Twiddle your thumbs, or, finally look at NYC photos!

So many memories… and so many photos (below is absolutely the shortest possible synopsis, I promise you).

Hello Tours, Loire Valley, France. Arrived and explored the gorgeous little town, before retreating to my toasty hotel room to celebrate with some Bordeaux French red wine… party for 1. The highlight? Having to ask the hotel concierge to open the bottle for me (no screw tops here) …in french… in my pyjamas. Because, no, I was not going to get changed again. I really love that no one knows me here.

Anyhow, i’m getting back to my vin and Malcom Gladwell’s The Tipping Point.
NY Photos below.

Love x

New York. The city of … wow.

I left the city three days ago, and I am still coming down from the most indescribably mesmerising, fun, insane, inspiring, busy, chilled, overwhelming, blissfully contradictory week. Which, let me say, is somewhat difficult to do, because I have spent these past three days roaming the idyllique, romantique streets of Paris, which are so completely beautiful and enamouring that I find myself speechless and completely overwhelmed for similar, yet completely different reasons.

All I can conclusively say in my current state of rapture, enchantment and inarticulate dumbfoundedness, is, this world… c’est stupéfiant. C’est absolument magnifique.

I’ve hardly opened my laptop in the past week, and as someone who is the first to admit i’m a little bit too attached to my Mac, that’s saying something. So, considering this, please understand the lack of photos… because, well, they’re still on my camera. I’ll get around to it.

My well-travelled, wise and forever inspiriting sister tells me that it is actually okay to be like this, and that I don’t have to be on top of things. Apparently I am allowed to just live in the moment! Be in it. Soak it up. Who’d have thought.

And all I really want to be do right now is wander the streets… observe, smell, taste, touch, feel the magic, breathe in the city. Be in it. Like, really in it. So that’s what i’m doing.

You’ll hear from me eventually. xx

P.S Explaining the title, I’m pretty certain that the idiom ‘joie de revivre’ is not gramatically correct. At all. In fact, when I typed it as the subject of an email to my family upon arriving in Paris, I think I had meant to write joie de “reverie”, which I had self-translated in my own special Franglais to mean “living the dream” or “the joy of living in a state of pleasure” (which is also, probably, grammatically incorrect).

Anyway, my french translator kindly translated the sentence to “the joy of coming alive again”, which made me really smile. Isn’t that a beautiful idiom, even if incorrect?

Maybe there’s actually something in that. Joie de revivre-ness.

{The travel bug}

It has been another incredible beautiful cold blissful fun week. I have wobbled my way across the Capilano Suspension Bridge (thanks Craig) and walked amongst the Fir treetops, indulged in a beyond amazing tapas dinner at one of downtown Vancouver’s most hip and happening restaurants, Sanafir (more on that below), ate a Sesame bagel literally straight out of the wood oven at the Granville Island Public Markets, cycled the perimeter of picturesque Stanley Park (with multiple stops at the ‘washroom’ to thaw out frozen hands under the dryers….brrrr), laughed alongside some crazy laughing public art statues, attempted (and survived) ice skating, lined up for an hour to brunch at the popular Twisted Fork cafe, sighted about 29 too many Starbucks, purchased some groovy gumboots, discovered how many people can actually fit into a Smart Car (if you’re smart about it), contemplated my future on Facebook after watching the fascinating film The Social Network, tasted my first Snapple, bought mandatory Maple souveniors at Gastown and most importantly, spent quality, beautiful time with two very special, cherished friends, Bec and Craig, who have been my amazing hosts for the week.

After a thrilling first week of solo travel in San Francisco, I cannot describe how comforting the simple gestures of a welcome note on my bed, homemade cooking and two familiar faces to greet my arrival in Vancouver felt. This week, I don’t think I held a map once…and I have relished being guided around the Vancouver sights instead of going it alone! Bec and Craig, who moved from Adelaide to Vancouver a few months ago for working holidays, have immersed themselves in the depths of this cool city. Now locals in the Big V, unbiasedly i’d say they are the coolest cats in the Yaletown hood.

This week, we’ve reminisced over the good times shared together back home, and made a whole heap of new memories that I know will leave an indelible imprint in the years of our friendship to come. No matter how far I circle the globe, it’s the simplest places and experiences that mean the most. This week has been about good food, good coffee (finally), good chats, great company, and so much laughing… and really, that’s what it’s all about, isn’t it?

Next stop? New York, New York! x

P.S Dinner at Sanafir was so magical, I just have to share my attempt to capture the evening’s magnificence through my camera lens. The restaurant has such a beautiful ambience… including hand-lit pillar candles on one wall, ALL the way to the ceiling!

It took a 12 hour, cramped overnight train trip in a (slightly less than comfortable) cabin, full of (loudly snoring) (somewhat smelly) men, not to mention (ok, i’m mentioning) the 3 hour delay in the train departing due to heavy snow (ok, the snow part was nice and all), but I made it!

Au revoir Loire Valley and maximum daily temperature of -2 degrees celsius.
Hola sunny (well, comparatively) Barcelona!

