FROM A SMALL ISLAND // epilogue

Goodbye England, goodbye blog. 

PARIS

I feel like I've been all over the place these past few months and that's because I HAVE. This blog is winding down, and with that I'm scrambling to put together my last few posts. Luckily, this is the last of the travel spots that has been hanging over my head, and now feels like it was ages ago, considering this happened before my jaunt around Scotland.

We spent a week in Paris in a lovely, tiny flat in Menilmontant. We used Velib to bike around the city, and managed to cover quite a lot of territory. We went to almost all the major museums, ate some delicious food, had some great wine, and entirely too much cheese. The sun came out and warmed us as we read by the Seine and drank wine in the parks (do I sound #abroad enough for you?).

FROM A SMALL ISLAND // 10

Been really falling behind with all this traveling that I've been doing. Here's what I've been up to these past two weeks. I'll get my last few posts up soon!

VENICE & ROME ("DOES THE VATICAN HAVE WIFI?")

I'm trying to pinpoint what made Venice so great, and what I think it really comes down to is that it was it was our first time in months being in a summer climate. The weather in England affected me more than I thought it would, and there is no feeling more freeing than stepping outside in sandals. I really recommend it.

We were pretty much all on the same page once we arrived: prosecco, pizza, pasta, repeat. In between, we visited museums and took strolls through all the winding streets, stopping for gelato every couple of feet.

I had heard that Venice was going to be unbearably touristy, but it ended up being probably one of the more relaxing cities we visited. Rome was a different story.

AMSTERDAM (LAMBSTERDAM, HAMSTERDAM, JAMSTERDAM ETC.)

 

Welcome to my new favorite place in the entire world. I can't put into words how I felt about this city (What do you want to be, Kate? A writer?) but I can only explain it as the feeling you get when you're visiting colleges and you know you've found the one for you. 

Back at La Souqueto we were having a conversation about whether or not we ever wanted to live abroad in the future. We all resolutely said yes, but I couldn't specify a place. I feel like after a childhood and a year of study, I can maybe cross England off the list (although I'll always come back for QI and Cadbury). At that point I hadn't really seen very many other countries to think about. But after just two days in Amsterdam, I was doing that thing you do when you're bored where you look at apartments on Craigslist (or maybe that's just a bad habit Carolyn's got me into). I can't say I found any in my $35-a-month budget (which I just spelled as "budjet" thank you all day paper writing) (have I done enough of these yet?) (let's move on)

Where were we? Oh right. I really like Amsterdam. We had frites and mayonnaise and GUYS I drank BEER and I think I drink BEER now. We did a lot of canal-strolling and bagel eating and went to Anne Frank's house and wouldn't let Jacob try to find Justin Bieber's note in the guestbook and we went to the Van Gogh museum and my ticket had the almond flower print on it and I was like that's MY print how did they know and ugh so many thoughts so little words actually functioning in my head. 

On our last full day it was really sunny and we were walking around and people were just leaning out the windows of their apartments and sitting on the stoops of their steps all overlooking the canals. It was a city with no pretension, no image it was trying to force on you. It's like all the people with functioning adult jobs who like to bike and wear really well put together outfits all fell into the most beautiful city in Europe and didn't even question it. AND I WANT TO BE ONE OF THEM, dangnabbit. 

LA SOUQUETO CHAMBRES D'HOTES (MIREPEISSET, FRANCE)

I will always feel forever lucky for these three days I got to spend with good friends in the south of France. La Souqueto, run by family friends from when I used to live in England, is a B&B situated just by the Canal du Midi in a Medieval French village. It was the first stop on our trip, and so absolutely beautiful and perfect that we kept joking about canceling the rest and just curling up here for the remainder of the month.

FROM A SMALL ISLAND // 9