Summer 2016

Bordeaux is always beautiful, but it really shines in the summer. The clouds clear up, things dry out and we all remember why we decided to live in this city. This summer was no exception and it was made doubly special by all of our visitors!

Erin and I have been friends since high school and we have always shared the same itch to travel the world. We both spent a summer in Salamanca and when I studied abroad in Seville, I went to meet up with her in Rennes at the end of my semester. She speaks about a million languages and signs, and is just an all around beautiful person. Even though she lived in France for a year, she had never been to Bordeaux and I was thrilled to show her around. We toured the city, I showed her the CEL, and we checked out the brand new Cité du Vin. It was being called "an amusement park of wine" in all the American newspapers but it was more like a really cool interactive museum. We spent several hours there and still had a million more things we could have seen. The free tasting in the top-floor lounge overlooking the city at the end was a nice touch.

The UEFA championship was also going on that year and some of the games were even being played at our new stadium. Normally, I couldn't care less about football, but seeing all the different fans from across the continent descend on the city and NOT tear it apart really renewed my faith in the power of sport. We caught the end of a game in the Fan Zone at Quinconces and being in that environment when France won made you understand how people can get so worked up about their teams. It was infectious.

Erin had to carry on with her adventures and in her place, we got Natalia, Eric and Igor. They come around almost every summer to "give talks" at the LIRYC (and Eric is just along for the ride) but it mostly seems like they're here to enjoy some good wine and the southwest weather. Can you blame them? We were glad to have purchased season tickets to the Cité du Vin since they were interested in checking it out as well. With all that hype, it's hard not to.

Our final visitors of the summer were none other than the Stich cousins! They had mapped out an epic European tour and made the effort to come see us in Bordeaux for a couple of days. It was awesome!

Trying escargot. Delicious!

Their next stop was Barcelona so we tagged along for the ride since neither Jason nor I had ever been there. I had heard some not so positive things about Barcelona (it's big and dirty and a little bit dangerous) so I was pleasantly surprised to find that it was actually a super great place to be.

We took the chair lift up to the Castell de Montjuic for some amazing views of the city...

Sagrada Familia is still under construction since the 19th century.

...checked out Camp Não, home of FC Barça...

...the site of the 1992 Olympics, and the Palau Nacional. It was a busy first day!

The next day, we wanted to check out Sagrada Familia but couldn't get tickets until the evening so Kyle and Jason too the train out to Monserrat while Ashley, Steven, Jason and I went to the beach. Glorious! We headed back into town to see Gaudi's masterpiece and it was pretty impressive. They are hoping to have it finished by 2026 to coincide with the 100th anniversary of his death. We'll see if that actually happens or not.

The cousins were off to Rome so we had a day with just the two of us before our flight back to Bordeaux so we explored the port and some other monuments around town. There were so many things to see and do. It's definitely a place that warrants more than one trip. We will see you again, Barcelona!

Bayer Bookings, Bed & Breakfast

Most people in France take their holiday time in July or August. As we learned this year, most Americans do it in June. This is the story of how we ended up running a tour service/bed and breakfast out of our apartment for a solid month.

Starting in January, we were getting requests from people who wanted to come visit. As far as I knew at the time, I was not going to be working after May, so when everyone said they were interested in June, I was thrilled. It's a great time to be in Bordeaux: lots to do, great weather, and the English-speaking staff at restaurants will be on duty.

It was going to be a busy month, for sure, but nothing crazy:

June 4-11: Kelly and Kate (our friends from Baltimore)

June 16-19: Jere and Joyce (Jason's aunt and uncle)

June 23-26: Drew and Kristen (my friends from college)

As time went on, though, I was offered more classes and more things to do at work. They needed people to interview the new students for next year, I had another sequence of my seminar to teach, my evening class ran through July 1. Suddenly, I was no longer as available as I had originally thought. Jason was equally tied up with things to do at work because, you know, he has a full time job. Adding to the madness, we had two more additions to the lineup come in at the end of May/beginning of June:

June 4-11: Kelly and Kate

June 16-19: Jere and Joyce

June 21-23: Alyn (our friend from Baltimore)

June 23-26: Drew and Kristen

June 28-30: Jenna and Ben (my friends from college)

I do not want you to think for one second that it was not AMAZING seeing everyone. It is really cool to share your new life with people from your old life. I find that friendships often exist in a specific place and time, and when you no longer share that space, many of your friendships change or fade away completely. It is truly special when a friendship can 1) last despite the difference in time and space and 2) exist, even in a small way/moment, within a new situation. It's more obvious when the time and space is greater, like moving to another continent and not seeing each other for over a year. Also considering that we don't have a ton of close friends here, it was wonderful to spend time with people that we know well and that know us. Refreshing.

All that being said, I must admit that it was kind of an insane endeavor, now that I have the time to reflect on it a bit. Trying to balance work, touring around, catching up with people and just living was a lot more challenging than we had anticipated. Even more so when you have to do it five times in a row with very little (sometimes no) break in between. Little things like eating and getting places take much more time and energy than normal, and you start to feel like a kindergarten teacher: "Is anyone hungry? Who has to use the bathroom? Did everyone get a chance to see that? Okay, let's keep going. Stay together!" I felt like I didn't talk to Jason for the whole month, partially due to our tag-team work-guest routine, and also because we were so busy talking to everyone else. It was all such a blur and I wish I had had more time to just sit and enjoy the company of our friends instead of running from pillar to post, trying to see and do everything.

But how do you really balance the two? When people are here, maybe for the only time in their lives, it would be a shame not to explore the city and the surroundings. Seeing as I live here, I do know some things about Bordeaux and I was really happy to get to share that knowledge with everyone. There are so many things that I love about this place and it's hard to do them all in two or three days, so you almost feel obligated to run around a bit.

What have we learned from this whole experience? First, that there is no substitute for good friends and family. Even under somewhat stressful conditions, there's love there and that makes it all worth it. Secondly, planning and anticipating are paramount. If you can check it out ahead of time, do it, so when you arrive, the only thing you have to worry about is having a good time. We have also gotten pretty good at knowing how long people are able to walk around before they need a rest, a bite to eat and/or a bathroom break, and you can't count on them to ask for any of those things before it becomes urgent. Lastly, it's okay to not know everything. I know I'm supposed to be the resident expert on all things European but that fact of the matter is that I still have a lot to learn and figuring them out together is not so bad.

Thank you everyone for coming to see us! We love you!!

I didn't have time to take a lot of pictures but there are a few good ones I managed to snap throughout our crazy adventures:

With Kelly and Kate: Cognac-Bordeaux-Biarritz-Pamplona-San Sebastian-Bordeaux. I learned that cognac is delicious and re-learned that Spain is awesome.

At Rémy Martin in Cognac

 

Biarritz

Pamplona

San Sebastian

With Jere and Joyce: They kind of did their own thing so they took their own photos. Thanks for being so independent!

With Alyn: Fête de Musique in Bordeaux and St. Emilion. The best way to do an outdoor concert is to have performances everywhere and to be able to drink in the street.

With Drew and Kristen: Bordeaux and Arcachon (w/ Nicole). Crowded transportation + climbing a giant sand dune + eating your body weight in mussels = epic nap on the beach.

With Jenna and Ben: Bordeaux Wine Festival and St. Emilion (w/ Jason). A diet comprised solely of wine and cheese is a pretty good diet.

This is made completely out of corks