Approaching the edge of France and the end of the world (or just the year)!

Wow, November has FLOWN by!!! It's hard to believe that I've already been back at work for three weeks since the Toussaints vacation! Here's the latest...

On the last Saturday of the vacation, I joined Anne-Marie, Andre, and the UW study abroad group on a day trip to Bretagne! We were driving around all day long, but were able to see some great locations! Our first stop was to see some of the Carnac Stones. This grouping of Neolithic stones has been around since about 4000 BC! There are over 3,000 of them scattered around the village of Carnac, and while we drove by quite a few different sites, we only stopped to poke around at one. It might not be much to look at, but it's still incredible!! To think that people from thousands of years ago dragged around all of these massively huge boulders and placed them upright in formations or made stone huts just blows my mind. Having visited Stonehenge in 2007 and then being able to see these formations was quite a treat!

After visiting Carnac, we hopped back on the bus and drove to Anne-Marie and Andre's country home for a nice Bretagne-style breakfast. Of course, there were croissants and baguettes, butter and jam, and juice and coffee, but we also had Gateau Breton, which I had never tried before! It's kind of a heavy cake-type dish that tastes almondy. Haha, anyway, it's quite good, especially accompanied by coffee (if you can read French, here's a recipe)! It was also so fun to see Anne-Marie and Andre's cute little place. I wish I had a country home in France! :)

A beautiful French village along a slowly meandering river.

Concarneau!

We hopped on the bus again and drove through some pretty French countryside and little villages before arriving in the oceanside town of Concarneau. We wandered around for a bit before enjoying crepes and cider for lunch. Always a fantastic combination!

Next up was Quimper. Evidently, if you're going to visit Bretagne, then visiting Quimper is essential. We checked out the cathedral in town and walked through the awesome old city streets before moving along on our trip to the edge of France!!

The Cathedral in Quimper

The clouds were super amazing all day long!

Now, unfortunately, I don't remember the exact name of this location, but we went to the western-most point in France, whatever that might be called. So, now I've been to the southern-most point of the USA (in Hawai'i) and the western-most point of France. Awesome!

It was a beautiful evening to visit; lots of interesting clouds and great lighting as the sun was setting. Seeing as we were right on the ocean, it was also very cold and very windy! But everyone had a fun time scrambling around the rocky coastline and taking pictures of the lighthouses and the ocean. 

This little lighthouse waaaaay out there was so cool!

At the end of the world! Or just the end of France, rather.

After that adventure, we returned to the bus and spent about five hours driving back to Nantes. It was a really long day of being in an autocar, but we saw some beautiful places and I had a great time!

Most of the rest of this month has been business as usual; working hard and hardly working! I joined the UW kiddos at Anne-Marie's for an informal Thanksgiving get-together on Thanksgiving day, the Marché de Noel opened up downtown (vin chaud! vin chaud! vin chaud!), and I celebrated my 24th birthday!! 

With our mugs of vin chaud at the Marché de Noel 

I only took a handful of pictures on my birthday, and they all came out blurry, but we celebrated in style! Seven of my friends and I enjoyed dinner at Entrecote, my very favorite restaurant here in Nantes, and then we went to the Tour de Bretagne, the big skyscraper downtown, and had drinks at the bar called Le Nid ("The Nest") at the very top. Super cool! There were tons of other assistants at Le Nid, as it was another assistant's birthday the day before mine, so we had a double-celebration. After that, my group headed off to Bouffay for more shenanigans and closing down the bars!

Birthday cake at Entrecote :) (Thanks, N.!)

Man oh man, I thought turning 21 in France was a great time! Turning 24 was even better!! A huge thanks to my family for sending me lots of love and birthday packages, and un très grand 'merci' to everyone in France who was there to make my birthday the best one ever!!

To top off this week, I have been cooking like a fool! N. and V. came over to my place on Sunday and we baked up a home-made Pumpkin Pie! (Thanks for sending the ingredients, Mom! :) ) The next day, I made beef Rendang Padang curry with couscous and then baked cranberry scones for the first time ever. They turned very well, but I'll be eating them forever! It was a big batch of scones. :)

Pumpkin Pie! Delicious with Creme Fraiche
and vin chaud! Can you see the sweet
Marché de Noel mugs we bought??

Next up in my Nantes adventures: Soccer games! More vin chaud! Rock climbing (maybe?)! And only three weeks until I head back to the States for the holidays!!