Marseille

Victory is ours!

We walked blindly to the sea.

Marseille, we owned you.

As you can see from the haiku above, we went to Marseille last week. We are quite proud of ourselves because we did not get lost once.

We saw the Mediterranean for the first time!

Cathédrale de la Major

The doors are amazing.

We didn't take many pictures because they don't do it justice.

We went to the only Starbucks in the south of France. It was spectacular.

Hooray for good ole American coffee.

This is not Marseille...It is the Quatre Dauphine fountain in Aix.

After a lovely afternoon in Marseille, we went to the Chritmas market in Aix. You are probably wondering why we look so happy in this picture...

It's because we were eating chocolate covered pears.

Une parodie de L’Automne de Victor Hugo.

                                                       L’hiver

Les fleurs est moins vivants, le soleil est moins chaud, l’humeur est moins gaie ;

Les jours des vacances sont passés, Les promenades d’étés finissent.

Hélas ! La neige est ici !...

L’hiver est comme un vieil homme qui pleure.

Et le beau temps est oublie.

Thanksgiving/Christmas market

Thanksgiving dinner...

Stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy...we had it all.

We even had turkey! There was a Thanksgiving meal at the English speaking church and there was leftover turkey, so they let us have some.

We made Vin Chaud, it was scrumptious.

We miss snow! So we made our own.

We have Advent candles! They are not all the right colors, but we made it work.

They really go all out with Christmas decorations here. The lights are absolutely amazing.

This is the main street, Cours Mirabeau.

Hotel de Ville. This is a square right by our apartment.

Cours Mirabeau.

The Christmas market on Cours Mirabeau that is open every single day.

We tried Macarons for the first time! They were interesing...

You all should come and visit us, if not to see us then for the lights, they really are breathtaking, and they are everywhere! The church that we go to is having a Christmas carol concert on Sunday. We are both in the choir for it. The service is in the main cathedral in town, and it is a candle lit service. From what we are told, there are usually about a thousand people there. We cannot wait, it sounds glorious. And we get to sing in a huge cathedral!

We rebel against clever titles!

It was an absolutely beautiful evening, so we decided to go out for some nice hot mulled wine. It was scrumptious. There is nothing better than hot wine on a chilly night.

It was gone all too soon.

One of our new favorite things is Nutella hot chocolate. It is so good! I don't know why we didn't think of it sooner.

We are very proud of our wine bottle collection. Five bottles in a month and a half is not too shabby

It rained nonstop all last week, which was also the week of our break. I woke up one night to the sound of dripping, I ignored it for a while, but then finally decided I should find out where it was coming from, and it's a good thing I did! When I finally found where the leak was I discovered a big pool of water just inches away from all of my books. I almost had a heart attack. Over the course of the next week we found several more leaks, the grand total now is nine I believe.

Stuff (We're too tired to think of a creative title.)

On Wednesday we didn't have school so we decided that it was time to get to know Aix a little better. We went to Granet Museum and got to see lots of Picasso, a few Monet's, and one Van Gogh, it was very exciting.

We also went to the main cathedral in town, that is right next to our school. It was beautiful! The pictures do not do it justice.

While we were there we wondered into a beautiful courtyard. 

As soon as we had walked through the doors a French lady came over and locked them.

She was leading some kind of tour, and we were obviously not suppost to be in there. We were locked in there for about 30 minutes until some nice lady came and saved us. Hey, but not many people can say they have been locked in a cathedral courtyard, right?

The clock tower in the center of town.

The most amazing door ever!

Nutella crepes!

We discovered that our favorite bakery sells day olds for really cheap! Hooray!

Lasagna bolognese.

We went out to dinner with a friend from school and her husband.

We can't believe it has already almost been a month! We have our first break next week, which we are very excited about, but first we have to get through our first test on Monday...

A failed expedition.

Well we were planning on going to the beach last week, but it was a bit cold for that. So we decided to climb Mt. St. Victoire instead, but it didn't go as well as we hoped.

We were told by one of Anna's sisters (who shall remain nameless) that the mountain was no more then three miles out of town. She lied. After walking at least six miles we reached the mountain, but were too tired to climb it. We took a bus back into town. But at least we got to see it!

Food!

From a delicious sandwich place that is way too close to school.

From a greek restraunt that is too close to our apartment for comfort.

Our first meal in the apartment.

Chocolat eclair...yum.

Date night.

Crepes

Trying out our snazzy espresso maker.

We went through our first jar of Nutella disturbingly fast, so we had to upgrade to a bigger size jar.

Well we are starting to settle in. We finished cleaning the apartment yesterday, yeah! And we figured out where to put the trash out, which is kind of an importent thing to know. So far we have not blown anything up, although I think I blew a fuse on the first night, two of our lights don't work... Otherwise things are going well. We started school on Monday, tomorrow is the first day of our teacher not speaking ANY english...gulp. We are actually the only Americans in the class. We are planning a trip to the beach on Saturday, so expect to see pictures some time next week.

Our apartment!

                        What you see when you first walk in the door.

                                         At the top of the stairs.

                                          The guestbook.

                                         The dinning room table.

                Our awesome couch. Above the living room is the loft with anna's bed.

                         Our mega entertainment center! The TV doesn't actually work.

                                          The loft.

                                         Looking down from the loft.

                                       The hallway to rest of the place.

                                        The kitchen.

                                       The cute little table in the kitchen.

                                                  The pantry.

                                        Yea, we have a martini shaker...no big deal.

                                         Pretty much the best teapot ever.

                                      Our somewhat creepy bathroom.

                                   The stairs going up to the 2nd floor.

                                                    Cool tiles.

                                        The bedroom upstairs.

                            The toilet in our not creepy bathroom.

                              The rest of our not creepy bathroom.

                                          Heading out to the terrace.

                                        The view from the terrace.

                                                                        We love our apartment! There a two extra beds, so if you ever find yourself in France...