Tour de France!

Today was the technical end of my program! We all presented our final exposées that will make up most of our grade, and we had the entire day free yesterday to prepare. My friend Sarah chose to present on the Tour de France, and by chance yesterday, the Tour de France came through a small town in Normandy called Lisieux. Sarah planned on going (obviously) and a few of us decided to tag along. Despite the slightly miserable weather, it was incredible! And since Sarah presented today, she was an open book of TdF facts and history. 

 One of the uphill turns with the Lisieux Basilica in the background

 Clodagh, Sarah, Mike

 We arrived around 1:30, but racers didn't come through until almost 5pm! So after an extremely long lunch we walked up the hill, along the path that the bikers took and found a spot to watch the parade and then bikers pass. While we waited, it poured rain for a while unfortunately... but the parade was hilarious with lots of funny cars and floats.

 Finally the bikers came through! I think there were about 128 of them at that point....

Afterwards, we walked the 2 kilometers to see where the bikers finished, and picked up some new TdF gear along the way!

So despite the fact that I spent the day NOT preparing for my exposée, it was a blast! And I did quite well on my presentation today anyways. Thankfully summer classes are now OVER. Time to celebrate tonight!

Champagne tasting

So last Sunday, I spent the day in a beautiful little village in the Champagne region called Epernay. The village is tiny, but it is home to Moet & Chandon headquarters. I took the train with my two friends Hilary and Chrissy, and we spent the morning exploring the area and had an amazing lunch. We came across the Opera house that still has scars from when Epernay was occupied during WWII - bullet holes on the outside. We also spent time wandering around the Hotel de Ville and surrounding park. It was a gorgeous day (one of the first in weeks it seems). In the afternoon, we headed over to Moet and took a tour of the cellars. The cellars were huge and hold millions of bottles of champagne. Afterwards, we had a champagne tasting in the private garden where Napolean used to come and buy champagne/socialize. Our guide, Helen then surprised us by taking us to the abbey that Dom Perignon ran and where he really invented and developed champagne. Our day trip was definitely the highlight of my summer in France.
Here are a few photos....

 Outside of the Hotel de Ville

 Inside the cellars...

 Huge bottles of champagne

 Champagne tasting

 Dom Perignon's abbey

 Abbey's vineyards

View of Epernay village

Budapest!

Greetings from Budapest! I spent this past weekend with fellows from Kairos Hungary (www.kairossociety.org) in one of my new favorite cities....

View of the city! With Kairos Hungary fellows.

Going to the top to see the Presidents house and visit old Budapest

View of the famous Chain Bridge..

My first taste of Palinka, a Hungarian spirit made of fruits. So strong but so good!

Beautiful church

View of Parliament building

On Saturday we drove basically across the entire country (me and Miklos). I passed probably thirty huge fields of sunflowers just like these-  it was amazing!

At the arboretum outside of the Pannonhalma monastery - which is over 1000 years old and a UNESCO World Heritage site

Had an amazing tour thanks to David Maasz!

Picked up some Hungarian Paprika of course...

St. Stephen's Basilica, the largest and most important church in Hungary. Miklos and I visited on Sunday morning just before Mass started. It was incredible inside - and so big!

View of just part of the main room

Miklos and I also visited Heroes Square..

This is Hungary's most famous medicinal thermal bath, Szechenyi...

The Great Synagogue, which is the 2nd largest in the world.

Inside view of the synagogue...

After that, my camera died. But the weekend was truly amazing and I love Hungary. Am still full from eating so much Goulash...