After setting up our next night train, Julia and I decided to take a break from the usual European fare and had Chinese takeaway for lunch. I enjoyed a Coke and some mediocre Lo Mein, but it didn’t bother me a bit.

The beaches of Nice were fantastic; it’s obvious why people come here. While it’s a bit overcrowded for my tastes, I welcomed the beach’s clear water and perfectly blue sky. We also got our first glimpse of nude sunbathers, though there seemed to be little correlation between beauty and nudity.

Julia and I split up for the better part of the afternoon. I stopped by the hostel to clean up, then headed into town to check out the shops. I spent a good bit of time in the Virgin Megastore, which I discovered holds a very diverse array of products, as if it is meant to replace a whole host of smaller stores. In addition to the expected CDs, DVDs and games, they carried electronics, books, painting and art supplies, office supplies, and greeting cards. It’s like Borders, Office Depot, and Sam Flax combined. We met back up in the shopping district, and dinner at La Lorraine was excellent.

We grabbed our bags and headed to the station to catch our night train. This time we could only book a normal 6-seater compartment rather than a couchette, so sleep was sporadic. There were many more stops along the train’s route with passengers entering and leaving our compartment, so at times we were able to lay across our respective seats to sleep, and at other times we had to sit upright. As if that didn’t make it hard enough to sleep, we were awakened numerous times to have our tickets checked. (On our earlier French train from Paris to Narbonne, our tickets were checked before boarding so that it was unnecessary to wake us.)

View the Nice Photo Set

We hiked back to the Metro and Sants Station (the departure location for our new train) and relaxed as we made the first train. Our connecting trains were reliable as well, so we arrived in Nice and collapsed at the hostel.

View the Barcelona Photo Set

We casually began today in Barcelona with a visit to the train station to buy tickets to Nice, France. That trip would involve two hops, from Barcelona to Montpellier, France, then on to Nice. Julia and I came back to Las Ramblas and split up for a bit. I had not spent enough time in the open-air market, so I returned to sample the chocolate and take more photos of the colorful stands.

Julia and I met up with Jay and Alicia to eat lunch at a well-known restaurant, Les Quinze Nits, which sits just across the plaza from our hostel. We waited in line for about 10 minutes until the lunch opening time, then sat in the outdoor seating due to the excellent weather. I enjoyed a chicken salad, then veal, then the four of us ordered an ice cream and custard dessert to share.

Because we could only get two nights in our hostel on Plaça Reial, Julia and I gathered our belongings after lunch and hiked over to another hostel. By the time we finished checking in, we had only about an hour to rush through the Picasso museum before the 5:30pm ferry tour of the coastline. While the museum was interesting, it seemed like it was missing too many of my favorite pieces by Picasso, so it wasn’t all I expected it to be.

We practically ran from the Picasso museum to the coast and barely caught the ferry tour. On the tour we took plenty of photos and enjoyed the Mediterranean breeze while the people around us enjoyed their pints. The harbor was surrounded by graffiti-laden barriers, and I was reminded how parts of Barcelona were practically covered with graffiti, though much of it was artistic and seemed carefully drawn.

Upon return to shore, the two of us split again: Julia headed for the Magic Fountain on Montjuïc, while I took the Metro and FGC (Barcelona’s outer rail system) to Tibidabo. I then hiked partially up the peak before noticing the funicular line that lead to the top, then took it the rest of the way up. At the end of the funicular line I found several restaurants and a hidden gravel driveway, which I followed until reaching some sort of pet sanctuary. This area made for a good view of the city below, and I collected some photos of the surrounding scenery.

Once I arrived back in the area near the hostel, I stopped in a small shop and forced down a sandwich that had been drenched in mayo (I’m not a big fan of mayo). As I was finishing up, I goggled as a customer received his order of fries that had similarly been completely covered in mayo. From there it was just a short walk back to the hostel for the evening.

View the Barcelona Photo Set

We didn’t enter the cathedral, instead choosing to head to an apartment designed by Gaudi, where the top floor has been designated as a museum for his work. It was similarly interesting, and the roof (which was accessible to visitors) was intriguing. After wandering around the museum and the roof, we checked out another apartment of Gaudi’s, but it was considerably more expensive and we ended up only viewing the exterior.

In order to prepare for a picnic lunch we visited a small grocery store and bought sandwich materials; Julia stocked up on Nutella and crackers. We made our way to one of the peaks of Parc Guell, where Gaudi had attempted to build an exclusive housing community, but its lack of success found it turned into a park instead. As with Gaudi’s other works, the park’s architecture was funky and creative, and I’d imagine it was quite difficult to construct. At the peak stood three crosses where tourists would gather and peer over the city. Once we’d seen enough we began to hike to the nearest Metro station, which turned out to be quite far. By the time we arrived at the station the crosses were tiny spires in the distance, allowing us to realize the distance we’d walked.

