February 27th

Second day of Normandy travels: mission Etretat.

Now Etretat is relatively famous for its cliff formations. They look like this:

What do you do with that? Why hike up and down the cliffs of course. I loved it! Whenever something becomes an outdoor activity of exploration I become an eight year old with sugar energy and endless curiosity. Kate was my mother and prevented from most likely killing myself. Alright that's a bit of an exaggeration, but I did have some daredevil thoughts about snaking along some of the smaller narrower deadly paths that only the seagulls attempted.

See this is why I need wings, extra safety. We did stick to the paths and looked all over the place just in shock at how high and beautiful the cliffs were. They also were windy, really windy!

  

After trekking the western cliffs of Etretat, Kate and I decided to grab a hot drink. But before we indulged, we both bought mini flags of our respected countries and I bought a pinwheel. Hey, I told you I have an eight year old's mindset when exploring audience. Also I love pinwheels; they are just so amusing and silly. Basically we went to afternoon beverages with flags and an orange pinwheel. We clearly were the envy of everyone there. Kate decided to have some calvados, for the second time in her life, and I ordered an Irish coffee, for the first time in my life. I quickly figured out that mixing the whipped cream into the coffee helps cool it, heh beginner's mistake. We enjoyed our alcoholic drinks (we're on break!) and chatted away the time. Once all was downed we ventured back in the cold air for more hiking!

We headed to the eastern cliffs which included a faster climb but loads of stairs. At least it was good for our calf muscles. We made it to the top and I made a discovery. There happened to be a small path to the right that led down the bottom shore. I of course followed the path. Don't worry audience, it had hand rails. At the bottom was a stony beach and various jetties. I looked up and my jaw dropped. Those cliffs are ridiculously high!

It was a sweet feeling to know that we had been climbing all over those cliffs at that height. I then made another discovery; I found a cave. This cave was tiny and by tiny I mean short. You could see the end from the beginning a real alpha omega situation. Sadly it had a little stream running through it so Kate forbade me from walking to the other side. Just as well, I'm not all that familiar with the tide at this time of year.

However that would be a sweet way to go out; girl dies from adventuring through cliff caves, all that survived was her orange pinwheel. We did make it out alive, obviously.

Once back in town we had some startling news, we had missed our intended bus. It wasn't a worrying situation, there was another bus in two hours and we were relatively hungry. We sat down at a decent restaurant and had ourselves some omelettes and crepes. My omelette was pretty good (though lacking ketchup) but my crepe was fantastic. It was banana with drizzled semi-sweet chocolate all over. It was worth every cent and was gone too quickly. Good thing Le Havre doesn't have crepes like that otherwise I'd be fat; a short butterball.

All in all our meal was wonderful and it passed the time nicely. Our bus arrived and we boarded with a few yawns. I drifted to sleep but before I did I was happily reflecting on what a great adventured we had had. Plus, it was only day two.