On July 10th, we flew from Montreal to Manchester, England, where David's Auntie Sue picked us up from the airport on Saturday morning. We spent a few days with her and Uncle Peter, before David hopped on a train for a music conference in Durham, England. He was there from Monday to Wednesday, while I stayed with the family. He came back Wednesday evening, and we were able to stay another day before heading off for the next leg of our trip. Here are some pics (just a few) of the many things we did during our visit!
The four of us climbing the terrain near their home in Adlington, Lancashire on the morning we arrived:
Visiting Southport:
David's trip to Durham:
My trip to the lake district with Auntie Sue:
Babysitting Sue's granddaughter (David's 2nd cousin), Ellie:
And when Sue took David and I to visit Liverpool, including a tour of Anfield!
We had a great time with them and were really sad to leave. But it was a busy trip, and at something like 4:15 on Friday morning (7/17) Uncle Peter drove us to the train station, where we headed to London for a day with Garrett! He happened to be studying in Cambridge, so we all met up at King's Cross station and made the most out of one day in the city. We managed to see the Tower of London, get our picture in a red phone booth, tour Westminster Abbey, stand under Big Ben, and even do a pub crawl for T-shirts!
It was too short a day, but we had a lot of fun. David and I managed to get a couple of hours of sleep in our tiny room in the hostel, before getting back up at 3:00 a.m. to catch a shuttle to the airport! We had a 7:00 a.m. flight to Karlsruhe Baden-Baden, Germany, where we caught another shuttle that drove us straight to Strasbourg, France. From Saturday (7/18) to Wednesday (7/22), we explored the Alsace region of France with Derek, Hazel, Chris, and Laura! I apologize in advance for having forgotten many of the names of places we visited, but at least I have pictures!
Walking around Strasbourg:
Exploring picturesque villages:
Translating our way through a fun wine tasting:
Touring Strasbourg by land and water:
Even visiting the black forest!
The days were packed and we really tried to make the most out of our time together. It was great to get to see the family, not to mention all the lovely Alsatian wines! In retrospect, we probably should have brought more than two bottles back to Montreal with us...
On Wednesday evening (7/22), David and I caught a fast TGV train from Strasbourg to Paris for the last part of our trip. We checked into our really nice hotel (after we wandered about for a while looking for it) and crashed early. The next day, Garrett (who we had seen in London already) and Haley joined us in the city, and we spent the weekend exploring Paris together. Here are a few pictures from that part of the trip.
Notre Dame de Paris:
At a nice restaurant near the Eiffel tower, where we escaped the rain and all tried the escargot that Haley ordered:
Under the Eiffel Tower:
After touring the Louvre:
Sacre Coeur:
The painting we purchased at Montmartre:
We never did go up it, but we did see a lot of the tower!
After an awesome long weekend in Paris, we finally packed up our suitcases and made our way back to Montreal. We saw so many things that it feels like three different vacations all packed into one! But we had a great time, and as always, there are many more pictures on Picasa if you want to see more.
3 comments:
Wonderful update - thanks for all the detail and great pictures!! Love you!
I know it's a little late, but this is so neat! Your pictures are really beautiful, Shan, and you do a great job explaining what you did. It sounds exhausting and fun!
nice shot on the southport bridge--too bad you couldn't have been there to take some at night!
also, is it sad that the very first thing that popped into my head when i saw the one of derek and hazel by the car in that shadow was "hmm, it looks like you're looking down from the tower of isengard"? maybe they were happily waiting on their ent friends to lay the smackdown...
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