les vacances de printemps

its been a long time since my last update. time's been going really fast here, and i just finished my spring break. i had a good time traveling and saw a few really beautiful cities.

clint came from bilbao to spend a few days in aix. we walked around a lot, ate burritos and a ton of ice cream. then on thursday (april 1) we took the train to paris to meet A on friday. from paris, we all traveled together to brussels and amsterdam. even though the weather was cold and rainy, i enjoyed paris. we were only there three days, and since the city is so big i felt like we needed a lot more time there. but, we did get to see all the usual and necessary sites-- the eiffel tower, the arch de triomphe, notre dame. we also did some vintage shopping, went a cinema museum and visited père lachaise cemetery, which is a huge cemetery in the city where a lot of famous french people (and jim morrison) are buried. it was very cool.

from paris we nearly missed our bus to brussels because we slept in too late. thankfully we made it.. brussels was my favorite city, by far! our hostel was great, the people are friendly, the food is fatty and delicious, and the beer is awesome. brussels is a pretty small city, but there is still a lot to see and do. the architecture in the old part of the city is really ornate and kind of gaudy (i love it), but the city doesn't have the pretentious kind of vibe you can get from other cities. they're really relaxed and funny. (and there's this really tiny fountain of a boy peeing. its called mannekin pis and its one of the many weird sites in brussels). we mostly just wandered around the city and took in calories. my favorites were french fries with mayonnaise, a waffle with bananas and chocolate syrup, and chocolate candies. and, of course, we sipped belgian beer throughout the day. the weirdest was called "gueze"-- its a belgian beer that the locals say tastes like vomit. maybe it does a little, but i liked it.

finally we headed to amsterdam. the first night we stayed in a boatel (bahaha.. a boat hotel) in a really strange dock next to tankers and a pirate ship. the boat was super small but cute, and a cool experience. the rest of the nights we stayed in the red light district, which we found out later was a mistake. the pot and prostitute culture there draws kind of a gross (and loud) crowd of tourists, and you can tell that a lot of the visitors are there just to get high. we tried to avoid that scene, and ended up wandering the city, shopping at the market and visiting anne frank's house. our hostel, durty nelly's, sounds like it would be a nasty place, but it was actually pretty cool. there was a pub downstairs that we hung out at, and one night we wanted to dance so we found a stinky bar to go to. we were supposed to leave on sunday, but it turns out that we booked our plane ticket back to marseille for the wrong day, so we ended up staying an extra day in amsterdam. we went to an abandoned fishing wharf that now has a skate park and bunch of artists' studios.. and a giant seesaw!

on monday, clint went back to bilbao and A came to aix with me for two days. i showed her the market, my favorite stores and the best food in aix.. which happens to be a four cheese panini that we ate every day. she left last friday but has been stuck in london ever since due to iceland's volcano.


eiffel tower


paris carousel


the metro!


main square in brussels


canal in amsterdam (look at all the bikes!)


giant see saw, amsterdam