Later in the afternoon we watched as a man, in his late 50’s by my crude estimation, walked nude down the sidewalk past us, his body tattooed and pierced in places that were only apparent due to his lack of clothes. Needless to say there was a bit of immature giggling once he’d passed. As the five of us reached the coast, we broke out the wine and Perrier along with Julia’s Nutella, then plopped down in the sand, tired from a long day’s exploration. The beach itself was quiet and relatively unpopulated.

For dinner we tried a small paella shop only to discover that our orders were being provided by a hidden section of the ice cream freezer at the front of the restaurant, then microwaved. We decided not to think too deeply about our mistake, heading back to the hostel to converse in the active and considerably more genuine atmosphere of the hostel lobby.

View the Barcelona Photo Set

Our layover was spent, again, on Sudoku and snoozing. About an hour later we boarded the train that would take us to Barcelona. While it arrived nearly on time, there were several delays on the way into Spain, including customs checks on both the French and Spanish sides. At one point we had to stop while debris was removed from the tracks; apparently a car had gone off an overpass in an accident such that it was laying face down in the dirt, with the car’s undercarriage visible as the train passed it. That moment was a bit surreal.

Seeing that we arrived at least an hour late in Barcelona it was already clear that Renfe, Spain’s rail system, put a lower priority on scheduling than France’s SNCF, which was incredibly well-run and punctual.

With the long-distance traveling complete and France behind us, it was time to drop off the bags at Kabul Backpackers Hostel, which was in a great location within Plaça Reial and along Las Ramblas, a long pedestrian strip lined with street vendors and performers. Julia and I went for a “ramble”, visiting an outdoor market that had the content of the Buford Highway Farmer’s Market but with more culture and color. I bought a few strawberries to match Julia’s sliced pineapple, then we sat on a step nearby and munched on them while watching some construction workers fill a front-end loader with dirt.

We wandered through the old city, eventually reaching the Barcelona Cathedral, where 2.20€ got us an elevator ride up to the roof – like Notre Dame but minus the 370 steps. From the roof it was easy to see La Sagrada Familia for the first time, and even at that distance it was clear how different it is from every other cathedral in the world. More on that tomorrow, when we visit it up close.

Back at the hostel, Julia and I spotted a guy wearing a Tech t-shirt, so we immediately stopped him. Jae Soh, a management grad as of December 2006 was in Barcelona on his own tour. Once we got to the hostel’s lobby area we chatted for some time with Jae and Alicia, a girl he’d met while at the hostel (herself from Florida). Later in the evening we joined a big pub crawl that wandered over a long stretch of the city, eventually reaching a bar on the coast. It was a new experience for me, but it was quite enjoyable to meet so many different people.

View the Barcelona Photo Set

Before lunch, Alexis accompanied me and Julia to the Epinal train station where we proceeded to spend at least 15 minutes trying to figure out how to reserve a night train into Barcelona. Alexis’s translation skills were particularly helpful, and we ended up simply telling her what we wanted and letting her duke it out with the woman at the counter. It was impressive and frustrating at the same time, having to put Alexis through it. Apparently Eurail passes are pretty uncommon out in rural France, so the woman was constantly referring to her manuals and asking coworkers for clarification. Eventually we booked a night train from Paris to Narbonne, then another hop to Barcelona in the early morning.

After lunch we said our goodbyes to Alexis and Antony and departed Epinal to Nancy, then to Paris. We wasted several hours in Gare d’Austerlitz, the train station, waiting for our night train out of Paris. Most of it was spent reading and doing Sudoku puzzles.

Eventually the train arrived and we found our couchette: a sleeper room with six beds. Much like our original transatlantic flight, the sleep on the train was rare and short-lived. Since I’m already a light sleeper, the constant rail noise and motion-shifting kept rousing me from sleep, so I was practically a zombie when we reached Narbonne, near the southern border of France.

View the Nancy and Epinal Photo Set

Our first destination was the top of a nearby hill, upon which sat the ruins of Epinal’s castle. Being kids, we had to hop and skip around the ruins, pointing at curious features and wondering what purpose they served. The area made for good viewing of the town, and the beautiful weather and greenery made everything feel peaceful.

Just beyond the castle sits a small petting zoo, and being a Sunday around lunchtime meant that it was nearly deserted, save for the animals themselves. Julia and I went to town photographing pigs, chickens, peacocks, guinea pigs, and plenty of others. Most of the animals were uninterested in us, which made for good shots. I admired the ostrich for quite some time; the skinny legs and bulbous body just looks so ridiculous. The body of the ostrich seemed to move as one solid unit, like some artificial character made of Styrofoam and operated by wire.

