Rarrg, Mr. Mistral

So it's been a few days, but I will catch up from the last week (probably).

Today in Marseille, summed up in one word: windy. Not your average "Oh shoot my hair's in my face wind." No this is hurricane-force, I physically cannot take one more step wine because I have hit a wall of air. The Mistral wind is a wind that only occurs in the Provence region, and our tour guide actually told us about it yesterday, but of course I didn't think it would happen while we were here. I think on Wikipedia it said something about getting up to 90 km/hour. Sounds about right.

It was also rainy, which together created a lovely day to be a tourist :).Right.

We started out a little late today, a result of our exhaustion from yesterday's travels. From what I had looked up, everything was centered around the Vieux Port, or Old Port. Turns out that was where we had dinner last night and we had just stumbled upon it because that is where all the restaurants are. On the way to the port, I realized I had left my umbrella in the hotel and so we stopped in the shopping center to get a new one. 2 hours later, tada- umbrella! Did I mention due to the winds that umbrella is now probably non-functioning? Better it than my good one.

Right, so in my researching last night on what to do in Marseille today, I found out that the Chateau d'If is just off the coast here! I was so excited; you can take a ferry boat to the island and walk around the prison Alexandre Dumas' used as inspiration for The Count of Monte Cristo, one of my favorite books and movies. Guess what happens when the winds come into town though? Oh yeah, the ferries don't run, the water is too rough. Awesome.

From the port, we could see the Basilica Notre Dame de la Garde, a church built in the 1850's that is one of the landmarks of the city. It looks really pretty, but was an hour walk up the hill and we were in no mood to do that. So a nice picture from the port sufficed. I was still determined to see Chateau d'If, though at this point I could tell I would not get to actually go. We walked up one side of the port, one the opposite side than last night, which in itself it a feat. When we thought we were close to the ocean, we were rounding and old building, a monument of some sort, and just got a view of the sea before literally being slammed by the winds. After standing there and figuring out we could not physically walk all the way to the water, we took shelter behind a van to catch our breath.

Still determined, we walked back around the other side of the port, where all the restaurants are. At this point, the heavier rain has stopped and it is just drizzling sparatically. We all the way to the end of this side of the port, and though I still would like to at least see the Chateau d'If, I am starting to lose hope. Just as we are about to give up, a man taps me on the shoulder and starts chattering away in French. He is the cutest short old man. He obviously could tell that we were either lost or getting there. Through a conversation in our broken French, he tells us that the ferries were not running because of the weather, and when we asked him if there was a place we could see the Chateau, he asked different people on the street until he found a man who spoke both French and English and could tell us how to get there. Then he just walked away. It was literally the perfect timing and he was easily the nicest person I have met in France.

The place from where you can see the Chateau is the Catalan Beach, about a mile walk from where we were. Getting there was easy, and actually seeing the island was awesome. It was hard to get a good picture with the wind blowing my arms all around, but I'm not going for any sort of prize, so it should be fine. You definitely could see all the water slamming against the rocks all around the island and against where we were. Another man walked up to us while we were taking pictures, and I gathered from his French and his gesturing that there was somewhere that provided a better view of the island, but Jess and I were both too tired to try to find it.

At this point, we are just tired of being outside, it is just plain miserable. I had seen that there was a Virgin Megastore and so we stopped in the tourism office and asked where it was. Once in there, we found the English book section, which included about 500 books. Basically, Harry Potter, Stephen King, Twilight, and your classics like Jane Austen and Charles Dickens. Though I would like to have a Harry Potter book with the British words in it, I really am trying to save money and couldn't reason spending 15 euro for a book I've read multiple times and have in the States.

After wandering around in the store for a little bit with what appeared to be the rest of Marseille, we decided to head back to our hotel. My feet were hurting, and we were both wind-weary. I probably got a really good workout just walking around today. We'll see how my back holds up. It's already talking to me a little bit.

I can tell that this city would be really nice when it is warmer and sunny. It is probably great in the summer when the beaches are open and there aren't the death-winds. It was really cool to see the port full of boats and some of the shops on the side selling fresh fish. I can tell why people vacation in the South of France in the summer, not the winter.

Gerta has surprisingly held up well this trip and is doing fine with the internet here. She is not plugged in right now though, and she's probably not too happy about that.

Tomorrow we are going to Aix-en-Provence for the day, not far from Marseille. The weather is supposed to be nice, which I am excited about. I'm sure we won't see any lavender actually growing in the fields as it is the winter, but it should still be interesting there.

Now it is off to find dinner and then maybe walk around more or go to a cafe if the weather is nice. We might just go to sleep early and get an early start tomorrow. I guess that depends on your definition of early.