warning: word explosion ahead

It's an inside joke inside my family (not anymore, though) that I am a person with a "word quota" per day... a certain amount of words with which I need to share with the world each day.. My brother jokes that if I've had a quiet day he pities the person who gets stuck with me at night. I start by saying all of that because, well, my housemates have been gone the last two days and I've got so many exciting things to share with everyone about my last ten days that I thought you may need a proper warning.

From my last entry, you know I had made my way to Bordeaux to visit a friend. My words were restricted while there due to the French keyboard. Typing was so hard!

<-- Bordeaux was beautiful, and it was extra special to visit with the help of Juliette and her family because of being from there and opening their home to Megan and I to stay. So... to start the food her mother prepared was amazing. Fresh baguettes at every meal, yummy pasta, ham, salad... MMmmm.... This picture is of Juliette and I in Lacanau, a beach town west of Bordeaux. It wasn't quite warm enough to hit the beach in a swimsuit and go for a swim, but it wasn't hard to picture how packed the area would be as soon as the real heat comes!

<-- For one of the evenings, we went out for dinner with some of Juliette's friends. Talk about a "local experience." Juliette was the only one at the table who spoke both English and French fluently. The extent of my French is "bonjour," "pardon me," and "au revoir." Pathetic, really. Thank goodness smiles are universal! We ate at a restaurant in the Bordeaux city center and then went for a stroll. The ambiance of Bordeaux felt sophisticated. I don't really know how to explain it, but it made me want to sit outside a cafe and sip some of that world-reknowned red wine and talk about global issues. A photo doesn't really capture it well, but this photo is looking out over one of the bridges. During the summer, the open area you see before the river is a water mural. Bordeaux boasts the largest square in all of Europe-- lined by quaint cafes, elegant city buildings and then backed up against the river... there was a garden and also this water mural.

<-- I feel a little embarassed to admit I am not a wine drinker. Embarassed because I was unable to grasp the significance of the wine chateaus we visited. Bordeaux, as most of you know, is known worldwide for their wine... This photo doesn't do it justice at all... but what I was going for was to show the vastness of this region of grapes. Try to imagine when the grape vines are in season! We drove for over an hour and still all you could see were rows and rows of grapes. While there were literally hundreds (maybe thousands) of chateaus, we visited the Medoc and St. Emilion regions. You may recognize some of the bigger chateaus... Petrus, Canon, Cheval Blanc, or Beau Sejour-Becot. I will be honest and tell you that I don't know much about wine..

<-- The oldest Bordeaux area to produce wine, Saint Emilion. This is where the chateaux Cheval Blanc was. There were quaint wine shops everywhere on the tiny, winding cobblestone streets. Saint Emilion's is considered a midevil French village, with its first vineyards were estimated to have been planted in the 2nd century. Amazing!