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Recent Posts, Below:

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LIVING IN 5 COUNTRIES IN 5 YEARS: 5 LESSONS
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BLUE FOOTED BOOBIES: THE BEST PLACE TO SEE THEM 
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CLIMBING 
​CHIMBORAZO VOLCANO 
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THE HIDDEN GEM OF SINTRA,
​PORTUGAL
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A MONTH OF ADVENTURE IN KENYA

Turin (Torino), Italy

8/26/2017

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We went to Italy for a day!
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Aix les Bains

8/24/2017

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Quite a lovely afternoon! After my morning classes which ended at 12:30, we drove an hour to this lovely town and spent time by a large lake after struggling to find lunch past 2:00 PM (they only reopen after lunch for dinner around 7:00 PM!) We went on a short little walk by a lovely lake, Lac du Bourget. As the day went on the sun got hotter! Camille, Michele, and I slept on the way home. Great day with the family :) 
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The Fam Visits in Grenoble!

8/22/2017

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Views from our airbnb <3
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"Ziplining for Free?" Yes, please!

8/20/2017

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Today when Emma and I arrived at Chamrousse, not only did we accidently not pay for the bus because the bus driver shuffled us off the bus too quickly before leaving, but we also went ziplining for free because we happened to be there during the one promotional day of the year. Right on! 
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Annecy Stole My Heart

8/19/2017

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Annecy can be best described as the setting of fairytale storybooks I wrote as a kid. Just dream of a bustling picturesque city, swans on the lake included, and you’ll get something along the lines of Annecy.

Our bus left Grenoble at around 9:45 AM and we arrived close to 11 AM. I could have spent the entire day walking around the old part of town admiring the little boutiques. We people watched while listening to dozens of languages. Very much a tourist destination. 

We ate crepes and continued to the lake. We learned it's possible to walk all the way around the lake, which I would have loved to do if we were staying there longer. While the three other girls went on a little boat ride, Anna and I visited a church up on the hill and then went to an old castle which had a museum exhibit about Chinese visual art. Why not! 
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We had a fun time finding eating dinner and eventually wound our way back to the bus station to catch a ride home on a spanish coach bus. It was fun to hear spanish when I wasn't expecting it and communicate with the bus driver that way. 
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Castle Before Noon

8/18/2017

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What did we do before class today? We went to a castle. And to think I almost slept in! 
The 35 minute bus ride from the train station left us a 10 minute walk from the entrance of the castle. The stroll through town was lovely, and we had plenty of time to enjoy a coffee outside before the gates to the castle opened at 9:30. I had no idea what to expect, but I know that I was not expecting to fall in love with this place as easily as I did. 
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Grenoble Shenanigans

8/17/2017

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Cuves de Sassenage

8/17/2017

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After school today (which ended at 12:30), we went to visit les Cuves de Sassenage, or the Sassenage caves. They were created hundreds of thousands of years ago by water currents. Super neat! Despite the intense heat outside, it was quite cold inside the cave. The walk to get there was just as cool as the caves themselves. 
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Gem of a Run by the Water

8/11/2017

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The temperatures last week were much too high to actually enjoy the runs I was going on, but this week has been much more reasonable in terms of temperature. Last week we even had an official heat-stroke warning!

Yesterday evening I was pleasantly surprised to stumble across a bike path lining l'Isere, the main river winding through Grenoble. From the Houille Blanche residence to the bike path took about 10 minutes (at a slow jog) and from there to the right hand side I scrambled to a dirt path. This one was parallel to the bike path and closer to the water but I enjoyed it more because it wasn't paved (ie. precarity is pretty much the definition of my preparation for these things). 
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I snapped these ones from the second bridge that crossed the path perpendicularly after about a half hour of running before heading back. The most lovely part of the evening was reaching the residence, sitting in the grass below a tree stretching, and enjoying the sunshine on my (disgustingly sweaty, but still charming) face. 
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Night Hike on a Tuesday? Absolutely.

