Moral of the story thus far:

Always check your camera battery.

I've done many things since my arrival in France, including learning the proper way to say "since my arrival in France 3 weeks ago" in French.  The one thing I haven't done is remember to charge my camera battery at appropriate times.  Last weekend, upon arriving in Annecy, the battery promptly died.  This weekend, after working long and hard all day Saturday, my camera couldn't muster the strength to take more than a few pictures on Sunday.  Whoops!  Unfortunately for you guys, this means you'll have to read 4000  extra words (I probably would have posted 4 pictures, 1 picture = 1000 words).  I was originally going to go hiking on Saturday with a group from the CUEF, but the hiking trip was moved to Sunday to accomodate the weather.  Thus, I decided on Friday night to go to Lyon with a few other people from my group on Saturday instead.  We met at the train station bright and early - except it was actually quite dark and dreary.  The train ride was great (how could it not have been?) despite the fact that it was early and a bit crowded.  When we arrived in Lyon (the second biggest city in France), we decided to skip the maps/directions/plans of any sort and just wander towards the river, where we were under the impression we'd be able to find places of interest. 

It turns out we didn't have to go far out of the train station to find something of interest, as we were accosted by a giant Mango as soon as we walked out!  It turns out that a drink company here is having a Fruit of the Year Contest, so they had people dressed as each fruit out campaigning.  To be honest, this was really the highlight of my trip.  I'm definitely voting for the Mango because he was the most friendly to us, but if you'd like to vote, you can check out the contest on Facebook (facebook.com/oasisfunpage).  The strawberry and raspberry both seemed a little conceited and the pineapple was nice, but I just don't see him as a true leader.  The nice thing about France is that, despite their overwhelming devotion to bread and cheese, they still find it in their hearts to support fruits and vegetables.  Speaking of bread and cheese, those are always the 2 things that people mention when they are asked about the differences between their culture and French culture.  This has happened with some regularity in my classes and it never fails that after the professor asks about differences, someone responds, "The food is different... so much cheese and bread!"  Cheese gets mixed reviews; I think it's wonderful, but a lot of other people aren't so fondu of it, particularly people in my classes who are from areas of the world where cheese and dairy is not very popular.

Anyway, the rest of the day was well spent.  It happened to be the weekend of the Journées de Patrimoine, which meant that there were a lot of  museums etc. open for free.  We walked through the beautiful Lyon Hôtel de Ville and went to the Musée de Beaux-arts for free.  The museum  was great, and I impressed myself with my art history knowledge from 8th grade art class.  For example I recognized a painting by Degas because it was a painting of red-headed ballerinas (Degas was a ginger himself and Degas and Dance both have 5 letters and start with D - Thanks Dahlquist).  We ate lunch at a cute little restaurant with good food and appropriately snobby weighters.  My friends are convinced that the waiters were snobby because we're American, and I'm convinced that my friends are paranoid, so we'll just chalk it up to French people being French.

Sunday, I woke up bright and early again - this time to go hiking.  We took a bus to a tiny village in the Vercors (a mountain range) called Villard-en-Lans and I fell in love as soon as we got off the bus.  It was a picturesque little mountain village and I would live there if I could.  After an hour or so for breakfast, we started off on our hike ... and ran into some donkeys.  I knew it was going to be a good day when we started off walking by some farm animals, since in my dream life I would live on a farm in a mountain village in the Alps.  The hiking was beautiful.  To be honest, while we were walking through the woods it looked an awful lot like Maine (not a bad thing) but once we got out into the open it was clear that we weren't in Kansas anymore, and definitely not Maine.  And then my camera died, before I could even snap a picture of the mountain people who gave us bread and the best cheese I've ever eaten.  When I returned home and told my host fam. about the cheese, they told me it was delicious because it wasn't pasteurized.  This was probably true and its making me rethink my stand on pasteurization.  The cheese was THAT good.

Anyway, we continued on our way.  The top of the mountain (I don't know its name) was 1,700 meters, which is just higher than Mt. Katahdin, although I think we started at about 800m so it was really only a 900m climb.  The views from the top were spectacular, we overlooked the valley that Grenoble is in, but we couldn't see the city because it was covered by a mer de nuages - a sea of clouds.  With the clouds swirling around us, we caught a glimpse of Mt Blanc, covered with snow and true to its name, and the other mountains all around us. 
All in all, it was a wonderful weekend and I was ready for bed at about 7 pm on Sunday when I got back from the hike.  But before I could go to bed, I had to find a bathroom.  French people don't drink water the way Americans do, which I think explains the lack of public toilets.  Even in the train station, there were no restrooms.  Isn't that absurd?  Everyone has to use the restroom whilst travelling.  I just don't understand.  This weekend I am off to Provence with my Swarthmore group.  Wine tasting, delicious food, and a visit to a monastery are all on the docket, so I'll let you know if there is indeed "more than this 'provencial' life".  Just kidding, that song is actually about 'proVINcial' life, not life in ProVENce, but I felt the reference was appropriate. 

Hiking friends at the top with a sea of clouds behind us!