9/4/12

The trek over here was longer than I expected. I left from Santa Barbara, took a flight to San Francisco, then SF to London (Heathrow), then Heathrow to Paris (Charles de Gaulle). That whole expedition took about 14 hrs in total with layovers etc. Once I arrived in Paris I had to figure out how to catch a train from Paris to Lyon and Lyon to Saint Claire du Rhone, which is near the city where I am staying. After a bit of conversation in very broken French and English with the ticket attendant, I had one ticket to my destination. After getting the ticket I paid for 15 minutes of wifi in the station to email the manager of the winery and let him know when I would be arriving in St. Claire du Rhone. I eventually got on the train and headed for Lyon. This train trip took about 2 hrs, most of which I slept since I got very little sleep on the plane ride over (turns out I was on a new United Airlines plane which had personal TV’s with movies and shows—How I met Your Mother, Tommy Boy, and Dinner with Shmucks were my choices). Thankfully I woke up just before arriving in Lyon and I asked a kid next to me if I was supposed to get a different train to St. Claire du Rhone. He said yes. I got off, asked my way to the other train, found it, got on, and it left within 30 seconds. Needless to say I was very lucky to find the next train so quickly. This train was about 45 mins. When I got off, I was lucky to find Yann (the manager) waiting for me. He told me that he had received the email 15 mins before I arrived and rushed over to pick me up. Lucky again! We took the van back to town, he showed me around a bit, and then gave me the keys to my room.

That afternoon/evening I met the other interns. An Englishman by the name of Adam (he has been living and working in France for three yrs.-speaks fluently), a Brazilian girl by the name of Thuise (she has been living, working, and going to school in France for 2yrs-speaks fluently), and a Kiwi by the name of Tom (it is his first time in France-speaks no French). I like all of them, and it helps to have two who speak both English and French to do a little translating haha. It is nice that Tom doesn’t speak however because it makes me feel better about being such a rookie. I literally put my things in the room, came down to the kitchen, and went to the market to get a couple of things with Adam and Thuise for dinner that night. We got to the market and I grabbed a couple of items for breakfast and lunch the next day and we headed back to the winery.



That night we had a little BBQ across the street at a building that was part of the winery where another intern/student Louise is staying. A bunch of workers from the winery ended up coming as well as some other interns from a winery up the road from us-two Slovakians who spoke little French, and one Argentinean from Mendoza who also spoke very little French. We communicated in Spanish! First things first, wine. We drank some white and Rose.

It was very good after a long day. Then we ate very simply. BBQ sausage, with bread, and a salad consisting of sliced cucumber and tomato. It was not the largest meal I have ever had, but it was substance after a long day and a half of traveling, so I was happy to eat.

Surprisingly, I stayed up until 11pm there, and finally crashed at midnight. I was extremely tired, especially given the fact that France is 9 hrs ahead of the states so that would have put me at about 3 pm back home, about 32 hrs since I awoke in California on the 3^rd to go to the airport. I slept soundly for about 4 hrs, awoke and 4 am and couldn’t go back to sleep until about 530 am, knowing I had my first day of work that day, starting at 8 am.