Spoonerisms Abroad: Monet's Giverny Digs.

Waking up bright and early this morning for my planned day trip north, my Velib ride to Saint Lazare was relatively hazard free, the sun was shining and the tourists were out in droves in Paris, the perfect start to a countryside getaway.

After purchasing our tickets on the slowest machines known to man (and sure to embarrass their practical and efficient German counterparts) we made it to the train in time for departure and were lucky enough to choose the same train departure time as 1/3 of the tourist population in France, making for an interesting, claustraphobic and personal space-less 45 minute journey. After sharing a small carriage with two bikes, three prams (complete with crying babies), an assortment of suitcases, kissing couples (and shouting ones, which I personally preferred), as well as people from every continent, it was a relief (total understatement) to arrive at the quaint, tranquille town of Vernon. From here we joined the queue and, like one big, not-so-happy family, all boarded the bus that would take us to Giverny in the region of Normandy to see Claude Monet's gardens (his inspiration for many of his paintings as well as his crib).

After a quick bus ride and stunning views along the way (seeing wide open spaces, trees, green grass that isn't covered in "la pelouse interdite" and rolling hills was like fat-free chocolate for an obese kid) and we were off the bus into the bright blue sky of Giverny!

Purchasing my 5 euro entrance fee to the jardins (and happily still claiming to be a SP student, but what 21 year old can really get 14,50euro excitement from a jardin?) and we were off. We were lucky enough to get perfect weather and roamed the area checking out all the flowers, the water lily pond, and dodging inappropriately stopped Americans. I went with two Americans, two Germans and an Austrian and the day was like a non-stop comedy show involving the mocking of all cultures and their stereotypes. Most of the NZ style jokes revolved around me having not seen Lord of the Rings and no one understanding what I was saying, asking me to repeatedly say words like 'bed'...

After checking out the jardin, traipsing through his ridiculously colourful house (pretty sure the colour chart for his kitchen was headlined 'vomit'), taking sneaky photos of the inappropriate cat vases and looking out the windows at the incredible view, we left Monet's hood and walked through the town. Only about 500 people live there (all of whom surely must migrate for the summer as the crowds there were already getting crazy) and the town was tiny but so beautiful. I felt like I was truly in France bar Edith Piaf belting out her magic.

We ended up getting carried away walking through the town and took a bad turn and somehow ended up on the highway walking back and with no footpath and plenty of corners it was an adrelanine fuelled return. We arrived back having just missed the last bus so we grabbed ice creams from the glace truck (I think sorbet coco is my new addiction) and picked a spot to lie out in the sun surrounded by more grass than I've seen in weeks and a bright blue sun and sky for a ceiling. Sunday's don't get much better than that...