A Taste of Spain: Let Them Eat Cake

Hey everyone! So much has happened since I last wrote. I recovered from my weekend at the beach by doing 2 final presentations, which both went really well. I am just glad they are over! We are all getting geared up for finals, which start this Thursday. I think it is pretty unfortunate that finals come at the same time as our last week here...too much to do, not enough time!

As I'm sure you all remember, I took my last trip of the semester last weekend to PARIS. Hunter's birthday is this week, and I wouldn't miss it for the world. Except that technically I am missing it, but I've gotta go to class sometime I suppose! I left Granada around 11 AM on Thursday morning and arrived in Paris around 7:30. Hunter was nice enough to come meet me at the airport, which I really appreciated. This meeting went much smoother than the one in London! We hopped on the metro (the first of many times) and headed back to his dorm. On the way, we stopped at Mezzo di Pasta. If any of you ever go to Paris, remember this: You MUST eat at Mezzo di Pasta. This was the beginning of one of the best eating weekends I have had. We arrived at his dorm and had a small feeding frenzy on our pasta. That night, we went to Mix Club, which was an absolute blast. They even played Shakira, so I was excited. We had so much fun, but I think we all slept very well Thursday night!

Friday morning we woke up and got ready for a busy day of sight seeing. We started at the Marais, which is the Jewish district in Paris. Most importantly, this area is home to, according to Lenny Kravitz (random I know), the best falafel place in the world. I'm going to have to 100% agree with Lenny on this one. I think I'm going to find myself craving this falafel for years to come. We left the Marais and walked toward Notre Dame. Upon arriving, we found huge tents set up. In one of my favorite moments of the trip, Hunter turned around and said to me, "Oh, it's a bread party." Tons of bakeries from around Paris were giving out free samples and making delicious baked goods under the tents. HEAVEN. We marveled at that for a while before entering the cathedral. I had seen Notre Dame before, but I had forgotten how impressive it was. I love the stained glass windows in there. We continued our walk through the city, stopping at a little bookshop called Shakespeare and Company. On top of being one of the cutest places I have ever seen, this store used to be a hangout of literary geniuses Ernest Hemingway and James Joyce. We also passed the Louvre, Musee d'Orsay, the Pont d'alma (the bridge where Princess Diana's car accident took place), among countless other Parisian sights. We ended our walk at the Eiffel Tower. We had a little photo shoot and decided to come back the next day and go to the top. Friday night we ate Mexican food. I am a little obsessed with the tacos I ate. So yummy. We were exhausted, so Hunter and I decided to stay in his room, watch a movie, and eat enough cheese, crackers, and hummus for a small army. It was a wonderful evening.

Saturday was our busiest sight-seeing day. We woke up and headed out to the Palace of Versailles, which was absolutely beautiful. Everything is so golden, and the place is massive. The gardens are lovely as well, especially when the weather is good. We toured the palace for FREE (thanks, European Union visa), and then walked around the gardens for a bit. When I get super rich and come back to Europe, I'm going to rent a golf cart and go cruising through the grounds of Versailles. A girl can dream, right? This time, I just walked around and pretended to be Marie Antoinette, so that was fine, too. We jumped back on the metro (so much public transportation this weekend) and went to the Musee d'Orsay. While it is not nearly as big as the Louvre, this museum houses a ton of masterpieces by artists such as Van Gogh, Monet, Degas, Renoir, and countless others. The collection is simply ridiculous and so impressive. We decided to make our way to the Eiffel Tower, and on the way we stopped for arguably the most amazing hot chocolate in the entire world at a precious place called Angelina. I seriously think I drank a melted Hershey's bar...I don't even know what else to say about that. We waited in line to go to the top of the Eiffel Tower. We spent so much time going up, but I'm not even mad about it. The view of the city was amazing, and we arrived at the very top right at sunset. We got to the bottom just as it lit up for the night. The entire thing was something out of a fairy tale, and I'm so glad we took the time to do it. We went straight from the Tower to a place called Breakfast in America. This restaurant was created by a man from Connecticut who moved to Paris and eventually made this restaurant with all the things he missed from America. I'll just say that I had the best bacon cheeseburger possibly of my life and that I've never been happier to drink a Budweiser. After a long day, we got back to Hunter's dorm after midnight. We were exhausted but decided to go out anyways...we can sleep when we're dead, right? We went to a club called Showcase, which is located under the Alexandre III bridge. The club was very unique and very large. We had a great night, but didn't arrive back to the dorms until the sun was coming up. This is when things really started to go south...

I had a flight at about 10:30 on Sunday morning. We had decided that we needed to leave by about 7:45 or so to get me to the airport on time. You can imagine my feelings when I woke up and looked at my phone to discover it was...9:11. After running around like crazy people and a little bit of luck, we got my flight changed to later that night. We spent the rest of the day eating a delicious brunch and watching Marie Antoinette (we were inspired from our visit to Versailles). I did manage to be on time for my next flight and I also managed to successfully hang out in the Malaga bus station for somewhere near 7 hours while waiting for my bus. Not an ideal journey, but I made it home to Granada safely! A little adventure never hurt anybody, I suppose!

I absolutely LOVED my weekend in Paris. I went to Paris for a day when I was in London during high school, and to be honest I kind of hated it. Paris is a huge city and the public transportation is a little confusing if you don't know exactly what you're doing. I am so thankful for my tour guide--It was amazing to have Hunter since he knew exactly how to get places. And he speaks French, which I definitely don't. I am so satisfied with all the things I got to do this weekend, and I can officially say that I no longer hate Paris! So thanks, Hunter for an amazing weekend! And Happy Birthday!!!

So, I am back in Granada just in time for final exams and final goodbyes. I am still having extremely mixed feelings about going home, but I seem to get more and more excited to return to America every day. More on all those emotions later, though :)
Love and miss you all! Thanks for reading!
Besos, Shannon