Sophie À La Carte!

As I wait for the taxi to take us to the train station, here are a few musings. I feel like barely any time has passed, yet it's been a wild two months here. I've met some amazing people: counselors, locals, and campers alike. I've danced more this summer than I had for at least three years combined. I've probably also eaten more bread than the past years combined. I've become tan, fat, and happy. I haven't had a proper shower in six weeks. My French is better. My "ESL hands" are greatly improved. I can sing songs about llamas, Tarzan, kissing in a tree, following you deep sea baby, and bananas- oh, so many bananas. My tolerance for wasps has increased a hundredfold. Here's a few more observations: Never underestimate the power of a 8pm instant Nespresso to get you through an evening program.  Speculoos spread is the stuff of Gods. (There's a reason I don't buy Nutella or cookie butter at home.) Speculoos s'mores. Get r...

I can't believe my two months at American Village is almost over. I think when the time comes I'll be ready to leave, but that won't stop me from enjoying my last few days here. It's been quite an experience. For most of this week I've been feeling under the weather- I think I caught a bug. It culminated in me staying in my bed practically all day yesterday, a quite challenging feat considering it was 90 degrees (remember, I live in a tent). I managed to sleep off and on, and feel much better today. Logistically, I have this morning off, and I was feeling well enough to trek 20 minutes to a couple of peach trees on an inhabited farm property. The fruit was mostly ripe, so I packed my Decat bag halfway full and trekked back. This session has been a warm one, with practically no rain. The kids are smart, energetic, and talkative. A great group if the counselors were all fresh-faced, however we're wearing down. For many of us it's our third, fourth, or ...

I found out that I'll be staying in Miramont for the rest of the month, so I took that as an opportunity to plan the next leg of my journey. I need to be in Modigliana, Italy the first week of September to start my WWOOFing adventure. I bought a train ticket to Milan from Paris, and then will take Italian transportation (train/bus) to my final destination. I'm pretty excited for this train journey. It's about 7 1/2 hours, and leaves the Gare de Lyon at 6:30am. It travels through rural France before crossing the Alps. We pass through a crazy long tunnel before hitting Italy. You can read more about the journey here . (seat61.com is a great resource for train travel in Europe) Not a bad time to wait for a train I've been trying to get some local traveling in, too. Last week I took a quick trip to Bordeaux with Bubbles, my bunkmate. We were dropped off at the closest station and shortly found out that our train had been canceled and that the next one wasn't com...

Yesterday was our last day with the kids. We had the traditional "American brunch" in the morning, and the kitchen staff gave us the leftover bacon with the rest of our dinner supplies. We were planning a barbeque, so they gave us hamburger, sausage, tabouleh, cantaloupe, lettuce, tomato, and a ton of grated carrots. Kind of a random feast, but we ran with it. I was not on convoyage this time, so after the kids left yesterday I helped clean and prep for next session's crop, which is coming on Tuesday. We have a few days to relax, which is why I'm eating breakfast at 11am. Everyone else is still asleep. The kitchen delivered fresh baguette around 7:30am, as they do every morning, so I tore off a piece and added some leftover lettuce and tomato, plus a smear of dijon mustard. I microwaved two pieces of bacon until they were sizzly and brown around the edges and stuffed them into the baguette. With a couple of slices of cantaloupe and a bowl of coffee, it was ea...