February 28th

Final day of Normandy travels: mission Deauville (and Trouville?).

It was our earliest morning but one of our longest days. Kate and I decided to go to Deauville (known for its extravagance and beauty) to see what the fuss was about. My friend Paula had visited Deauville way back in the fall and raved about it. The weather was so-so just a big grey blanket in the sky but without rain. When we arrived we set off to see Deauville.

Pretty right? That's about it. See as you all may know (or have guessed) I'm not into designer clothing. Don't have me wrong, I enjoy buying top notch dresses (my prom dress was almost $400) on occasion because formal occasions (wedding receptions) are fun. That being said my every day wear is just that, every day clothes. In France I show almost no skin which is strange compared to my Chicago and Iowan habits. My mother remembers me begging her to allow me to wear shorts while it was snowing. Be it France or the States my clothes are allowed to fade and show their age after months of wear. Designer clothing is a giant hole in my wallet. Not only is it not designed for all weather conditions it often doesn't like mud or grass stains. In Deauville there is nothing but Channel, Lacoste, Louie Vuitton, and every other high class fashion store. In short Kate and I looked at the scenery.

We did discover the Deauville beach area which in the summer I'm certain is overflowing with people. The cool part about it (besides actual sand being there) was the beach huts were named after celebrities. Kate and I posed for different ones but this one has to be my favorite.

Do the creep audience

After we had walked all over pretty Deauville we both decided that it was time for some lunch. Across a basin we saw that there were several restaurants and decided to investigate. Turns out that crossing the bridges takes you out of Deauville and into the wacky world of Trouville.

Heads up, Trouville was much more my speed as well as Kate's. In Trouville we found our lunch which turned out to be a few crepes. I opted to also have a dessert because I frickin' miss ice cream. Yes audience the super market sells ice cream. However audience it does not sell DQ soft serve nor EDS sundaes! So a banana split was very welcome and demolished in about two minutes.

We then spent the rest of our time wandering the streets of Trouville looking for open shops. Sadly we picked the wrong two hours to be doing this. Although Kate and I had eaten lunch we had eaten relatively early. Those morning brioches don't seem to fill us anymore. Trouville was completely shut down from one to three and our bus was at three-thirty. Great. We did have fun walking in the streets because like Deauville Trouville was very beautiful just in a different style. Now the only challenge was finding some post cards and a single souvenir. This proved to be difficult. But when faced with a challenge I often exhaust every option before giving up. The one exception is geometry.

Kate and I hopped (not literally though that would be funny) from shop to shop in the hopes of finding a little something to take back with us. We did discover some postcards at a Tabac and through tradition along with sifting through all the tacky photos I found three cards that depicted Trouville and Deauville in my eyes. We did find a small shop that had been closed but had then opened in Deauville that promised something. I spotted a red fish charm (or pendant I don't really care) that reminded me of Trouville. Thus I completed my mission with flying colors; both the postcards and the souvenir were found.

Three-thirty rolled in and Kate and I collapsed into our bus seats. I fell asleep (as I often do after too much sun exposure least that's my theory) and Kate took care that I didn't fall out of my seat; that hasn’t happened yet but I've been close to it. We arrived in Le Havre, returned to the dorm, and headed out to dinner.

Today was the day that Jaimie decided to celebrate her and her twin sister Sam's birthday with her friends. I gave Sam and Jaimie their gifts (a toy pear with a ladybug inside for Sam and a small turtle for Jaimie) and the four of us headed out to the station to meet Julie. Once she was in our company it was off to the Volcan for some pizza. We spent a few hours at the restaurant eating, laughing, and for me drinking a Heineken. Desserts were ordered (they have decent ice cream) and the talking continued. 

There were only two snags. The first was that our waitress took forever to realize we done almost causing me to drag her by the collar, and I somewhat injured myself. Hopefully I'll be fine in the morning. Good times of travel, later!