Herkese Merhaba! or Hello Everyone! ın Turkish, at least İ hope that is right.  So far I have been to Athens, Istanbul and today we spent the day ın Izmır.  To the rıght you can see Carla and I ın front of the Grand Bazar ın Istanbul! It was so hot that day and was a welcome sıght when we saw shade and aır condıtıonıng. 

 Insıde the Bazar.  There are around 4000 vendors ın there and ıt was quıte overwhelmıng.  So many people ımplorıng you to step ınto theır shops.  I ended up gettıng a sılk scarf and a charm wıth the Turkısh flag symbol. 

 After the Bazar we went to the spıce market whhıch was full of yummy smells and food.  There we trıed some Turkısh Delıght and apple tea.  People drınk a lot of apple tea ın Turkey and ıt ıs very very yummy!  I wıll be brıngıng some home ıf you would lıke to try ıt :) 

Turkısh delıght

 There were a lot of nuts...lıterally.  Some very good pıstachıos. 

I was asked to take a pıcture wıth these guys, they were happy I suppose haha

Outside of the spice market there were also a lot of tasty cheeses!  Here Lucy is holding some real string cheese, it was very yummy!

 The next day we did a full day tour of Istanbul and we crossed a bridge that looked a lot like the Golden Gate bridge in style but not as pretty.  I am on the Asian continent side of Istanbul in this picture and my head is sideways because I had ear drops in for an ear infection! :( sad day

Blue Mosque

Inside the blue mosque.

 To the right is inside the Hagia Sofia which used to be a Christian Church built in the 6th (or 7th?) century.  It was absolutely beautiful. 

I started taking the mosque apart but I didn't get very far...

Behind the paintings in the mosque were beautiful mosaics created for the Christian Church

We went to see some Turkish rugs which were absolutely beautiful and change colors when you turn them different ways.  They did a little "flying carpet" demonstration for us.

Inside of the palace that I don't remember the name of

In Izmir we visited the Agora which was the center of the city in Ancient Roman times.  It was very cool wandering around the ruins.

I tried the Turkish coffee and it was very good!They keep the grounds in the coffee.

 
This is more inside the agora.  You can see a stray puppy to middle right.  There were many stray dogs and cats around the area. Also inside the agora was a little water way about 6 inches across and it has been flowing there since the agora was built and they still do not know where its source is.  needless to say I dipped my feet in :)

Next on our tour was Patmos and Mykonos, the water was so blue and clear as you can see in many of the following photos. 

View of Mykonos going in to the city from the harbor

Just one of the few streets in Mykonos.  It was very easy to get lost in the town because the inner city was originally created as a maze to protect the inhabitants from attack.  The streets were so beautiful and what you think of when you think of Greece.

Carla and I overlooking the Mykonos Harbor

The sunset at Mykonos was so beautiful and we were very sad to leave the island.  We spent most of the day wandering the island and hanging out at Paradise Beach which was loads of fun.

Mykonos at night.

Next on out cruise was Rhodes.  We spent most of the day on the beach.  The water was so beautiful and a perfect temperature.  As you can see, it was a bit pebbly. 

The old town of Rhodes was so beautiful with fortifications and ramparts from Medieval Times from when the Knights of St. John had been there protecting the city.  It was amazing that they were in such good condition. 

 There were many children around the city playing music asking for money with small puppies at their feet. 

Next on our list and sadly our last stop was Santorini.  The island was lovely to say the least.  Santorini used to be a circular island, but over a thousand years ago the volcano it sits upon erupted leaving a caldera in the middle of the island where the ocean now fills it in.  The buildings sit atop the cliffs and look a bit like bird poop on top of the island but upon closer inspection you can see that they are very beautiful buildings. 

It was magnificent to say the least...

One of the many doors I took a picture with.  

We were able to see the sunset as we left Santorini and it was marvelous.  

Today we saw the Acropolis and wandered around Athens and luckily it wasn't too hot! It was wonderful to finally see some of the sights in Athens.  Tomorrow we are going to see the Archaeological Museum and some more temples and such. 

Until I next post, arrivederci!

Bon Voyage!

Bonjour Tout le Monde!

Above you can see my tentative itinerary for Europe this summer.  I say "tentative" because you never know who you'll meet while on an adventure and so my plans may slightly change!  I will be gone for 2 months and am so beyond excited to embark upon this adventure of a lifetime.  I will try my best to post in this blog as often as I can, but as I will not be bringing my own laptop, those times I do update may be far and in between.  (However I do have a handy dandy iPhone app that may allow me to post more often than I expect).

As I have said to some friends, I cannot promise souvenirs but I can promise a postcard.  Soooo, please send me your address so you can receive a postcard from a far away land!  (My email is nmetildi@gmail.com or you can just leave your address in the comments below this post).  I only publicize this a lot because I myself absolutely love receiving postcards and, as many of you may know, I always send postcards to myself from places I travel to because, Hey! I want one too!!

