I have been travelling all over southern france and haven’t had computer access for the past two weeks. My life has been quite crazy. After Florence, Assisi and Pisa I took a night train over to Nice in Southern France. Well, the nqme fits, Nice is very nice. First thing I did was catch a ferry from Canne (home of the international film festival) to an island in the Mediterranean that is entirely occupied by a monastery. I walked 1k in the wrong direction with my giant back 15 kilo back back on so that boat ride wasx one of the most relaxing ones I have ever been on. I dinn’t know why Nice is so popular. It is real pretty, but all the beadches are rock. I met a really cool girl from Australia who I hung out with for my full time there. She will be working France till October or febuary so I will be able to meet up with her at some point. After Nice and all its pleasures I moved on ot Avignon to stay with my Family. After surviving the previous few weeks on bread and camobert (which I detested before France) it was very good to have a full meal. At the end of my stay there I finished the meal saying that I was satisfied and my uncle responded, “It only took three days”. While in Avignon I visited 3 cistercian monasteries, the papal palaces and the point du gard. Wow! The roman aquaduct od pont du gqrd is 2000 years old and it is huge! It was so impressive. I caught a train on bastille day to the pyranee mountains and spent a very cold night in a mountain refuge outside one of the monastries that I am researching. From there I went on to Toulouse and Lourdes. I got some weird skin thing that I think I got in the baths at Lourdes so I think I am one of the few people who took the baths in Lourdes (Catholic pilgrammage sight with water of reported healing power) and walked away sicker than before they went in. Lourdes was real cool. I went to confession while there and had one of he best confessions ever. Not because I had a lot to get off my chest, but rather because I just enjoyed talking to the guy. He is a Jesuit priest from India and we ended up talking for 40 minutes about church, vocations, theology and just life in general. When I walked in there one of the first things that he asked is that if there is something that I enjoy doing that keeps me in shape and proceeded to tell me that I should find some form of exercise in the next couple months while to do while I am still young and have my health. I then spent a week in an interdenominational christian community called Taize. It was so cool. I made two great friends from England and one from Romania. I am considering coming back to the US in January so I can go to the big taize meeting in porugal and maybe go to Romania. I have just finished with a family reunion in Vire france. It was awesome! The food was amazing, the wine, cider, and calvadose were great, my family is cool and I got all my living plans arranged for the next 5 months. On Saturday night we all stayed out singing French songs by the fire. I was up till 3 AM convincing one of my cousins to stop smoking. Well anyways, this email must be overwhelming for you to read. My French is coming along well and I have found some running partners for the next couple months. Well I miss you and I hope camp is going well. You are going to love it here in france. My sister will be here so I am going to make sure that you meet up with her at some point so she can introduce you to some of the cute relatives, and the great family drinks. (maybe not in that order) What are your plans after going home? Isn’t crazy that our summer is almost over. What a blur it has been.