We found the zoo’s playground equipment particularly enticing. It’s amazing how good it feels to swing on a regular swing set and fly across a zip line.

On the way to the lake (for our picnic) we stopped at a hidden waterfall and enjoyed the sounds and scenery.

A nearby lake was our picnic spot for a late lunch. After we set out the blanket and began eating, one passer-by yelled “bon appétit!”, to which we raised our sandwiches with mouths full. We then walked around the lake and chatted, and I dipped my feet in the frigid water for just a few seconds. After we skipped a few rocks and began to head back to the car, I noticed a young boy nearby say something in French to his parents, and Alexis explained that he wanted to know how to do the “tut tut tut”. This was how he described the skipping of our rocks across the water surface.

The “bon appétit!” comment and the boy’s rock-skipping question were the sorts of things that made me giddy. Like the situation with the constable in London asking me about witnessing the fight, these simple moments meant that we were interacting with people as fellow citizens rather than as foreigners or tourists. Each time one of these interactions occurred I was giggling inside.

From the lake down low, we headed way up high to a nearby mountain. At the top, which was probably a good 15°F cooler, the wind made it quite frigid. In a couple spots it was possible to see snow that had likely been around since winter.

A random point of interest: the header and footer images on this journal come from this day. The header is our windy mountain, and the footer is Epinal itself.

View the Nancy and Epinal Photo Set

I had phoned Alexis (my cousin in Epinal, France) the night before to inform her that we would be catching an earlier train to Nancy, which would hopefully give us more time there to have dinner and explore. However, upon arrival at Gare de l’Est we discovered that the earlier train ran only on Sundays, a fact that had escaped me via the rail schedule’s French fine print. We phoned Alexis again from the station and discovered that she had already noticed our mistake, but had no way to inform us. Our original (later) train would be leaving two hours later, so Julia and I poked around the station while we waited.

Luckily, you might say, a building fire had started just outside the station, and the photojournalists in us took over. While I don’t envy anyone who has to deal with watching their home go up in smoke, it makes for a good opportunity to watch how bystanders react to such a scene. People leaving the station peered up and simply stopped walking, staring at the plumes of smoke and occasionally glancing around to see how others were reacting. Occasionally the wind would push the smoke back down and straight into the train station, giving it the typical smell of burning building. Once we’d had enough of viewing the smoke, it was a struggle to find seating among the very few benches in the station itself; I haven’t quite figured out why so many public places in Europe lack decent places to sit.

When we arrived in Nancy at 7:30pm, Alexis was waiting with Antony, her beau, on the platform. We stashed our bags in the back of Antony’s car and headed out to eat. They treated us to our first (and only) proper three-course meal at a little restaurant in town, then Alexis gave us a walking tour of Nancy.

It’s funny how my imagination led me to expect that “rural” Europe would be sparse and generally dull like rural Georgia, but this was very different and much better. The rural towns of Europe are densely-packed, but with very little between the towns themselves, as I suppose life had to be before easy transportation. The square in the center (as far as I could tell) of town was bustling with activity as people walked to and from the various restaurants and shops. It gives a very urban energy to a place that still has the intimacy of a small town.

We later drove south to Epinal, to Alexis’s apartment. It was great to be able to drop our bags without having to worry about locking things up, and not having to deal with noisy roommates coming in at all hours of the night.

View the Paris Photo Set and the Nancy and Epinal Photo Set

The next morning I thoroughly enjoyed the cool shower even though it was controlled by a pushbutton. These timer-based showers appeared in many of our hostels for the rest of the trip, but it was quite a novel concept at the time. It’s strange having to tell your shower “yep, I’m still here” every 30 seconds.

Julia and I sat in the lobby munching on the breakfast croissants and mapping out our first day in Paris. This would be a routine we followed quite frequently, and I enjoyed it each time.

Our first stop was the Catacombs to see the bones of many of Paris’ dead of the 18th century. In the late 1700’s, the overcrowding of cemeteries was creating serious sanitation problems, so it was decided that the spacious quarries under the city would make for a better place to store these remains. For us, getting to the Catacombs themselves involved walking down 80 steep stairs (we counted), then going about 500 meters underground. The bones themselves were stacked neatly so that one end of each bone faced us, with skulls arranged in various designs: many were in horizontal lines, but occasionally they formed crosses or even hearts. It was obviously quite morbid, and we were happy to reach the end of the path. Interestingly enough, an employee at the surface did a quick search of our bags to make sure we hadn’t grabbed any “souvenirs,” and I was amazed to see a couple femur bones and a skull on the desk behind him.