8/8/2017

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The Bastille is an old fort in Grenoble surrounded by kilometers upon kilometers of hiking trails in all directions. We left our residence at 7:00 PM, arrived at the base at 7:30 thanks to the killer tram system, and enjoyed the most magnificent views the whole climb up for an hour and a half. The path we took was from the left hand side of the hill, and the climb consisted of LOTS of stairs but they were part of an old fort, so the historical significance of the place made our legs hurt a little less. You can easily reach the many openings by going through centre ville until you get to the canal/river, "l'Isere." The green space in this city is impressive, and it was neat to feel like we were sorta-kinda in the forest while still admiring the vast expanse of Grenoble in the valley below us.

Just so you know, it is possible to take a gondola up to the fort, but I'd suggest doing the hike because you can see so much more this way. Actually, a nice little lady told me the hike was worth it when I was on the train ride the first day I got to France. She was right. (Thanks Debra.) I'd love to explore the many more trails that expand from this one into the mountains. Here is the website for more info: ​http://www.bastille-grenoble.fr/english/sentier_uk.htm
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Sunday Stroll

8/6/2017

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I was going to stay in and do homework all day, but when somebody asks you if you want to go for a stroll downtown, you can't necessarily justify staying in and doing homework. We went to drink an overpriced espresso, walked by the water to catch some views, and trudged along to the first viewpoint of the Bastille hike (photo above). I'll definitely be going back this week to get the full view from above. We got back at about 4 and I was still able to do all my homework. 
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How to Spend One Marvelous Day in Lyon

8/5/2017

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Let me just start by saying it would be possible to spend MUCH more time in Lyon. BUT if you only have one day, it is absolutely still worth going, as we learned on Saturday. Here are some suggestions on what to do if you're crunched for time in Lyon and don't know what's worth seeing (based on our experience). 
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Centre Ville

While all the parts of Centre Ville we saw were nice, the Historical Section of town was absolutely the highlight for all. The little winding streets and the gorgeous architecture in all directions blew us away. We started our journey at 7:30 AM in Grenoble, catching a bus for 12 euros (flexbus.com) for the hour and a half ride. I read Le Journal d'Anne Frank the whole way and enjoyed the scenery. 

We walked 35 minutes from the bus station to centre ville, crossing two canals on the way. So picturesque I cannot even explain it. Place Saint Jean was our breakfast destination, where we sipped coffee with a view of the Lyon Cathedral, a Roman Catholic church.
After visiting some cute little shops and listening to the hustle and bustle of 10:00 AM, we made our way up through the Jardins du Rosarie to get to Fourvière hill, which had amazing views of the city. The hike up was fun even though we were definitely sweating when we got to the top. 

Fourvière Viewpoint

You don’t have to be religious to appreciate the largest cathedral in Lyon, the Fourvière basilica. The architecture was impressive, the mosaics mind-boggling, and the colors everywhere made it hard to decide where to look next. We must have been there for at least a half hour because the place is HUGE. ​
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From the left hand side of the cathedral, we started making our way down the hill on the cobblestone streets. We soon reached the Roman Amphitheatres, located on rue de l’Antiquaille. They are over two thousand years old! In the first century BC, Lyon was called Lugdunum and was capital of Gauls under the Roman empire.
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We walked back through the Rue des Antonins and eventually came out at the Rhone canals, which we had walked over earlier. We sat down for a while, listening to two musicians from Argentina who had been traveling together for 7 YEARS (!) as we bought the return bus tickets back for 8:30 PM. From there, our initial plan was to head to Tete d’Or Park to enjoy some green... but we got distracted along the way. 

La Fresque des Lyonnais

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One of my highlights was seeing the murals. The picture on the left is completely painted... there are actually no windows there at all. Even below the yellow, the little shops are completely painted. Very impressive. 

