First week in Marseille

Our first full week in Marseille has past and we are settling into our new life for the summer.  The kids are pros at the transport system and can tell us which Metro to hop on when:)  Isaac has a very good

sense of direction(even better than Kevin:)

Cooper and Mei had separate meltdowns this am that ended with them saying they were really homesick and just wanted to go home.  I know this is normal and we talked with them about how normal it is to miss home and our dog.  They both voiced how much they did miss their dog, Lucy.  So we decided to eat a quick lunch and explore a new beach.  This was one close to where Pete and Ruth Mitchell live and they enjoy it.  So when we get off the bus, we see a promising sign that said "Gelato" so we tucked that info away for later.  The water was perfect and calm and the kids loved splashing about in the sea.  We of course brought our ball that goes most places with us.  Some teenage girls even asked to kick the ball around with the boys.  They could not organize because the girls did not speak English and went splashing away back into the water.  It was fun to see some kids learning to sail out in the inlet.  There was one motor boat pulling a bunch of mini sailboat all in a row.  Like a mother duck followed by the babies!  You can see the blue sails in the picture.  The kids thought that would be fun to do, but I told them I am pretty sure they could not do it because they would need to know how to speak French to do it:)  Behind the sail boats it the city of Marseille, or at least part of it.  We are going to go on more of a tour later this week.

This is Gabriel.  Isaac was on his team one of the many times we have been to the park playing soccer.  It was so cute to see them high-fiving after they make a goal.  I hope we see this kid again!  He is so sweet!

We got our monthly bus/tram/metro passes so we can hop on and off several times a day easily! yay!!

Mei at the Longchamp park overlooking Marseille.  She got bored at the park and I told her we could do a photo shoot.  She is a good little model!

The French church we are working with at the Flash Mob/gospel choir this past weekend.  They did this in the middle of a busy mall.  The French people in general have a great interest in "gospel" choirs and people will sing in them, even if they are not Christians.  Many people stopped to watch and enjoy.  It was a great event for the church and fun too!  

click here if you want to see it!  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=of_LgLWHy9Y

Here is one picture from the park that Mei took!  I thought she did a good job!  She gets bored watching the boys play, so now she loves taking pictures, too!

We went to the next apartment that we will have for the month of July on Monday and met the nice family that lives there.  They have 2 boys and more space to spread out.  We are going to love living there I think!  Another week and a few days in our current place then we move down the street!

Tonight I went to the airport with Pete to pick up our 3 girl interns!  So happy to see them all arrive safe! Our first team meeting is in the am!  

Marseille day 1!

So we made it back to Marseille after a very long 12 1/2 hr train ride.  It was not as bad as the ride over the first time because we were not jet lagged this time and most of the way was either first class or hugging the beautiful coast of Italy/France.  We traveled through Milan and went through some very beautiful mountains in Italy.  Very glad that day is over, though.

The first full day in Marseille was spent finding food and finding our way around our new summer home.
After we got breakfast, we made a trip to the local grocery store.  We brought two big bags to help us carry our groceries back the three blocks to our apartment.
Our morning was also spent doing lots of laundry!  We do have a washing machine in our place, but no dryer.  This is a new experience for us to not have a dryer.  The apartment has a very small balcony that opens to the street four stories up.  When I first opened it to the street, I noticed a line that was strung across the balcony with clothes pins attached with another what looked like a small drying rack on one side.  The apartment is about two rooms wide and has wonderful doors/windows that open up to get the breeze across the house.  There is no a/c either, but it has been pretty here so far so that has not been too day.  After I did the laundry I was very happy for the line and drying rack outside for all our clothes.  I eventually found a hidden mud room that had a very small room with another window and more lines for drying!

We are working on not being the very loud Americans that we normally are.  We are learning to not walk loudly up and down the stairs and learning little bits of French everyday.  We are also learning to watch were we step when walking down the street because we are living in a big city now and the dogs are happy to go wherever they please.  We are finding the bakeries with the yummy baguettes and croissants, although they have very strange hours here, usually closed in the middle day.

One of our other adventures the first day was riding the local Tram line that runs down our street.  We also rode the Metro and the Bus all in one day.  That was our work for the day.  Our play was finding the best park close by.  Thing we found it!  It is called Longchamps and is very beautiful!  It has many open spaces for soccer and Frisbee and even a-little baseball.  They boys brought their gloves and got lots of attention throwing, because baseball is rare in France.  Soccer is the main sport!  We even has an American guy walk by and could not believe we were playing baseball!  We ended up playing soccer with he and his boys.  We met a few other people and had a fun pick up soccer game.  We will be here a lot this summer and it seems if you bring balls you will always make friends!

I think I have bummed enough time down the street at the McDs who is the only local place by us with wifi that we have found.   xoxo

Venice

I finally found internet here in Marseille so I can upload the pics from a couple days ago in Venice!


