chartres

Pronouced..."shart" basically.
This beautiful cathedral was built during the Gothic period, but started at the beginning of Gothic and finished at the very end of Gothic, so that's why the two towers don't match - one was built at the beginning of the cathedral's construction and the other at the end of construction.
Just a fun fact for your cathedral knowledge bank.

The west rose window was under construction while we were there, but it was still amazing. We spend over an hour wandering around and observing and discussing all the facade design and architecture.

And then we spend another hour on the interior, checking out the amazing stained glass and labyrinth on the cathedral floor.
This cathedral is so amazing! (hollow sentence, but really, it is.)

And then we explored the town of Chartes. And we love it. And we would be perfectly happy living there.

Basically, we love Chartres.
Including the creepy old guy outside the cathedral singing "He's Got the Whole World in His Hands" and getting it stuck in my head for the rest of the day.

i have class and you don't.

I was thoroughly excited to take the Eurostar/Channel Tunnel/Chunnel from London to Paris. That is, until we had to leave our hotel at 4 in the morning to get to the train station. Needless to say, I slept the whole way to Paris, but then we had to get out in the city and start exploring and stay awake!
No big deal, but I live like ten minutes from this:

We were walking on the sidewalk and I was getting distracted by the people selling mini-Eiffels and then I looked up and grabbed the nearest person for support. Holy. That thing is giant huge! And there I was, just walking by! Crazy.
Walking through, actually....

 rockin.
So, my first day in Paris I got to hang out with Eiffel and hang out in the Latin Quarter and have an early bedtime.
Because guess what? I attended an event the next day which was in my top ten classy moments called the French Open.

 It was so so so fun! I am now going to play tennis all summer long because I am totally inspired. We had the best time. And don't worry, I adjusted my outfit so that I would better fit in with the French Open crowd.

 

The funny thing is that no one gave me a second glance. Camo gear is to army as cardigan over shoulder is to French Open.

joyeux noel/bon fete des meres

Foreign birthdays rock my world.
I celebrated with Monet, Picasso, Louis XIV, Marie Antoinette, and crepes.
Not bad, not bad at all.

this is a birthday pic. at versailles. no big deal - this is my life now. 

Also, don't worry, I will soon tell you about the French adventures I've been having lately, including my favorite cathedral in the world, delicious dinners, my favorite art out of my ears, and some super cute shoes that I found...all of this and more if you promise to keep reading my blog!

PS.
I know that the blog title is slightly confusing, but those are the only two holiday-related expressions I know in French....

romp through jane austen land

The second part of the England daytrip was like being in a Jane Austen novel and I'm totally legit in saying that because I have read all her novels and I currently read Pride & Prejudice when I'm on the Tube/metro/underground/whateveryouwanttocallit. So, we went to Stourhead and I was lagging behind the group the whole time because I was taking pictures of this estate. This place is absolutely incredible and so beautiful. I wanted to walk around the estate wearing an empire dress and really complete the look.

Did we watch Pride & Prejudice immediately following this daytrip. Yes, yes we did. Typical. Awesome.

Don't worry, I did, in fact, rock a side ponytail for the majority of the day. They're coming back. As are overall shorts, I'm sorry to say.

Our next stop after Stourhead...Bath! I love Bath! It is such a charming place and I am planning to buy a flat on the Royal Crescent someday. You're all invited to stay over.

 this picture is right after the I gave my class presentation on the Royal Crescent. I chose to present somewhere where I could move around and be loud and excited.

England is the best. Don't worry, soon I will talk about my awesome adventures in France!

stonemasons

Remember when I was bus fun?
I got to re-live my glory days a little bit when we had our daytrip day in England. Just because we were on a bus/coach. Not because I told hilarious limericks or watched Harry Potter. In fact, we did a lot of eating snacks and sleeping on the coach, because what do we do best?
Intake art, eat, and sleep.
Our daytrip, though, was very rad.
First stop was Stonehenge, which, despise what the poses in our pictures may suggest, was not built by druids.

It was a beautiful sunny and windy day at Stonehenge and I was again surprised by how close Stonehenge is to the highway.

on the left: line of sidewalk people, and just lefter than that is the highway. see the cars? ok, and these rocks on the right are Stonehenge. No big deal.

Our next stop was Salisbury. Way awesome. It's the largest Gothic spire in England. So tall that it's leaning a wee bit, visible inside the cathedral.

Also, the town of Salisbury is absolutely charming and they have swans.

This is a picture of the interior of the cathedral. It was obviously beautiful.

The rest of our daytrip is forthcoming in another post. I'll just leave you with two pictures:

totally brill.

Don't mind that my feet are super decrepit from being on all day. But i would like you to notice my very cool tan line from my toms. So maybe I wear them all day everyday.

'ello mate

So, as you may know, I am basically in love with London. With England, in general, but particularly in love with London, just because I was there on a study abroad a couple years ago. So, imagine my freaking-out-ness of getting to go back to London. Actually, here, here is a picture of my excitement so you don't have to stretch out your imagination too much:

Yes. Very very glad. And we landed and flew over green vegetation and people speak English! Ah, refreshing after nodding stupidly all the time in Italy. So, we land and then, voila! LONDON, BABY.
So the day after the night we arrived, I decided to lead people on a walking tour of this city so we could the famous sites and get a feel for the city. Ah! I love the Tube, I love walking the city, I love the sites! I feel like everything was so glad to see me and I felt like I was seeing old friends. I may or may not have tried to hug Big Ben. It's fine.

But yes, I dragged my friends on a long walk. They are troopers. And it was an awesome walk, starting at the Tower of London ending in Trafalgar Square, with a ton of stuff in between, including delicious food (of course) and snagging wifi at McDonalds and a wee bit of window shopping.

That's not even the best part of my day.
Because I went with a friend over to the BYU London Centre, because she has a friend in the program there now and wanted to see the friend. And I obviously want to go to the Centre, so we go over together and we ring and ask if we can see her friend, and they are in the middle of a fireside and we're like, oh no.
BUT THEN A MIRACLE HAPPENED.
It's called they let us INSIDE the London Centre to sit and listen to the end of the fireside and then HANG OUT in the parlor and servery afterwards.
I was weeping, literally, for a solid few minutes when we first walked inside and climbed that beautiful creaking staircase. It was so awesome to be in there again for that hour or so.

I will live in London when I grow up...somehow...I can busk, right?
London rocks my world.

?

So this is the most hilarious statue that I have seen this trip.

it's like he's trying not to let us see that he is, in fact, texting.

ps: More posts of what I'm actually doing besides eating are coming.