Rhone Canals

Not only did we enjoy some beautiful views of the Saone Canal, but we also bought refreshing drinks to cool off as we sat under a bridge enjoying the scenery. What a catch! ​
After about an hour of reading on the Fleuve (what is my life) we made our way to Rue Neuve to get some dinner. We saw neat stuff along the way, including a bookstore. We had a rude waiter, but it didn’t matter because we were enjoying ourselves too much to notice. We headed back to the bus station and were on our way back to Grenoble about a half hour after expected.
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Postcards: as fun to write as to receive

8/4/2017

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Université Grenoble-Alpes

8/2/2017

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The 36 degree celsius or 97 degrees fahrenheit weather has been a challenge these last few days (aka you can't see the off-camera sweat dripping from my nose) but not a bad picture of the bumble bee eh? I took this at the University today after my class that finished at 12:30. There was a "Welcome!" meet-&-greet for a half hour after class. I listened to some live music, ate crackers with apple juice, and even tried a popular mint-flavoured soda that tasted like mouthwash. These pictures are from around the university. I absolutely love the little tram because it's everywhere and so cute. 
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I got back to the residence, cooked some salmon, listened to a french podcast, tried to work out but almost died from the heat, jumped in a cold pool (bliss, pure bliss), and wrote a postcard to a longtime friend. 
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Maps on Maps on Maps

8/1/2017

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We found an insane insect! It looks like a praying mantis but I didn't know they lived around here. You're allowed to say "Ew" because that's what we're taught since elementary school to say when we see a big bug, but you've gotta admit it's a beautiful color.

​It's too hot to sleep with the windows closed so crossing my fingers this gentleman of an insect doesn't end up in my bed in the morning.
How many times have I said "Never Eat Soggy Waffles" in the past three days I'll never know. (Hint: that's how I learned to remember a compass, or "North East South West," in second grade.)
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    HINT: Click "Previous" at the bottom of this page to read about and see photos of: 
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    • My 3 month internship in Kenya where I had some interesting culture shocks, traveled, and saw beautiful things like Naivasha's Hell's Gate National Park, Nairobi National Park, and Mt. Longonot 
    • Moving to Montreal to start my MA program 
    • Going to Stockholm, Sweden
    • Working at Kingdom Trails and mountain biking on the daily
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    • A glimpse at what I did in France for 2 months  
    • 2 intensive French classes in Sherbrooke, Canada and Grenoble respectively
    • my month-long visit back to Ecuador (where I climbed a snowy volcano, performed a rap, ate bomb ice cream, and soaked up the sun with blue-footed boobies)
    • an impromptu trip to Toronto to see the activist Vandana Shiva, and to Quebec to see my lovely grandmother
    • & adventures in Vermont last summer (including an owl visitor and a hike)
    And you can even keep scrolling through beyond that if you're interested!

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  • Home
  • Travel Blog
  • Photography
    • 1 Country 1 Picture
    • South America >
      • Ecuador >
        • Andes
        • Amazon
        • Cloud Forest
        • Coast
      • Peru >
        • Lake Titicaca
        • Machu Picchu
        • Sacred Valley Region
        • Rainbow Mountain
      • Bolivia
    • Asia >
      • Cambodia
      • Laos
      • India
      • Thailand
      • South Korea
    • Europe >
      • Portugal
      • Sweden
      • Spain
      • Italy
      • France >
        • France (Brittany)
        • France (Rhone Alpes)
        • France (Mont Blanc)
      • Iceland
      • Austria
      • Switzerland
      • Denmark
      • Germany
      • Monaco
      • Luxembourg
    • North America >
      • Canada >
        • Western
        • Eastern
      • Mexico
      • Bahamas
      • Virgin Islands
      • United States >
        • Northeast
        • West
        • South
    • Africa >
      • Kenya
      • Tanzania
      • Zanzibar
    • Oceana >
      • Hopefully One Day!
    • Middle East >
      • Hopefully One Day!
    • Panoramas
  • Travel Tips
    • Packing List(s)
    • How to Fund Travels
    • Study Abroad
    • Language Learning
    • Work / Travel
  • Artwork
    • Pottery
    • Woodworking
    • Jewelery
    • Miniature Sculptures
    • Miscellaneous