After a fun filled night of dancing and 2 hours of sleep (I swear the French Friday night doesn’t even begin until 1am; I can barely handle it), I jumped out of bed and literally ran to catch the bus for our group field trip to the small town outside Paris, Fontainebleau. Given this is an early Saturday morning, a total of about 14 out of 30 of us show up for out little day trip. I tried to get Rema up, but she simply responded with “I just can’t see myself getting up right now”. So diva, I love it! But I’m glad I got out of bed to go! The bus ride was a trip in itself. First we are on a normal Socal-looking freeway, then the countryside changes to agricultural fields and rural buildings that remind me of the central valley on the drive to my Granny’s house in Tollhouse, then to a lush landscape that looks identical to the roads in Michigan on the way to my Aunt Mae’s house with super green trees and grass. The town is about an hour away, and apparently a tourist destination…I was hoping to catch a glimpse of a French Red Hat Society but am greeted instead by a very enthusiastic senior group. 
The Chateau is massive. There are ballrooms, cathedrals, bedroom upon bedroom, canals, private gardens, and public gardens; all gorgeous. It was a guided tour in French that lasted about 2½ hours …a little lengthy but fun overall. The best fun fact: the Royal families never bathed due to water contamination, so they have perfume rooms instead; yuck.
The chandeliers were amazing!!!! Just to give you some perspective, each chain link holding them up was bigger than my fist. The Chateau was pretty inside and out…no luxury too great for the kings of France…
For lunch, we headed to a Boulangerie and found a good deal on a sandwich, drink and dessert. Parfait! We then proceeded to walk 10,000 miles to our picnic destination which you can decide if the trek was worth it…(Yes!)
So after lunch, I decided to break off from the group and explore the gardens and the surrounding town a little bit (read: After I came back from the bathroom, everyone was gone)... In one of the gardens, there are peacocks and other birds, as well as, a super adorable mother and daughter combo, three teenage French boys sitting. In a park. Talking. without a single electrical device, (so bizarre), and super cute old couples wandering the grounds together. It always strikes me as fascinating to think that these people have this huge historical monument in their backyard; it’s a part of their everyday lives as opposed to say, the 405.
Look Mom, more Roses!!!
We had, in my opinion, way too much free time here. I still had 2 hours to go and was already searching for the bus. Okaaaaaay fine, I’ll find a quiet place to continue reading my 60 Million Frenchmen Can’t Be Wrong book. And, it looks like I found just the spot right through here:
PS on the bus ride back to Paris, I passed out like a little kid at Western Christian Summer Day Camp, mouth hanging open, head bobbing, and everything. Cute.
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