This morning we woke up much earlier than normal. The reason why was we got a bit of sun through our windows. Really quite wonderful to be able to wake up, and stick your head out the window into the sunlight to sniff the crisp autumn air and see the courtyard full of plants and cafe tables. Course, the only disadvantage is that all the other windows along the courtyard are within sight, meaning that yours is equally visible. We closed our blinds when we got dressed (btw, this is not the first time we've had to do this, normally we all go into the "phone booth").
We ate breakfast, and then grabbed our things to hit the road. We had a lot of ground to cover this day and we wanted to get as close to the Loire Valley as we could. When planning our route Ahmee didn't realize that the Loire Valley is just south of Paris. When we realized this we had a decision to make: miss Madrid for Chateaus, or miss Chateaus for Madrid. It's pretty obvious which one we picked. I think we all like France a great deal.
As we chugged on the highway (this cars chugs at you) I did some more schoolwork. I don't know if people know this, but we've officially reached the point at my school where we only have 3 weeks left to the grading period. This means two things: 1) I have to make sure to keep up (I'm miserably behind in Spanish, but my other classes are fine), and 2) our trip is going to come to an end in a couple of weeks.
I wrote and wrote and wrote a bit more, and every now and then I'd take a break to look out the window at the wonderful countryside. I've decided that I'm beginning to get a bit homesick. The sight of rolling hills covered with colored leaves coupled with fields of corn and other goodies made me warm and fuzzy inside (yes that was a reference to Legally Blonde 2). Perhaps it's just that in the cold weather I like to be close to home, then again, maybe it's just that I like autumn (even if I thoroughly dislike the cold that goes with it).
We eventually reached the point where we knew we had to get off the highway and find a hotel. Now the planet has tilted and the daylight hours are getting shorter we have less time to find a hotel before nightfall (unless we get up earlier and that just isn't going to happen any time soon). This forced me to put away the computer and my work for a good half hour too search with Ahmee and Poppy for a hotel. The first town we went into we didn't find one (but then we also managed to avoid the main street), but when we got back on the highway we traveled for about 15 minutes and wa la we found one. This hotel was right next to the service areas, so it was pretty much a truck stop hotel. It was not bad at all. The hotel was shaped like a U and we were on the right hand curve to the inside. We didn't have the spectacular view that the main desk and restaurant had of the mountains to the rear, we just had the windows of our neighbors across the semi-courtyard. Instead of hopping right back on the computer I let the computer recharge (it is possible to work with it plugged up but by then I was zapped of all motivation) and I decided it was time to check out our pretties. Some people might chuckle at my use of the word pretties for the huge collection of things we've got to give out to various people/keep for ourselves, but there really is no other word for them. They're just pretty. My rule of thumb is that you do not give someone something that you yourself wouldn't want to receive, so everything I've gotten I think is quite beautiful. It first started out with Ahmee's tablecloth that she got in Arles and her napkins and other various clothes. We set up the table on Ahmee's bed and then we decided that we wanted to check out everything. The table was the perfect background. I put all of my presents for people on the bed and went out and got all of our other treasures out of the trunk of the car to spread out. It was amazing just how much we've accumulated. I lined the back wall with the postcards and prints, while we filled up the bed with our things. I did not take a picture of the pretties, even though I really really wanted to. We sat there admiring the things we'd gotten and rehashing why we wanted to give so and so this particular pretty or that particular pretty. Unfortunately this talk didn't get to last very long. We had to pack up our things so we could go eat dinner and then go to sleep.
At the restaurant I discovered the one food someone should NEVER EVER get while in France. All other foods in France are wonderfully tasting, all of the nasty tasting things in France were combined into this one item. Sausage. Those of you who plan to go to France I advise you to neeeeeeever get the sausage. I'm a lover of sausage (my mom's told me that my first word was not Momma or Daddy, but was sausage), and this stuff made me want to gag. I got a very large thing that looked similar to a sausage. It looked just fine on the outside. When I cut into the thing though I met a terrible smell and an even worse sight. There were little white things that made up my sausage. They looked like some sort of animals intestines. The smell and the sight made me recoil, but it did not keep me from giving the sausage a good try. I ended up eating half of the sausage and then finally deciding that I'd had enough of the rubbery texture and the taste that managed to encompass all nasty smells I've smelled so far on this trip. Truly nasty stuff.
After the first terrible dinner I'd had in France we went back to the room where I did the usual: work a bit, get ready for bed, and fall asleep.
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