Bonjour! During my first weekend in Bordeaux, EAP (Education Abroad Program-UC) finally did something right (at this point every student had a problem of some sort with them) and took us on our first "excursion"! We went to the Sand Dune at Pyla (pronounced "pee-la"), the Archanon, and a beach on the Atlantic Ocean. First we went to Archanon, a small Atlantic bay where oysters (les huitres) are grown and farmed! We watched a short video about the process of farming them and how it takes 3 years to get an oyster worthy of eating! I had no idea it was such a complicated process- lots of taking out of water and putting back in, and moving locations around the bay from shallow to deep water- très compliqué! Anyway, everyone was pretty tired and hungry at this point (even though it was only 10:30 am) and we knew we were going to get lunch provided so we were hoping it would be an early one. Little did we know that lunch was going to be raw oysters!! What an experience that was...
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| 4/6, couldn't finish them all! |
After eating the salty, slimy, un-appetizing oysters, we were given a nice picnic lunch with tomatoes, baguette, apricots, a sweet desert and lots of cheese, of course! Never did I think I would be drinking wine before 11 am on a school sponsored excursion- only in France, right?!
After the oysters and picnic we were off to the Sand Dune at Pyla- the tallest sand dune in Europe! Most of us slept on the bus ride (about an hour) from Archanon to Pyla but once we got there we were shocked to see how cool this place actually was! Who knew something so magnificent was so close to our new home??
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| It was a rough climb... |
After climbing up and down the sand dune and watching my fellow Californian boys try and race down it (which ended in one large fall) it was off to my very first visit to an Atlantic ocean beach! We hopped back on the bus for about 20 minutes until we arrived at the Pyla Beach! Something about the beaches in France is just amazing-the water, the sand, and the sky are all just more beautiful than any other place i've ever seen. We hung out at the beach for about 2 hours until we headed back home to Bordeaux (or Pessac, because at this point we were still stuck living in the dreadful dorms). I didn't go in the water at the beach because it was windy and a but cold but i felt the water with my feet and it was incredibly warm! Probably warmer than the outside air, I just wasn't willing to be cold in the wind after I got out! I'm sure i'll get another shot at the Atlantic... Til next time!
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