The return to France

I met up with Carson in Paris on the afternoon of the 22nd. Since we were only in Paris for a night, I chose a place that was close to the train station we would be departing from the next day. Or at least, that's what I wanted to do. I quickly realized that it was very difficult to find a hostel that didn't have terrible reviews online (not that I'm picky, but the number of complaints about rats in these places was terrifying) and was also less than 40 euros. I ultimately found one in Montmartre for a decent price that more than likely didn't have an infestation of any kind.

When I got to France, I was overwhelmed with happiness. After staring blankly at Hungarian, Czech, and Greek, languages that all look as if they were formed by aliens who decided to play scrabble but instead of making words just wanting to win the most points, being able to read signs made me feel very competent. Carson was already at the hostel when I arrived, and we immediately went out to find some Fischer (our favorite cheap beer) and sit outside because it was a super pretty day. Later on we went to a lesser known park with an awesome view of the city that Carson knew about and took the metro to the Seine for one last look. Overall, a great way to spend less than 24 hours in Paris.

The next morning we caught our train to Mont St Michel. I wanted to go there for my final destination because I wanted to 1. end in France 2. no longer be in a city 3. stay at this awesome bed and breakfast that I found online. In fact, my choice was almost entirely based on the incredible marketing of this bed and breakfast (it's called Au Bon Accueil and I suggest it to anyone and everyone). They picked us up at the train station and took us to the castle that day after giving us a brief history lesson about the area. When we got there, we decided to get all the workings for a picnic before going up to the castle, however it immediately started pouring down rain because the weather in Brittany is unpredictable and changes drastically about every ten minutes. We improvised and just had our picnic in a Brioche Doree (small cafe chain kind of like Panera).

After leaving a remarkable amount of crumbs in the restaurant, we managed to get a ticket for the castle tour by pretending to be french students (i.e. said nothing and handed the man at the booth our french student ids). The tour was great and we ran into some very friendly people wearing NC State hats who referred to where we were as Mount Sheh-mell.

The castle was cool, but we mostly just harassed
this seagull for an hour 

That night we walked up the road to perhaps the only restaurant within walking distance because our hosts insisted it had the best galettes in France. This is seemed like a bit of an exaggeration, given that we were in the middle of nowhere Brittany and France is a big place, but when the food came out their claims proved to be true. I'm going to stop there because I could probably write a novella centered around this galette.

I will never know a higher love

Since we were the last people in the restaurant, one of the two chef/owners offered to drive us back to our hostel. We promised we would be back before we left.

On the following day we rented bikes from the hotel so that we could ride to the next town. Of course, my back wheel kind of exploded about halfway through the journey, so we just locked both the bikes to a fence and walked the rest of the way. This actually turned out to be a good thing, because we got to walk on the beach. It was low tide, so the beach was comprised of miles of sand and beautiful shells (I got a little ahead of myself and collected about 30).

There was also this grass stuff on the beach. If you look REALLY hard you can
 see a tiny Mont St Michel in the distance.

I forgot to mention that I booked this bed and breakfast a month in advance for the nights of the 23rd and 25th, however it was completely booked up on the 24th because there was a huge marathon in the area. I was so determined to stay at this hotel that I decided to figure out a plan for the 24th later on. Turns out, there aren't that many options around the area. We ended up at a youth hostel in Pontorson that either used to be a prison or a school. It was gigantic and probably could have fit 100 people, but we were two of four staying in the creepy building. It was totally adequate for one night though, and the next day our fantastic bed and breakfast hosts picked us up and took us to the train station so we could go to St Malo, a port city that used to be a pirate republic. Both the hotel owners said it was a necessary place to see and that we would love it. They were once again correct. We had a great day walking around the city, sitting on the beach, and hanging out at the creepiest bar ever that had swings instead of bar stools and was decorated with doll appendages.

A good and completely candid shot of the city

Creepy but awesome

Totally worth the most expensive pint of my life

We gave ourselves plenty of time to walk back to the train station even though it was a straight shot. However, somehow, we ended up getting kind of lost and lost track of time, which resulted in frantically sprinting around the city 5 minutes before our train was supposed to leave and asking every pedestrian how to get to the station. Although I was dry heaving, we made it on the train with about 30 seconds to spare. 

That night we went back to the galette place to try the Camembert crepe (the essence of perfection) and prepared to head back to Montpellier for our last night in France.