metres from ouur delightfully ramshackle apartment (they said 1st floor - but I swear its 5th floo, so many stairs). For dinner we went to a slightly odd restaurant that had their menu classified into different sections and numbered so you could cross reference, I had v. yummy pumpkin soup with roast potato and vegies and then a delicious tarte tatine.

Well, goodnight everyone (I will post some photos of Barcelona tomorrow)
ciao, kate