Anyways, I am so excited to start blogging about my travels again and hope you enjoy reading this blog as much as I enjoy writing it.

Bon Voyage!

Leaving Dijon

Hello Everyone, unfortunately I will be leaving Dijon tomorrow morning and will be heading for Paris.  I am so sad to be leaving the beautiful country of France on Sunday, but I am so excited to go home to see my family and friends; I miss everyone so much!  I think the things I am looking forward to the most are huge breakfasts, In n Out, and real barbecues.   In France a bbq is considered anything where people gather.  We all thought we were going to have a bbq in the garden, but instead we had pizza, which was very good!  Some things that I am going to miss from France will be, of course, all the people I have met here in the program, the beautiful landscape that surrounds me all the time, having wine with lunch, and all the French cheese and bread.  I will never forget this trip and will always remember how I learned about wine making and culture in the heart of where it all started.  Stay tuned for my last post on Sunday or Monday about my last hurrah in Paris where I hope to go visit the Sacre Coeur and the Opera Garnier.  Good night!

 

We began our journey to the South of France with a trip to a really cute winery in Beaujolais (boo-jhoe-lei) which is in Southern Burgundy.  The landscape was especially beautiful and hilly.  Our tour guide, Pascal, has a vineyard in this region that has been in his family for over 400 years.  

  

 After having dinner (and frog legs, which weren't too bad!) we got ready to head out and ended up seeing some lovely swans again.

The next day we stopped at this tiny little town on a hill called Seguret, which means "secure" because it was very secure during the medieval times against attacks.  I thought that it was very interesting that there was a car with a Massachusetts liscence plate...

This is the view from the top of the city, it was pretty fabulous, you can even see the curvature of the earth.  

Some more tiny streets in the city:

There was a very beautiful view of Seguret from Domaine de la Cabasse where we had some amazing wine and even better food. 

After we went to the winery, we checked out the Roman ruins at Vaison la Romaine.  These ruins were thousands of years old, although much of it was reconstructed.  The photo below shows the House of Apollo, thus named for the head of the god Apollo found there.  It was soooo cool finally seeing Roman ruins in person after studying the Roman Empire in school and seeing them on the History Channel all the time.  

We also saw a 2000 year old Roman bridge in the city.  A few years ago the river was actually up and over the bridge.

The Dentilles in the background, where rock miles under the earth's crust had been pushed up to the surface thousands of years ago.  The rock from far below the earth's surface is an integral part of the soil in the vineyards situated near them.  

The next day we went to Moulin des Barres at Maussane, an oil making place!  Their olive oil was very yummy and I will bringing some home.  It was very interesting to hear all the things the owner had to say about how the trees were very old, some 100 years, and that everyone should have a spoonful of olive oil in the morning for their health.  

A very old and destroyed castle from the medieval ages.  The narrow streets were beautiful, as usual.

There was a very yummy cookie shop in the town by the castle as well.  

The view from the castle.  

I enjoyed walking around the little town just below the Castle and imagined what it must have been like when the whole place was up and running.  Unfortunately we didn't go up into the ruins of the castle because they charged a pretty hefty fee, 7.50 euro which is about $10.75.

The next day we drove to the Mediterranean Sea and on the way we saw this huge castle wall.  Pascal told us that the water would have come just to the front door of the castle during the Medieval times.  

Finally in the Mediterranean Sea!  It was very salty and cold, but I got used to it :)

There were real, live flamingos.

..and white horses! which are called the Carmague and are wild.  Make a wish when you see one!

There were also bulls, that you can see in the arena, where men try to pluck a flower between their horns.  

We went to a winery that was modeled after Roman wineries from thousands of years ago.  They make their wine just as the Romans did, stomping the grapes with their feet and even adding ocean water and herbs when the wine is fermenting.  We   tasted the wine and I was surprised that it wasn't that bad. 

We then got to see Pont du Gard which was a Roman Aqueduct built in 50 AD.  It is a magnificent piece of architecture.  There was also a lot of graffiti on the bridge part, but it was really cool because a lot of it was from the 19th century.  

We had some very yummy fish paste/tartar with tapanade on top, which may sound disgusting but was actually very good.  For dessert we had a really delicious apple tart.  

This is a prehistoric grotto that I had to take a picture of since I have never seen a grotto before and am still not sure what it is exactly...

Our second to last winery that we saw was in Chateauneuf du Pape, which is world famous for the wines that come out of the region.  It used to serve the Pope when he was in Avignon.  The soil is very rocky from the Glacier that swept through here thousands of years ago leaving a moraine in its wake.  

Some beautiful grenache grapes

This machine, which costs as much as many houses in the US or more, is used to sort individual grapes and choose the best ones based on color using scanners and air pressure.  This machine boosts the quality of wine produced and almost guarantees a good vintage.  These were the first machines of their kind that my professor and Pascal had ever seen.  

This is the remaining castle at Chateauneuf du Pape and it was a beautiful sight.  I enjoyed my trip the south of France so much and loved the scenery that surrounded me.  I hope that I can go back sometime.