St. Pierre les Nemours

Duke of Nemours castle

A little boat hut chilling on the river

A building plucked from a history textbook

East view of the castle

This town is crazy talk. The entire town is older than Canada itself, it has a castle and cobblestone streets and bridges big enough for one car. I keep commenting to the girls that it all looks like a facade. Like behind the old shutter doors is a green screen, or it's like a building that was built in Disney Land for a ride. This is embarrasing that it's real, but my brain refuses to see it as history. In anycase it's beautiful. Today Courtney and I walked around the town, first looking for wifi and then taking pictuers. Don't get me started on wifi....non-existent....they have cobblestone streets but no wifi. It's hard to explain what my life is like here. It feels like I've pressed pause on my life in Calgary and now I'm playing in France. I have two suitcases and that's what I'll live out of for 3 months. We have a kitchen but we don't have can opener. We have a bedroom but no curtains. We have a living room but no couch. I have a computer but no wifi. I'm having a good time but I really miss home. I miss you guys.

I'm here!

So after a very long flight and not enough sleep for even a robot I made it to Paris. And then by shear luck I found the hotel. I found the street that the hotel was on and just picked a direction to walk in. The numbers on the buildings are really hard to find. Not to mention that there are a million doors on each building and some of them look like closet doors but are legitimate establishments 

The girls and I had 2 days in Paris and then we trained to Nemours. Paris was crazy, we walked and walked and walked until it was dark. We went to all the tourist-y spots like the Eiffel Tower and Champs Elysees. There is so much to see, it truly has to be done at your own pace. I'm excited for the weather to warm up when I can go on runs with my camera and take lots of pictures without my fingers falling off. It's super chilly here right now...brrrr Nemours is perfect. It's exactly what you think a small French town will be, Duke's castle and all. 
We had our first day of school today, Courtney aka Coco and I just observed all day, by the way school goes until 4:30, a super duper long day. I'm exhausted, time for a glass from the box of wine!

Leaving on a jet plane

This isn't real. Yesterday I said goodbye to my family, last night I said goodbye to my friends and today I said goodbye to my husband. I've left everyone I really know and I'm about to board a flight to cross the Atlantic, to a place where I'll pretend I know what I'm doing. This is a little surreal.

Something to do, somewhere to go

I'm going, I'm going, I'm going! The contract has finally been signed, it's Wednesday and my flight is for Friday, cutting it a little close. I have no idea what my placement looks like, or what's expected of me, but I plan on showing up smiling. I'm putting my trust in God...
I was at the library looking for books to bring with me and I found the most beautful book. It's called Something to Do, by David Lucas. It's about finding a stick and drawing adventures in the dirt. Check it out. 

Is it going to happen?

So France isn't confirmed yet. Maybe I'll winter in France, maybe I'll winter in Canada...is that considered "wintering"? Hopefully this blog will be for all the running trails I find through French wineries and Parisian alleyways. Hopefully this blog will be for all the adventures French young'ns demand of me. If not I'll blog about all the French verbs I downloaded onto my ipod for my Canadian running trails. Here's to France and wishful thinking!