Winter Break Partie Deux; Lyon!

This was a true adventure! So it wasn't the whole Fab Five. More like the Terrific Three lol. Me, Rob, Lalo, and a friend of Rob's, Joe, headed out for 4 days of mayhem in Lyon, France's 2nd biggest city (though some claim Marseilles.) I fell in love immediately. Such a clean beautiful city! I'm not gonna go into huge detail about it right now (its getting late here, I'll write more later, hopefully before another month passes) other than just to say that we decided on purpose not to book anything in advance and to just "wing it" because I always hear about people doing that in Europe. Well it worked PERFECTLY. We bought our train tickets that day, and though we did miss a connection in St. Etienne, the train ride through the mountains was beautiful and we didn't arrive in Lyon until around 930pm I think but we found a hostel immediately that was only around 16 euros a night!! AND it was in the Old Town on top of a hill overlooking the entire city of Lyon! We just sat out on the terrace each morning (And night) talking about life. Legend! Anyway I'll post the photos now but I'll go into more detail about the trip later, ok?

Lyon Photos!!

An Update...finally

So I'm finally gonna update this thing. Sorry guys I really don't have an excuse once again. Just been too busy living I guess. Anyway things have been going pretty well, I've been spending a lot of time with the "Fabulous Five" which consist of my British friends Rob, Dan, Chris, and Eduardo "Lalo" Gutierrez (A living legend) from Mexico. So anyway my Winter Break was absolutely amazing (other than the actually transportation, bleg). So the 10th of February I get up at 7:30 am to take a bus to Nevers (one hour). Then I wait about 30 minutes in Nevers for my train to Paris (2 more hours) then I think I had 5 hours to get from Paris Gare de Lyon (train station) to Charles de Gaulle Internation Airport. One hour flight to Prague, Czech Republic. Then 3 hours in Prague, before a 2 hour flight to Tallinn, Estonia. Finally arriving in Estonia around 10:30pm Estonian time. (+one hour) So pretty much just went to bed Saturday night. Went to this one club which was worthless. Anyway, I spent the rest of the weekend in Tallinn with Helen and her family which was nice. I never thought I'd say it but it felt SOOO GOOD just to get out of France for 10 days. I love it here but it just gets old after 5 straight months with no break. And of course practically everyone in Estonia speaks English (except Helen's parents lol.) Anyway then we went to Tartu for the rest of the week where Helen is at university and also the second biggest city in Estonia. I absolutely loved this city! It's like the Athens, GA of Estonia. Anyway we hung out there and Wednesday night went to this club to see the number one rock band in Estonia which was actually pretty impressive. I pretty much just relaxed and slept all day while helen went to class in Tartu and enjoyed my time off from work, but also walked around and took some photos. Long story short, I had a great time hanging out with her and her roommate, Liis. I actually met another one of Helen's friends, Liisi, who had spent a summer in Griffin, GA selling books. She had also spent a good bit of time in Macon!! I couldn't believe it, such a small world. She had a bumper sticker that said "Georgia on my Mind" It was great!! Took lots of photos, and ate a lot of really really good food. Took a bus back into Tallinn for the weekend where I took a city tour by bus with Helen and her family. Then went to Rakvere that night to meet Karin Kallam, another Estonian who was at my highschool in 2001. She now has a 2 year old son (!!). Saturday night Helen and I went to an authentic Russian restaurant where during the middle of our meal these people run out and start doing russian folk dancing with a full band! Great atmosphere! And then back to France! The trip back was even longer than the trip there because of a 4 hour layover in Prague. But I had plenty of time in Paris so I checked my luggage into a locker and set out for a nice 3 1/2 hour walk through downtown Paris. I made it as far as Notre Dame before I had to turn back for the Train station. But the weather was great and everyone was happy and you could smell spring time in the air and it truly restored my faith in Paris as I was in an incredibly good mood for the rest of the day. After that I took a train straight to Clermont-Ferrand to meet Rob and Joe, his friend from uni who is an assistant in south France. The next day we took a train to Lyon which leads me to part two of my Winter Break...

Photos:
Winter Break in Estonia Volume I

Winter Break in Estonia Volume II

Also, Fabulous Five Photos
Volume One
Volume Two