So me and 5 California friends set out early one Saturday morning to take the train to Annecy, a town that's been dubbed by some as the "Venice of France". Our Study Abroad director, Christine, had sent out an e-mail saying that there would be a Venetian style Carnivale in Annecy the 4th, 5th, and 6th of February. My roommate had already visited the town and loved it, so I had been planning on visiting anyway. First off, after getting on the train at 7:30 am (those of you who know me know how much I love being up early...NOT), we were in the train for about an hour before it stopped, stayed on the track at a station for half an hour, and then they announced to us that there were technical difficulties, so we'd be getting off and onto a different train. Our originally scheduled train ride of about 2-2 1/2 hours was now extended to about 4 hours.
After roaming around and admiring the beautiful little rainy town for a while, we decided to figure out when and where the carnivale was. Unfortunately, Christine had mixed up the dates, and the carnivale was actually the 4th, 5th, and 6th of MARCH! Some of my friends were really pissed off, but I didn't mind too much - I really liked the city anyway, carnival or not! So we went to check out the few big sites there are in Annecy - le Palais de l'Isle (palace of the island) which is a tiny museum/former prison that is literally squished into the middle of one of the canals. It's one of the most photographed sites in France (behind the Eiffel Tower of course!) and then the Chateau d'Annecy. To stay on the day's theme of everything going wrong, of course, the Chateau was closed.
However, it was still a very lovely trip, despite our setbacks. Good first "inter-France" day trip, hopefully there will be more to come!
Palais de l'Île
Me and Ora in the middle of old town, with Lake Annecy in the background!
My friend Alexix ready to jump into the lake...or not
Side view of Palais de l'Île
In front of the Chateau, since we couldn't get in!That's it for update number 1! However, I am leaving tomorrow (despite a national strike which will prove to make the journey a bit difficult) for Amsterdam to meet up with my ex coworker, part time roommate from June, slash very good friend Marja!! We will be in Amsterdam Thursday night, Bruges on Friday, Brussels on Saturday, and back to Amsterdam on Sunday!