After seeing all those bones it was obviously time to eat lunch. We sat at a small café and quickly realized that pronouncing the food names in French was a non-starter, so we practiced our pointing skills. I ended up ordering a croque-madame, which is a ham sandwich topped with a fried egg. It went great with the tiny bottle of Canada Dry. The waiter was an older man who spoke only French, but he was friendly and understanding.

Notre Dame was our next stop, and with Julia’s guilt for not having climbed it during her last visit to Europe, it was an easy decision to do so this time. We paid our 4.8€ and climbed the 370 stairs, stopping at the middle level and at the top. As I mentioned, I was already happy that I had brought my telephoto lens, and the view from Notre Dame made it even more helpful. The spooky gargoyles contrasted the tiny happy people below.

Eventually we made it to the area between the Arc de Triomphe and the Louvre, separated by a huge roundabout that handles at least 4 lanes of traffic but had no clear lines painted on it. I couldn’t imagine how anyone would navigate the lanes without constantly bumping into other vehicles, and the people driving scooters are completely insane. From there we walked to the expensive shopping district to the northeast, but finding no affordable food we settled for Quick, a European fast food chain. Consequently, I enjoyed a fountain Coke with the perfect amount of ice, and it was amazing. From Quick we made the long walk back toward the Louvre.

It had begun to sprinkle a bit, and since we arrived pretty late to the museum itself the entry line was not very long. Once inside, we made plans to meet up later, and I headed off to hit the major points of interest, including the Mona Lisa, Venus de Milo, and Napoleon’s apartment. One particular painting struck me: Delaroche’s La Jeune Martyre (make sure to click the images for a large view), and I was amazed to hear one of our hostel roommates pick it out as one of her favorites. She later mentioned that she liked the painting with the “lady in the water”, and I immediately knew which one she meant.

Back to the present, and the Mona Lisa. I’ve just decided that its allure is for people who are more cultured than myself. Maybe it was the crowd, or its diminutive size, or the fact that visitors can’t get within 15 feet of the painting, but I just don’t see it.

As we exited, Julia and I both knew that it would be silly to come to the Louvre and not photograph the large glass pyramid in all its evening lights. To the side were several pedestals (bollards, as I later found them to be called) that were popular as makeshift tripods. The one I wanted was in use by an Asian family who took turns making portraits in front of the pyramid. I had no problem with waiting patiently, but by the end they were giving me inquisitive looks, as I had just been hanging out there with seemingly little reason. When they gathered their equipment to leave, I tried to be as conspicuous as possible while setting down my camera with the same goal. The (I assume) mother grinned, nodded, and said “ah!”, which is the same in every language.

By the time I was done, there was another Asian girl behind me waiting to use the same pedestal.

It continued to rain lightly as we rested our feet outside the museum, and when 10pm arrived the Eiffel Tower lit up with sparkling lights, clearly visible through the dusk. Between descending and reascending the Catacombs, climbing Notre Dame, and walking near and all over the Louvre, our feet had done enough for the day. Thus, we never got much closer to the tower during the trip, but I was okay with that.

View the Paris Photo Set

After meeting up again around lunchtime we headed to Covent Garden, where individual vendors keep shops of artwork and crafts in an outdoor venue that is also lined with indoor shops and restaurants. Soon after arriving I watched as some English police wrestled a man up from the lower level, and as I peered over the edge to figure out what was going on, one of them asked me if I had seen who was fighting. I said that I had not, but as the officer left I noticed that the question made me feel welcome, as if the conversation were one British person speaking to another.

For lunch, Julia and I each enjoyed a pasty with steak, potatoes, and onions, which was an excellent idea (by whomever first created that food).

We wandered to Embankment Park and relaxed for a bit under the sparse rain, each hunched under our umbrellas. Julia worked sudoku puzzles as I watched the people walk past. Sometimes the best answer to the constant rain of London is simply not to try going anywhere in it. However, eventually the time came to grab our bags from the hostel and head to Luton Airport.

Luton, as it turns out, is smaller, harder to get to, and less attractive than Gatwick. It would seem that EasyJet (one of the popular budget carriers in Europe) is based out of Luton, and the persistent branding led me to believe that they were the major carrier of the airport. Wikipedia confirms this hunch. After reluctantly checking our larger bags, we headed into the airport and eventually ran through the rain to board the plane on the tarmac.

I stared out the window quite a bit during the short flight, and it was strangely satisfying when flying over France to see cars on the right side of the road. While the plane was small and no-frills (like most budget carriers), our landing at Charles de Gaulle airport was the smoothest I had experienced. We arrived in Paris well into the night, then took a regional train into the center of town, past the heavily-armed army patrol in the train station. I was very much ready to be asleep in the hostel.

View the London Photo Set