French Riviera

I have been slacking on my blog updates recently! This week we had midterm tests in all my classes, so I have been studying more than I have all semester! Haha!  They are done now and I think they went pretty well, they did not seem nearly as hard as ones that I have taken back at La Crosse.

I realize that I have not posted about my trip to the French Riviera last week, so here goes! It was a great weekend and even though the trip was only for 2 days, we packed a lot in! This trip was one put on by the school so we took a private bus there and back, which was pretty nice because we did not have to worry about figuring out train and bus schedules.  I went with 2 friends from school, but everyone on the trip was a student at our school. 

We left early Saturday morning (4am!) So that we got to the Independent country of Monaco by 10:30am.  From there we had a small tour of some of the main attractions and had some time to roam around on our own.  The country itself was very strange to me, it was only about 5km wide, right on the sea within the country of France.  It was very ritzy and today still has its own Prince.  The people who live there do not pay taxes (that is of course unless you are an American citizen or a French citizen living there for less then five years) but almost all live a very lavish lifestyle in a place where the unemployment rate is 0%!  While we were there we got to see the place where Grace Kelly was buried along with all the other past princes and princesses of Monaco.  We also saw the changing of the guards in front of the Palace...not as exciting as you may think...but a huge crowed was there to see them literally switch positions.  My favorite part was when we got some time to explore on our own and Megan, Laura and I walked down to see the old city walls and the gardens right on the edge of the cliff!

Country Monaco - literally the whole cournty

Our next stop was Nice, France where we would stay the night.  The city of nice was active, there were so many people around! I surprised by how much Italian influence was there, we saw pizzerias and gelato places everywhere.  "Old Nice" was right in the middle of the city and was very identifiable because the streets got really narrow (cars could not even drive through) and they were lined with shops...made me think of a real live Diagon Alley (I have been reading too much Harry Potter!) Had some Sacco at one of the stands, which apparently Nice is known for.  It was pretty good...tasted like a salty crape and was made with chickpeas.  Dinner was scheduled by the school at a restaurant near the hotel.  I forgot the name of the resturant but dinner was pretty good we had this salad with tuna fish and chicken.  Spent the night wandering around Nice, still very active, even at night.

Beach in Nice

Sunday started early with breakfast in the hotel and then to St. Paul de Vence by 9:30am.  St. Paul de Vence was a artist town where the famous Marc Chagall is buried.  I actually did not know who he was until I saw his grave and looked him up:)  Because we got there so early, it felt like we had the town to ourselves.  We went into some art galleries and went into some shops, it seemed like a very relaxing place to live.  Our second stop was Cannes; another city on the coast that is known for its film festival.  Even though we could not actually go into the building, we got to walk around the outside and see all the hand prints of the famous stars that had been there.  My favorite was this French boy who yelled frantically across the park to his friend in order to show him the hand print of Chuck Norris and take numerous pictures next to it! Our last stop was the village of Eze.  It was built right on a the edge of the water up on a mountain/cliff.  Looked pretty cool, but unfortunately we did not get to explore inside it.  We went on a tour of the Fragonard perfume factory right at the bottom of the city.  I did not realize how many different smells there are...came out with a slight headache...still neat to see.  Anyway after the tour we did not have time to get up to the city because we had to head back to Florence.

St. Paul de Vance (thats me in the background...little camera shy since I aged 50 years)

All in all it was a good trip! Tomorrow me and 3 of my roommates are off on our fall break adventure where we will see Paris, Barcelona and London in one week.  It will be great! I will take tons of pictures and update my blog when I return!

 Looking back at my blog I realize that I have not spent a lot of time talking about my experiences during the week in Florence.  In Italy I am taking five classes: Italian, War and Media, Sociology of Consumption, Beginner Drawing and Wine Tasting.  The classes are starting to pick up now as we approach midterms next week, especially Italian.  I am finally starting to understand what people are saying to me and how I should respond (in very simple words of course).  I use a lot of the word "good" and "yes."

Last week Wednesday I was fortuate enough to meet up with my Uncle Scott and Aunt Amy in Florence.  They are on a European cruise and stopped for the day in Italy.  We met at the Duomo and had a wonderful lunch at a resturant very close to my apartment called Gilli.  They told me some good stories from their trip and I met the other couple that were on the trip with them.  After lunch I went my separate way in order to meet up with my wine tasting class which was meeting at 3pm to go on a tour of a winery.