I’m now counting the minutes until midday, so I can officially check into my hotel room, shower, nanna-nap and feel re-energised to explore this intriguing new city and pay homage to Señor Gaudi’s masterpieces, among other exciting adventures on my list including Flamenco dancing (maybe!), Tapas, Museo Picasso and roaming the La Ramblas.

In beautiful contrast, I spent the past three days roaming the streets of the quaint and quintessential french town of Tours in the Loire Valley. The highlight? My day tour visiting the exquisitely grand castles of the Loire Valley including Ambroise, Chenonceau, Cheverney and Chambord, with my wonderfully adorable tour guide Pascal. Sporting a black baseball cap and a completely enchanting idiolect of Franglais, Pascal talked non-stop… the whole day… explaining a plethora of history, royal stories and seemingly endless controversies of the kings, queens, princesses and their mistresses who once inhabited these castles. Beheadings, murders and conspiracy theories included. Undeniably, history has never been a particularly strong point, nor particular interest of mine, but somehow, Pascal’s quirky command of English and his visible passion for the subject matter of which he spoke, instilled an absolute fascination in me too, and I found the whole day to be totally enchanting (I used that adjective a few lines up, but how can I not repeat it!). Being winter time, inside most boudoir were roaring fireplaces and almost no tourists, which Pascal explained was quite a treat, because in summer time the most popular castles can receive up to 10,000 tourists… a day. I felt like a princess, being driven around and losing myself in the hundreds of ornately decorated rooms, exquisite architecture and even ascending/descending (a few times for memory’s sake) Leonardo Da Vinci’s double helix staircase… like a real-life fairytale.

Well, back to my current reality, it’s now well past midday, and apparently my room is going to be another couple of hours still. Ugh. Boo. I want a shower. Yeah, I know that it’s these kind of gritty travel experiences that are meant to make you that stronger, resilient, street-smart, generally-awesome-er kind of individual. Great philosophy. But i’ll gladly take the princess and enchanting (ibid) castles option any day.

San Francisco.

As I type these words, I am sitting at the ‘Free Speech Cafe’, a single laptopped girl with soy latte beside my mac, amongst at least a hundred other students also with laptops and coffee, peacefully studying in the morning sunshine at the University of California, Berkeley. I am pinching myself to be here, inconspicuously blending in as just another student tapping away on my keypad.

I have had the most amazing week at my first destination, San Francisco, on a two-month creative whirlwind adventure around America and Europe. I have shuddered in the solitary confinement cell at Alcatraz, caught the cable car from downtown to Fisherman’s Wharf, discovered how smelly the Sea Lions on Pier 39 actually are, snapped the perfect postcard picture of the ‘Painted Ladies’ (cluster of houses) at Alamo Square, walked the crooked Lombard street, touched a starfish and other colourful sea urchins at the California Academy of Science Aquarium in Golden Gate Park, lined up for half an hour to get my coffee at the popular Blue Bottle Co. early on a Saturday morning Ferry Building’s Harvest Market, gazed at amazing photography and pop artworks at SFMOMA, seen probably 400 carved pumpkins (yes, really), walked the rainbow coloured streets of the Castro, elbowed my way through the crowded streets of Chinatown, chanted for the Giants in a rowdy sardine-squished train full of orange and black t-shirts, shared in a vegetarian feast and beautiful wine at a dinner party with furniture, perfume, fashion and graphic designers and an arts journalist while discussing arts, culture, travels and philosophy… and my standout highlight: hiring a bike and riding across the Golden Gate Bridge (most amazing experience ever) to sunny Sausalito. Pictures below.

I have pinched myself so many times over the last 8 days…and just again, as a squirrel ran under my feet in this outdoor cafe as I type!

Travel makes my eyes widen with wonderment, fascination and my creative heart burst with awe and inspiration and possibility. There is SO much to see in this world! Doing this adventure solo has been as thrilling and exciting as it has been terrifying, as I have needed to rely on my own (unpredictable) compass and (dubious) navigation skills to get me from A to B in a completely unfamiliar city. The level trust in both myself and in my intuition has grown exponentially in just a week… I can feel it. I have immersed myself in local suburban lifestyle, choosing to only use public transport systems and not once opt for a taxi. I have rented a room in a private house in the Mexican and Spanish cultural Mission District rather than staying in a typical hotel downtown, and that has been an awesome experience. My lovely hosts, both successful creatives have been so kind and welcoming, and it has been so comforting to return ‘home’ to a private room and a light on, at the end of every day’s explorations.

This week, I have completely followed my heart, I have let myself relax and just take each moment as it happens. I feel so free and careless and liberated without the strings of facebook and commitment and expectation. I have cherished glorious spontaneously and walking aimlessly without a specific destination, just so see where it takes me. I have soaked up every piece of energy and atmosphere and culture in this gorgeous, quirky, contradictory, colourful city.

I terribly miss my beautiful man and dearest friends and family back home, but I still have so much to explore and seek on this journey… tomorrow I am off to my next destination, Vancouver.

Much love x