Bonjour!!
Well, I’ve been travelling for a week and I thought it would be great to send an update, before there’s too much stuff to keep things a normal length.
I hope everyone is doing well! I flew into Frankfurt, arriving May 2nd, and I was really tired.  My friend Ann met me at the airport and we headed into the centre of town where we wandered around the older part of town.  It’s very much a business and financial town so all there really was to see was the Jewish museum, which was really neat. Then we spent the afternoon in the square where I completely crashed on a park bench for about an hour! (Thank God for a trustworthy friend to watch my stuff!) That night we headed to Paris on an overnight train. It was a smooth ride, and easy to sleep except for this old couple who were sharing our couchette and were totally drunk! That would have been fine except that we were kept up with the man’s snoring (he’d wake the dead!).
Paris was great, we visited the Conchiergerie, the prison where Marie-Antoinette was imprisoned, along with 2780 others in total.  We also went to Place de la Concorde where there is now a monument from Egypt, but it’s where the guillotine was (and where ~1400 people were executed).  What a bloody History! On lighter notes, we saw the Eiffel Tower! It was really neat to see sights that I remember from when I was here as a kid, and to see them again. We tried to go to the Louvre, but it was closed due to a strike.  We walked around the Cathedral Notre Dame, what a stunning place. And we also went to the Pantheon, which used to be a church but is now used to display french history and to ‘glorify humanity’.  It was interesting, though sad to see how a church building has been changed into something so secular. But, it was cool we got to see the crypts of people like Voltaire, Rousseau,  Victor Hugo, and Mme and Dr. Curie.  Mme Curie is the only woman there, and she also was the first female professor at Sorbonne (one of the Paris Universities).  On our last day in Paris we headed out of town to visit the Chateau at Versailles. What an amazing place, it reminded me of all the different things I learned in History 106 (Ros, you would have loved it!).  I think my favourite part was the garden, filled with flowers that were gorgeous and smelled really fragrant!  If anyone decides to come to Paris, you must spend a day at Versailles!
As we left Paris we hooked up with three guys (recent engineering grads from McMaster), and hung out with them for two days. We all travelled to Barcelona where having a bunch of guys around was great! Our first day in Barcelona we  went out for lunch (Everything is sooo cheap there!!!!!!) and had a huge lunch/dinner including Sangria for about eight dollars US. Great food. That night we took a walking tour lead by Fabi (a twentyish guy who’s done tonnes of travelling and has studied the history of the region too). It was a great tour and we learned stuff we wouldn’t have otherwise known.  It had some great roman ruins that we got to see and at the end of the tour he took us to the top of his “Mam’s” apartment building where he gave us local spanish wine and real spanish tortillas (not the flat ones you’re thinking of!).  The next day we went to this unfinished cathedral called (forgive my spelling) the sagrita familla (or something like that…) designed by the architect Gaudi.  I think I know where the term Gaudy comes from. It’s probably from his name. This was probably the ugliest church I’ve ever seen. It’s got  bubblegum pink tiles on these pillars, and it’s just plain tacky! Oh well, I prefer older buildings… to each his own… some people think it should remain unfinished as a monument to the architect who was killed by a tram… I think they should make it into a park in a very cement riddled city (worse than New York).  Barcelona was a great city, and we wanted to stay longer but we couldn’t change our train reservations (I’ll just have to go back some day…). So, last night we headed to Nice.
We’re staying in Nice for tonight, and going to head to Venice on an overnight train tomorrow for two nights.  Today Ann and I relaxed and spent the afternoon at the beach (picture it: blue water, it’s not called the Cote D’Azur for nothing!, gravel beach really warm outside, at least 25 or more, but windy so it wasn’t scorching!) and tomorrow probably more of the same!
Well, I’d better sign off, sorry for typos, but this is a different keyboard and they changed the configuration to the US International one so I wouldn’t have to hunt and peck. But it means I’m totally typing by touch!
I’ll talk to you all later, I’ll find another cafe in a week or so (Rome Probably).  Take Care!
Christina
PS Matt:  Make reservations NOW for your hotel in Paris! They weren’t full for us, but ours was this great hotel right by Notre Dame and the Louvre. It’s totally inexpensive and worth it! Ask for a room with a shower. It’s the Hotel Henry IV, and it’s in the Europe books.  It is often booked in the summer, and we barely got a room. We were walking away after being told it was full, and the guy came running after us to give us one that became available!   They include breakfast in the price! A double with shower is 252FF, without or a single is cheaper.