Ile de St. Marguerite

     Hello everyone!! Thursday was just a day for us to present our projects that we have been working on during our trip to our professors to make sure we were on the right track.  We had the rest of the day free so I did some shopping after lunch. 
     Today we visited the island St. Marguerite where the "Man in the Iron Mask" was kept.  I'm sure some of you have seen the Leonardo DiCaprio movie about it or just know the history behind it, but the guy from the fort today said that the "Man in the Iron Mask" is definitely not the king's twin brother.  They think he was just a regular guy and that the prison guards just wanted to make things interesting so they never allowed him to show his face.  The king had all documents and papers about him destroyed and the interior walls of the prison were scraped so that there were no traces of him.  So we got to the island at about 10:30am.  We walked around for a little bit until we got to some rocks/cliffs.  We jumped off of them into the Med.  Since I am terrified of heights it took some encouragement from my classmatesin order to get in but with the hand of one of the girls, I jumped in!  It was so awesome.  After we swam around for a bit, we headed to the fort/prison for lunch.  We had a personal barbeque with delicious food!! After we ate lunch, we went sailing on small catamarans (spelling?).  There wasn't much wind so it was pretty slow and there were three of us to a sailboat, but it was a fun experience.  The instructors had to hook us up to their boat and pull us around hahaha At one point, me and my sailormates finally caught the wind and got going pretty fast but then it ended and it was time to go back to shore.  It was a great day with great weather nonetheless.  We came back to Antibes and got dinner and here I am.  Tomorrow is a free day during the day, then at night a Dinner Cruise :) Love you all xoxo

White Water Rafting in the French Alps

            Hello everyone!! Today we woke up bright and early and headed into the mountains again for some "kayaking."  It was rainy and cold when we got there...the water around 40 degrees.  We put on our wet suits (which took 3 people to get mine on) and attached our helmets and life vests.  At this point we were all still under the impression that we were just doing a simple kayaking trip down a river.  We took one look into the water and rafts and realized we weren't going on a leisurely kayaking trip--we were going white water rafting.  I have been on plenty of canoeing trips, but never white water rafting.  We were in kayak rafts which were basically two person rafts.  I was in the front and my friend, Joe, was in the back.  We started off and within 5 minutes our raft flipped and Joe and I were submerged into the freezing cold water.  We managed to get our raft and paddles back and got back in.  During the second set of rapids, our boat flipped again when we hit a rock.  This time the raft landed on top of me which really freaked me out being under water with a raft blocking my way to air.  I managed to push the raft away from me and get up to the air and start floating.  Joe and I made sure we were both okay then looked for our raft.  Well, considering how fierce the rapids were, our raft was wayy down the river already.  The instructors told us to just swim until we found it, but we felt like hypothermia was about to kick in so we eventually grabbed onto someone elses boat and walked along the bank for a little while.  We got back in and continued to float until we found our boat and instructor.  After those two flips, we were determined not to fall in again because it was just too cold!  We had several more rapids, dodging rocks left and right.  Our instructors would collect us after every major rapid course and tell us about the upcoming rapids and which side to go on and which side to avoid.  At one point, our instructor looked at me and said "go on the left side of these rapids--if you go on the right side you will die, five people have died on the right hand side."  Comforting, right?  Needless to say, Joe and I went on the left side...as far left as we could go.  We made it through the rest of the rapids without tipping over again, although there were a few close calls.  Almost everyone flipped once or twice so it was comforting to know we weren't the only ones.  It was definitely tough but so much fun.  They compared it to a level 2 white water course with some parts maybe being a 3.  I feel very accomplished and it was so exciting!  I know my dad would have loved it!!  Thanks mom and dad for all the canoeing experience--it helped me and Joe a lot :)  Love you all!! Enjoy the pictures!

Rome and Pisa Adventure

          Hello everyone!  I have not typed in a long time because I haven't had access to the internet for a while and I haven't had much free time since I got back from Rome.  Last Wednesday we went hiking on the French Alps during the day.  After we got back, we packed our bags and hopped on a plane to Rome.  We arrived in Rome at midnight and took a cab to our first hotel.  The next morning we got up and took a cab to our second hotel and dropped off our bags.  Thanks to one of my roommate's mom, we got to stay in the Hilton Rome Airport Hotel for the second night for free :) 

         We took the train from our hotel into the center of Rome that morning (Thursday).  We toured the Vatican Museums and went to the Sistine Chapel first. The Sistine Chapel was absolutely breathtaking and although you aren't allowed to take pictures, I took a few without flash and took a quick video.  I will post pictures soon.  The whole Vatican City experience was one I will never forget.  We made our way to the Pantheon and Trevi Fountain that day as well.  Along the way we passed several castles and Roman ruins.  We ended the day with a nice dinner outside then took the Hilton Shuttle back to our hotel that night. 

         The next morning (Friday) we got all our stuff together and took the shuttle back into the city.  Our hotel was about 40 minutes outside the city so we had to carry all our luggage on Friday around Rome which was a bummer.  We went straight to the Colosseum.  What an amazing structure!!! It was just beautiful.  I took many pictures from all levels and angles that I will post later as well.  After the Colosseum we walked around the Roman Forum and saw all the Roman ruins and old arcs.  The history behind all of it was just really cool and interesting to me!!  We hopped on a train to Pisa at 6:00 that evening. 

         We arrived in Pisa around 8:30pm.  We checked into our hotel/hostel and went straight to see the Leaning Tower of Pisa at night.  It was AWESOME!  We took the traditional pictures of us pretending to hold up the leaning tower.  As we were finishing up looking at the tower, a town parade came through including dance performances.  It was great and I really liked the small town feel.  It reminded me of Blacksburg.  We had dinner that night then went to bed.

         Saturday morning we woke up bright and early and ate breakfast complimentary of the hotel.  We then walked back to the Leaning Tower and took more pictures to compare it at night and during the daytime.  Its just so cool haha no other words can describe it.  There was an outdoor market happening too so I bought a genuine leather purse "Made in Italy!"  I felt that it was only fitting and for 25 euros, I couldn't resist.  After Pisa, it was back to Antibes.  I will update this blog post with more details over the next few days so keep checking back for more fun facts!  This was just my first go at it.  Love you all :)