So we arrived in Venice about 2:30pm after a 4 hr ride on the fast train from Rome.  We got first class tickets, which is what the lady told us we needed to get when we reserved it.  We were so thankful to have it!  It had 4 seats facing each other and they had a shared table that we used to play card games!  We brought a new Monopoly card game that was pretty fun, although it did end in tears a few times.  We played pass the pigs, which is always fun!
Of course when we got to Venice, it was raining again.  We hopped on our water taxi that took us to our stop by our hotel.  You can notice from the picture that Mei has a couple balloons attached to her backpack.  I think I forgot to tell you we saw a big wedding party get off the train in Vernazza on our way to Rome.  They were there for a wedding that day in Vernazza.  We ran into a few people there for the wedding at breakfast and they told us the wedding would be that day on top of the castle in Vernazza!  It was so fun to see the bride and about 40 people all dressed up get off the train before we got on.  They had decorated the train with bows and balloons.  We grabbed a few and tied them to backpacks:)

                                                       This is Mei going into our hotel in Venice

We only had one afternoon/night in Venice so we put on our rain gear and pressed on to San Marco Square!  This is on top of the famous Rialto Bridge, which is very close to where we stayed.

Bird boy in San Marco Square!!

Isaac was not afraid of the pigeons!  Thankful the rain let up!

We toured around some of the famous sites there and had to find dinner.  Everyone was kind of sick of pizza and pasta, because we have had that everyday for a week!  So we spotted a Hard Rock Cafe and decided some American food would be good for the little bit of homesickness that was settling in.  We went back after grabbing our last bit of Gelato and turned in early because we had to catch a very early train back to Marseille, France to unpack for the summer! 

Vernazza day 2 (revisited!)

Now that my internet is running better, I can revisit my Vernazza day 2 post and hopefully upload some fun pics!  One day 2 we took a boat over to town 1 in the 5 towns of Cinque Terra:  Riomaggiore.  Here we did some snorkeling and both boys saw some real fish!  This was the first time Isaac has ever tried it and he loved it!  Cooper of course was very excited to see some big fish!  The only time he has ever snorkeled was in FL and saw tiny fish! We ate more pizza and took a boat back to Vernazza.  Right as we were pulling up to Vernazza, the sky opened up and it started pouring rain!  It was kind of a crazy fun memory to see Vernazza all wet and everyone ducking under restaurant umbrellas and shop canopies.  We escaped pretty quickly and opened our window to watch the people down below.  The decision was made to get pizza to go for the kids and put on a movie on our computer in the room.  The Kevin and I escaped up the hill to the Castle Restaurant, but this time alone for a quick dinner date.  They had my phone to text if they needed and the town is so tiny they could walk up the stairs if they needed.  They did great!  Yay!  A much need hour and a half away from the kids!  This has been a fun time with them, but we were thankful to get a quick date.

Riomaggiore

Riomaggiore

the Vernazza harbor rocks

Coop at the castle restaurant  day 1

pizza, pizza and more pizza!!  That is mostly what these kids have eaten in Italy!

out our window in Vernazza!

Mei climbing on the Vernazza rocks

Coop snorkeling! 

Isaac and Mei in the surf at Riomaggiore

fruit stand in Riomaggiore

I have many more pics, but that is all for now!

When in Rome....eat more gelato!

Well, we have had internet problems so I did not get to update you on day 2 in Vernazza. It was wonderful. I have many pics to upload to show you, but I can't get them off yet. My airport on my computer is not connecting to the wireless here in Rome. We got to Rome last night and did a little exploring in the city. We found some yummy dinner and then the search for the best gelato began. Rick Steves' guidebook gave general directions and we wondered around for a good long while trying to find it. It was worth it!
The hotel here in Rome has wireless and air conditioning! So everyone slept very good once we finally got in bed. This is one of the only hotels we found that has one hotel room with 5 beds! It also has breakfast included.

So we started the day with breakfast in the hotel then we were off. Our first stop was the Colosseum. We all had the Rick Steves audio tour of the Colosseum on our iPods we had downloaded so we all listened on our own as we walked around. It was great to have the background info as we walked around.
After that we got to a pizzeria and got to sit across the street from a local guys soccer tournament. The boys love watching that!
Then we went to find more gelato. At least we are walking lots.... We found a fancy place by the colosseum. They served it to us in fancy dishes and it cost more than our lunch! It was worth it:)
Then we headed to The Forum. It had just started to rain, but we pressed on the see some of the Ancient ruins. This is our last full day, so we wanted to squeeze a little more in. After that it started raining harder and by this time it was 4:30 and the kids were done walking. We finally found the place to get a taxi. We piled in and came back to dry out and get ready for dinner. In the morning we catch the fast train to Venice!!
Ciao

Vernazza day 1

Vernazza..Lots of Gelato and lots of stairs.

We arrived in Vernazza, Italy last night after a very long day on the train.  We were met in the street by Rosa, who showed us to the apartment that we are renting from her.  It has a small kitchen and some lovely windows that the kids love to poke their heads out and watch the people pass by below.  

