A Weekend in Rennes

Yo, gangstas! Wasssuppp?!?!

Enough of that, I know.

Anyway, last weekend I went to Rennes, the capital of Bretagne (or Brittany) with my friend Allison!

She's beautiful.

We were only in Rennes for about 26 hours, but man, did I have a good time! While we were there, we wandered the town, acting like the huge tourists we are...

We rented an apartment through airbnb, and took waaaay too many pictures with the cat that lives there.

Friendly guy.

Tried our hand at the infamous Rennes night scene, which was everything we had hoped it to be and more.  Showing Frenchies how to dance in an old, underground jail? Check.

And then I woke my butt up the next morning, realized I would be about 15 minutes late for the mass I had planned on going to, stopped at this church instead, met a really nice French woman who's been teaching English for years and has actually worked with many English assistants, met her American friends who are teaching in Rennes during this year and the next, was asked to read the Prayers of the Faitful at mass, said I'd love to as long as they didn't mind my American accent, read the intentions (in my American accent), and had a nice talk about ways to live abroad with the American couple I met.  This was easily a highlight of the year for me.

So though we weren't there long, I will forever hold my memories of Rennes near to my heart. Wonderful trip with a great friend. 

Phew. I think I'm almost caught up on blog posts now.

Lovesies.

Angie

St. Paddy's in Nantes

Apparently St. Patrick's Day is really gaining popularity in France.  As it was Bailey's last night here, and, well, one of the best holidays in the year, we decided to try our luck going out in Nantes. Not only were there people out, they were all over the place! Every pub had people inside, outside, and down the street.  What a fun atmosphere!! They were even throwing St. Paddy's paraphernalia off the roof of one pub we visited.  I got a little hat.

Cheers.
Angie

Beach Day!!

As I mentioned, one of my best friends and college roomies, Bailey, hopped the pond and came to spend two weeks with me in France.  We took an amazing trip that I will tell you all about soon! But first, we took a little trip to La Baule, a beautiful bowl-shaped beach that's about 30 minutes to the west of me.

Thanks for the pic, Bailey!

Selfies: Proof that we were all together.

Great day, great people.  What else can you ask for in life?

Lovesies,

Angie

When I See an Elephant Fly

Ya, ya, you're right, there are no flying elephants in Nantes, but there is one really cool mechanical elephant.  It hails from Les Machines de l’île, or Machines of the Island.  One of the coolest things about this elephant is that you can take a ride on it as it walks around the island.  Sounds cool, huh?

Hey there, big guy.

The hilarious truth of watching this giant machine transport passengers is that it moves at a pace that makes a battery-powered wheelchair look speedy.  Yes, it's cool to see. Yes, it would be so fun to take kids on there.  BUT, watching people wait on board for 30 minutes while they loaded everyone just to slowly saunter around this little island made me feel confident that I was enjoying the experience much more just watching it unfold.

That being said, if you go to Nantes, you have to go to see the re-purposed shipyards that this elephant calls home.  He's surrounded by really cool machines that are inspired by the imaginary worlds of Jules Verne and the mechanical genius of Leonardo da Vinci.  How cool is that??

Much love to all!
Angie

Francey Pants Reunited!

Reunited in France at last!!

The other leg of Francey Pants was able to make it out for a quick 2-day trip to my side of the bay this week! And I couldn't have been happier!

So what do you do when you're hosting someone who you've lived and traveled with in France?  I'll tell you what you do:

Eat yummy food with lots of cheese!

Run around Nantes for a day!

And find silly things...

And take silly pictures...

And more silly pictures...

And then some nice pictures...

And then pictures where you can't quite figure out if they were going for silly or nice...

But mostly just be together because that's what makes for the best memories.

Much love,
Angie

A Quick Trip to the Coast

One of the benefits of where I live is my super-close proximity to the western coast of France.  On a train, I can get there in about 30 minutes to an hour and a half, depending on how classy of an establishment I want to visit.  So my roommate, Natalie, and I chose to take a drive to Le Croisic and Guerande.

Le Croisic

Hey, look! It's me!

Poor little guy!

 We stopped for a fabulous lunch at this petite creperie because it was just too cute!  We were about 10 feet from the woman making everyone's lunch. She probably thought we were hilarious/really creepy because we stared at her for pretty much the entire time we were there.  I tried to look away, but she was just such a master of galettes and crepes!

So much Christmas!

Creeping on my new favorite chef

And then we walked around and did silly things... 

I couldn't have asked for a better roommate!

After we had our fill of crepes and the Bay of Biscay, we made our way to Guerande: the fortified city, and home of delicious salt!

Fortification.

Really we just spent our time in Guerande looking through cute little shops, and buying souvenirs. And then we found the wall of pigs:

It took so much self control to not buy all of them!

Great day, great food, great cities!

Lovesies,
Angie

A Quick Trip to the Coast

My wonderful friends Allison and Melina came to Savenay for the weekend to celebrate Allison's birthday, try our hand at the Nantes nightlife, and go to the beach in St. Nazaire!

See! It has sand; it's a beach!

I'm collecting cute Germans!

Note: Allison really was a cheerleader.  Learning from the best.

MirandaSings meets the French beach. Haters back off.

 Love to all!  I hope you're getting excited for my favorite holiday: Thanksgiving!

Angie.

The Nest

In Nantes, there is a 37-floor skyscraper named the Tour Bretagne.  Pretty cool.  Even icier is that there is a bar located on the 32nd floor that has an observation deck that allows you to drink and creep at the same time.  So, basically it's like every other bar in the universe.  The only distinguishing factor between this bar and the majority of others in the world is that I went there with my friends Ali and Mike.

Those are my friends. Proof!

Decent view, eh?

And if that wasn't reason enough to go there, the bar is called "le nid" (the nest), and is set up as a giant goose nest.  HILARIOUS!  The seats are all broken eggshells, and this guy is even there to greet you:

Looking painfully unimpressed.  Yup, he's French.

This place was really a lot of fun, except for the fact that we didn't get seats because we came at the high noon of pre-dinner drinking (also knowns as 6-8pm).  But it was fun all the same, and it would definitely bring a great place to bring kids!  We saw tons of mini-Frenchies sipping on their limonades.  Chic.

Much love to all! Thanks for reading!

Angie