Well, actually first you get to look at pictures of Chatellerault, where the four AFSers living in Angouleme were hosted overnight because we live too far from the train station to be there at 6 in the morning. Julia and I, the two Americans, were hosted by Shaolin (another American)'s host family.
So we walked around Chatellerault...
And helped the host family with a small "Thanksgiving" dinner (for me, a precursor of this weekend).
Isn't he cute?!?
In the evening we played MarioKart with the family and went to bed a bit too late (11:00) to be getting up at 5 to catch our train to Paris!
We were 23 AFSers from all over the world, 4 AFS volunteers/employees, and 2 visiting AFS alums. First stop: la musee D'Orsay.
And with a special exhibition on impressionism and fashion! So French! We spent an hour or so exploring the museum.
Our AFS guides gave us a bit of a tour, including the Bridge of Art (here's it's called the bridge of lovers) where couples come to attach a lock and throw the key into the Seine.
Since we had all gotten up early, we were all hungry, so we had an early lunch at the Jardin de Tuilleries in the sunshine.
We passed by the Louvre,
and took the metro to see the Christmas displays in the windows of the Gallerie Lafayette.
Then we took the subway to visit Montmartre.
It's a really fun area, touristic but very lively. There's of course the beautiful basilique de Sacre-Coeur, and also lots and lots of street artists.
And a beautiful view!!
So then we took the metro back towards Paris and stopped by the Moulin Rouge.
In the evening we enjoyed the Christmas decorations on the Champs Elysees...
...and arrived just in time to see the Eiffel Tower light up at 6:00!
All in all, a lovely weekend! :)
That sounds totally awesome. What a great post! I assume there's also a part where you get back to Angouleme... ;-)
ReplyDeleteWhat a fantastic trip! You really covered a lot of ground. It's so nice that you were able to go to Montmartre - one of my favorites.
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