Vernazza is one of the 5 small towns that make up Cinque Terre(5 villages).  It is in the upper part of the Italian Rivera.  I came here back in 1997 when I backpacked for 3 weeks around Europe with my good friend Sarah Catherine.  We stayed one night in Vernazza and I loved it and have always wanted to come back here.  It was one of my very favorite places I have visited.  It just feels like Italy!  It is very small and the only cars they let in are the small vans that bring the food in for the market and restaurants.  It has one main street with many alleys that twist and turn up many stairs to the  locals’ homes and apartments people rent out.  It use to be very secluded but now the train runs through it and Rick Steves has made it a very popular destination with many.  I usually see many people toting his book around. 

            My kids have loved climbing on the big rocks that guard the harbor from the sea.  If the surf is high, you have to be careful how far out they go because the waves can really smash the rocks.

            The church bells help you keep the time when you are eating gelato, playing in the surf or just people watching.  Isaac loves to watch the bigger boys play soccer in the plaza next to the harbor.  He is very drawn to anyone with a ball.

            

Today we grabbed breakfast and got our things together for a day at the next village, Monterosso.  We planned to go on the 1hr 30 min hike that links the two villages.  It turned into 2 hrs for us because there was one child (that I will not name) that complained the first 45 mins and we had to take many breaks but we made it to the top and then going down was easy.  We even stopped for some fresh squeezed lemonade that

someone gave us that they were making right on the hill where the lemons were growing!  Talk about fresh! 

When we arrived in Monterossa, we grabbed some pizza and changed into swimsuits to swim.  They have the best beach/place to swim in all the 5 villages.  We even brought the kids the snorkel gear so they could explore the fish and beautiful water.  Cooper enjoyed that the most I think.  Isaac eventually worked his way into a game of beach volleyball down the beach.  We had to duck into a overhang with the rest of the beachgoers when the sky let some rain downpour.  Another excuse for gelato for us.  The sky cleared pretty quick and we were back out enjoying the beach.  We ended our beach adventure with a shuttle boat that took us back over the Vernazza.  The children really enjoyed the short 5-7 min boat ride and I enjoyed seeing the coastline from a different view.  We had dinner under the famous castle in Vernazza.  This was the same place I remember eating at in 97 and have dreamed of going back to.  It has very stunning views and it was lovely to have a glass of wine and watch the sun go down while having very yummy food.  Of course we had to cap the night off with more gelato.  Even to get the castle restaurant, we had to walk up a lot of stairs so we feel we deserved another treat for the dayJ

            We have another full day in Vernazza tomorrow!  We will see what kind of adventures we can get into.  I hope you plan to visit here one day.  It is so lovely.

Ciao

         

We made it!

Bon Jour!  We made it to France!

As I type, we are on a train hugging the coast of southern France headed to Italy.  We had a very long travel day yesterday.  We went from Nashville to Detroit to Amsterdam to Marseille, France.  When we got on the big plane to Amsterdam, the kids loved the personal TVs in each seat with lots of choices for movies. They did not enjoy trying to sleep on a plane overnight.  Who does?  I think they got a few hours of sleep.  Needless to say, Amsterdam was a hot mess for my kids.  We only had an hour and 20 min to find a bathroom for one of them to throw up in, some kind of breakfast and get all of us to our gate.  We made it with just a few minutes to spare to get everyone settled on the big plane.  We had to ask someone to switch seats because the airlines had split us up.

When planning for this trip, we decided to go straight to Italy the next day to start our family trip.  This means we arrived in Marseille in the afternoon and stayed one night and woke up to catch an early train.  I knew the hour in Amsterdam connection was short and it was likely that our checked bags may not make it with us.  That is the reason I packed a week worth of clothes in a carry-on bag for each person and we all had a backpack for our personal item. It was a pain to get all that in and out of planes, ect but I am glad we did it.  When we got to Marseille, they put our name on the monitor at the baggage claim to go talk to the info desk.  They told us that our checked baggage was indeed not there and we should have it in a few hours.  It is now the next day and we had to leave and still have not seen the bags.  The Mitchells  are going to get it and keep it for us.  Thankful we did not have to cancel our train tickets we already bought for Italy!

Ruth Mitchell picked us up from the airport and we went back to their place to grab some food and hang out.  Amelia made fast friends with their daughter, Mary Ellen who is 11.  We went to the grocery store to get a few things and then to our apartment.  This is the apartment we are going to stay in for a couple weeks.  We had already looked up the address on www.maps.google.com and dropped the little man on the address to get the street level to see the things around us.  So we knew there was a little pizza place on the same block so we were planning to try it that night.  All the kids were excited about this pizza!  We turned in early and had a good night sleep.  The jet lag is not too bad right now.  We did all take this stuff called “No Jet Lag” pills.  We used these when we went to China to get Amelia and swear by them.  (So far so good this trip.)

I am going to go now and enjoy the view out my window of the French countryside.  Au Reivor