The winery we went to was in Chianti and was privately owned by our guide Marco and his family who has lived there since the 1700s.  Marco was very sweet and was very excited to show us around his property and all the areas where he makes his wine.  We got to see where the grapes were de-stemed and the skins were removed, where the fermentation process took place, and where there wine was stored to age it.  I learned there are three ways to store wine; in concrete tanks (for the lower quality wines), in steel tanks (for the white wines and some red), and wooden barrels (for the good red wines).  After the tour, he and his wife had set aside some wines and homemade jams for us to taste.  We tried a white wine, a rose wine, a Chianti Classico wine, and his famous Capro Rosso wine (which was my favorite).  He had us drink the Capro Rosso wine with dark chocolate and it was amazing! Unfortunately, I forgot to bring my camera so I have no pictures to document this trip:(

On Friday of last week, 2 of my roommates (Mara and Veronika) and i decided to go horseback riding in Tuscany.  We left early Friday morning and did a tour where we were first taken to see a castle in Tuscany that was built in the 13th century.  It was really cool it had an entire town within it with shops and even a church.  I found out that 50 people still live in the castle today.  I think that is where I will live someday so that when someone asks where I live I can say "Oh, you know in a castle in Tuscany."

Inside the Castle

 We headed next to where we would meet the horses and go riding.  The ride was beautiful, but I forgot how scary horses were.  They are so big and mine kept kicking the ones behind it when they got too close! We got to see some beautiful country side along the way and when we returned we got to feed the horses and see the baby horse.  I also got to try riding a Vespa at the farm, not as hard as you think they are actually a lot like riding a motorized scooter!

Mara and Veronika on the horses

Oktoberfest in Munich, Germany

Hello all! I am so excited to fill you all in on my experience in the beautiful city of Munich.  First off, I have this to say about Oktoberfest...it was nuts! I would compare it to the Minnesota state fair with a million more gallons of beer, enough brats to feed all of Germany, and too many people to count in lederhosens! I actually read a statistic somewhere that said, last year alone 1.7 million gallons of beer were consumed at Oktoberfest.

The adventure started late last Thursday evening.  We (me, three of my roommates, and about 30 other students who had booked through the same program) departed by bus at about 12am, the plan being to drive though the night and arrive in Munich by morning.  After a quick stop for breakfast, we got into Munich at about 9:30am Friday morning, where the bus dropped us right off at the Oktoberfest grounds.  So by 10am we were already in a tent enjoying our first beer of the day!  Oktoberfest has six main beer houses which all make a special brew that is only served for Oktoberfest.  I learned quickly that if you were not to the tents by 10am sharp (when they opened) it was near impossible to get in one because they were so crowded.  So the only house my roommates and I made it into was the one we went to on the first day the Hofbrauhaus.  The beer was great and only served in liter glasses, which is equivalent to about 3 1/3 beers.  Friday was pretty much dedicated to drinking, eating brats and walking around Oktoberfest (which besides rides is pretty much all you can do).

First beer of Oktoberfest!

 We stayed both Friday and Saturday night in a hotel right outside of the city, which was very nice and had a great complimentary breakfast for us in the morning.  Saturday morning I did a bike tour of Munich which turned out to be very informative.  The tour took us to all the main monuments in Munich like the Marienplatz which has the Glockenspiel (the town hall which has little show associated with clock which tells a story of a knights tournament on the hour).  The tour also took us to the National Theater, Englischer Garten (which has a nude section!..very odd thing for a park in my opinion), and a couple WWII sites (including one of the few remaining Nazi headquarter buildings).  The tour ended with lunch at the Chinese Tower Beergarden, where, of course I had another bratwurst and potatoes.

Chinese Tower Beergarden

Afterwards me and a couple other girls from the tour (Cory, Sarah and Kelsey) doubled back to some of the sights the guide had pointed out as places we should go in or explore further.  We climbed the tower at St. Peterskirche (the oldest church in Munich dating back to 1180) and got to see a great view of the city.  We also ventured into the Frauekirche church which is said to have the devils footprint stamped into it, in reality the print looks like a tennis shoe, so is not quite as impressive as I had thought.

The Famous Glockenspiel viewed from the top of the St. Peterskirche tower

Sunday was our short day because the bus was scheduled to leave by 3pm.  My roommates and I decided against another day in Oktoberfest and instead took a train to the Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial.  It was extreamly sad, but the audio tour that we did gave us some good information that we may not have gotten if we had tried to walk through on our own.

All in all the trip was a success and I am glad I got the opportunity to go.  I will say it again, Munich was beautiful and is definitely a place that I would visit again if I have the chance!

Munich!