Espagne!!!

Well, if I am being honest, transitions are quite hard for me, so I guess it was to be expected that re-entry back into Nantes life would be a little challenging, but I after hanging out with my two best French friends, Sophie all afternoon, and Lea and her family later in the evening, and crepe night with my host family on Sunday, life in Nantes was back to normal and I was suddenly feeling the realization that my time here is really closing up…and as excited as I am for this summer in Seattle, I am not ready for this wonderful experience to finish. Highlights from this week:

Tuesday: I went out to dinner with one of my French friends, Audrey, and decided to try a NEW creperie. Bad decision. There is a reason why I love my creperie St. Croix. For dessert I ordered a prune crepe to be advertenerous…don’t try that one!

Wednesday: Today was my good French friend, Sophie’s, 19th birthday and we had so much fun. My afternoon class was cancelled so we literally spend from 2pm until 11pm together and it was a perfect glorious SUNNY day. We met up at 2pm and walked all around the town in the sunshine, then went to this new movie that is all the rage in France, Coco Avant Chanel with Audrey Tatou---opening day! Then, we walked in the sunshine more and then went to dinner at the best creperie in the world and spent about 3 lovely hours conversing and sharing birthday memories and stories and presents over my usual seafood crepe followed by banana! It was perfect!

Thursday: Jean-Francoise and Anne-Marie, the couple who are friends with my French professor at Whitman, invited me out to dinner with them before they come to the United States in two weeks! Well, I showed up at our meeting place at the designated time thinking we would just go somewhere low-key. Then, they told me they had made reservations for us at the CIGALE!!! That is the NICEST and SWANKIEST restaurant in town that I thought I would never get to go to…the restaurant that is in EVERY guidebook and known for their seafood. They were SO nice and treated me to SALMON for dinner and insisted that we get dessert, so I got to have a three tiered chocolate mousse cake and it was delcious, and the company was even sweeter. They are so nice, and are going to have dinner at my house in Seattle with my parents on May 10th---I made the connection between them!

Friday: Today was full and fun…three classes until 2pm (rescheduled from Wednesday) then PLAY TIME! Sophie and I went to this exhibition at the Cite of Congress ALL filled with crafty exhibitions-jewelery, quilting, sewing, quilting, fabric, lamps, modge-podge. I was BURSTING with creative energy after spending three hours there and I can’t wait to get back to my craft desk at home and start creating! Then, I came home for enough time to throw things into a suitcase to meet at Lea’s house at 6pm to jet set off to SPAIN for the weekend with her and her family! We drove the 3.5 hours to Bordeaux, stopping for a wonderful smoked salmon sandwich picnic prepared by her wonderful mother, Catherine, and then literally just slept at Bordeaux.

Saturday: We were up early, hitting the road to arrive in Bilbao, Spain by about 11:30am. We stayed at the nicest Sheraton and Lea and I had our own HUGE room with comfy comfy beds, a view of the beautiful park in the back, a bathroom with a tub and shower that is twice the size of my bedroom at home…it was perfect. We spent Saturday “Se balading”---which means walking all over. In fact, we decided that the best and pretty much only thing Bilbao had to offer is the Guggenheim, that we spent all day Sunday at. It was so weird. You could definitely tell that the economic crisis had hit Spain, definitely Bilbao. There was NO one out on a SATURDAY in SPRING. No one in the shops. No one on the streets. It was really bizarre. Saturday night (we left our hotel at 9:30, definitely on Spain time, eating at 11:45pm) was a bit more lively, but still, it was definaltey a much more modern and less traditional Spanish city. But still SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO fun. Later in the afternoon Lea and relaxed in the heated outdoor POOL, SAUNA, our BATHTUB, and wonderful beds. It was perfect and so fun to get away and see SPAIN and how another family travels too! Oh, and BIlbao is really pretty-nesseled in the Pyrennes!

Sunday: We were first into the museum, the GUGGENHEIM (which is really STUNNING both inside and outside!) at 10am. We ended up spending the entire day there. The special exhibit was MURIKAMI, the Japanese artist who worked with Louis Voutton. It was very interesting…Lea and her family ended up staying there until 6pm! But I ended up leaving around 2pm, walking around a bit, along the river, then hitting the little SPA that our hotel had to offer: relaxing in the outdoor pool, sauna, my bed, and relaxing! It was just what I needed. For dinner we went to this Asian-fusion nice restaurant! It was funny…I was useful for once because of my English-the people at the restaurant didn’t speak French, but just a little English, so I translated the menu for everyone. I had spicy calamari and it was d.el.ic.i.ous!

Monday: We got off to an early start to the seaside town in Spain of San Sebastian. I am SO glad that we got to go here. It was SO Spanish and completely different from Bilbao and there was so much LIFE and activity. We did more se balading, in the town and along the board of the mer, until early afternoon where we headed onto France to Bordeaux. Hemoin, Lea’s dad, had bought 60 bottles of “Bio Vin Rouge” from a winery in Bordeaux so we went to the winery to pick them up and ended up driving around all of the Bordeaux vineries, villages, and cute little houses for a couple of hours-get a tour of the real Bordeaux valley. For dinner on the route we stopped at a cannery-the French version of a fast-food restaurant, but man, they have it down. Apparently they are all along the auto routes and it is like really upscale dorm food, meaning you serve yourself what you want-hot food, salads, whatever. It is NO comparison with McDonalds, but apparently they are all along the auto routes in France! The class! Home, and crashing after a wonderful little getaway at 11pm! What a fun escape to Spain for the weekend!