Greetings from Belgium. It's been quite a weekend! And we're not even done yet. Currently Josh and I--and the puppies--are in Brussels. Actually, we're staying a bit outside of town, by the airport, for two reasons: 1. the hotel is cheap and accepts pets, and 2. I really, really don't want to drive into the city. We got here by way of a little red Citroen, which is manual, driven by me. I've been mostly OK. Just don't put me on a hill, and for the love of God don't make me stop! Ha. No, seriously, highway driving has been A-OK. It's city driving that sucks. All the shifting gears and having to start from first and then quickly shift into second ... uggh. It's enough to give me flashbacks of driver's-ed. Seriously.
So, we started off the weekend on Friday because Josh didn't have class. We picked up the car and, since our friend Yulia was headed to Lyon and we had to pass through there anyway, we offered her a ride. That was my first test in city driving and it was scary! Stop-and-go traffic, hills ... we found a low-traffic street where a car was illegally parked with its hazards on, stopped behind it and dropped of Yulia. Then it was back on the highway, which went through gorgeous countryside. We first saw signs approaching Dijon and then we saw the mustard fields. They give the lush, green landscape these beautiful splashes of bright yellow. Wish I liked mustard ...
On Friday our destination was a town called Nancy. That's where we not only planned to stay for the night but also were supposed to meet up with a Chico friend of ours, Hailey. We got there a little later than we planned, and because of construction in the area, the GPS we rented with the car--a wonderful investment, to be sure--did not quite get us to our destination. We quickly tired of the "recalculating," parked and found our hotel. I attempted an uphill reverse, first failed and then succeeded (thankfully, because if I hadn't I either would have hit a car or put on the parking break and asked a random stranger to help me). I eventually parked in a more strategic place and then we caught a tram to meet up with Hailey. It was nice to see not only a familiar face but also someone who speaks our language. By that I mean more than English ... American English, California English, Chico English. Pop culture seems second-nature to us, but when you encounter people who are not from America, you quickly realize they do not get all your references.
It's now dinner time, so I'm going to eat. I'll fill everyone in about today's trip to Ghent and tomorrow's trip to Luxembourg later, complete with pictures.
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