Mont St. Michel and St. Malo 
Tues. June 7.

Mont St. Michel is the island that the kingdom of Corona in Tangled is based off of. It's actually an abbey on the top and not a castle, but still super cool. There are shops and homes and leading path ways that all lead to the Abbey. It was a lot of climbing and stairs. I'm not exaggerating when I say this. We were there for about three hours at least. By the end of that time we'd climbed about a thousand steps. It was a lot of fun. The little town is pretty cool and right on the ocean. The tide comes in twice a day and quite quickly, so that if you're caught in it, you're in trouble. There's also quick sand.  It felt great to be at the ocean again. :)   This island is on the border of France and England, so it's seen it's share of war over the years.

                                                         It's a draw bridge!

This is the smallest path ever, more so than the one is Paris.

                                                          It's the Ocean!!!!

Look at these tough guys wearing kilts on the left. What?

We're teaching Carson how to braid a girl's hair. :) We'll make an excellent pupil out of him.

This is the main chapel which has Romanesque architecture as well as Gothic to show the change through time and the rebuilding of the chapel after it was partially destroyed during the hundred years war.  This abbey was a popular place for pilgrimage journeys and housed 60 monks as well as hundreds of guests who came to repent.

The wheel on the right is a tool they used to build the place, its a method taken form the Egyptians. It's basically a elevator,

This is the oldest part of the chapel originating from the tenth or eleventh century.

The abbey is built on a pointy rock on the top of the mountain, yes it was difficult to do. This is part of the rock.

                        This is a place reserved for absolute silence. It's a garden on top of the chapels.

                                                 This was the dining room.

This is the story of the head monk of the Abbey, back then much smaller, being visited by the arch angel  Micheal. The angel tells him that he needs to build the abbey, but the monk thinks he dreamed the whole thing, plus the task would be quite difficult seeing as there was a pointy rock to build on. Micheal came back and put a whole in the monks head with his finger. The monk had the abbey built after that. So the legend goes.

This is me in the fire place. These are the biggest ones yet!

The island is quite lovely. This is a glimpse of what the village looks like. It's mostly tourists shops and restaurants now, a few hotels.

My impressionist drawing of the Seine by my house in Croissy. Drew it on the bus which is a bit shaky and makes steady drawing a bit difficult. Hence the impressionist style.

This is one of two still fortified cities in France. It used to be on the border of France, Brittany and England, but is now deep in France territory. I forget exactly how old the city is, but it's old. The city isn't very big. We walked around the whole wall that surrounds it in about forty minutes or so. The place was covered in fog, but Lew Bras says that it's gorgeous when the sun is out. It's right by the ocean and very green. It was still cool, though some sun would have been nice.

I think i'm standing in front of the ambassador of Quebec. He had a house here.

Me and Maddie were jail buddies!

Maddie found a Geo cashing item in the wall and got really excited. I think she's found a new hobby.

Maddie said that I looked like a mermaid today because my hair was gorgeous. I'll take it. :)

I don't even know where this photo came from or what it's of. There's too much sun and not enough fog to be the fortified city. Must be something we passed that I thought was cool.

This is what we had for dinner. Fish, and duck being the main courses. I'm not a sea food person in general and this was no exception.  Maddie and Jessica were in heaven. The dessert was really good though. Fancy doesn't always mean good I've decided. The duck wasn't bad. Dinner lasted forever, like three hours because they took their time bringing out each course. Very french. Meals are very social here. We were all starving and tired though, but we made it through.