Written by Journalism Staff Reporter Aubrey Voitel
France: a beautiful and unique country, one that some people got to experience first-hand this past summer!
Based on the basic itinerary given, these Allatoona students did quite a lot during their trip! Starting off, they experienced a layover in Quebec, causing their flight to be longer than normal. Landing in Paris city, they went and visited the Louvre. They saw the amazing Mona Lisa in person!
Their next day was also quite jam packed with fun activities. They started the day by visiting the Versailles Palace! As some of you should know, King Louis XIII previously lived in what is now the Louvre. He had the Versailles Palace built because he felt the Louvre was too small. They also went on a guided tour of Paris. There are many types of guided tours in Paris, some including a bike tour, or a ghost tour. There are even secret food tours! The next activity they did was a river cruise on the Seine River. Carson Gwynn said that this was his favorite activity during the whole trip. Their last stop of the night was the famous Eiffel Tower!
(Seine river cruise. Mme Gwynn)
Many of the students interviewed stated that the Eiffel Tower at night was the most beautiful thing they had ever seen.
The fun didn’t stop then, because the next day was just as crazy busy! The first couple of stops were the Chateau Chambord, Cheonleau, and Amboise.
 (Chateau Chambord, Mme Gwynn) |  (Chateau Cheonleau, Mme Gwynn) |
They also visited a Ferrari showcase for the Lemense race. Afterwards, they hopped on a boat to visit Mont St. Michel, a church that houses nuns and monks that sits on an island north of France.
(Mont St. Michel. Mme Gwynn)
They then saw Normandy and stood on the same beach that the Americans stormed on D-day in 1944.
(Normandy statues representing the soldiers that stormed the beach. Mme Gwynn)
The next day was dedicated to food and shopping! When dusk fell, this jolly group returned to the Eiffel Tower once more! Madame Gwynn said that throughout the trip, whilst having fun and shopping, this group also got to eat some good food, including macarons, crepes, good chicken, and some escargot! If you weren’t already aware, escargot is a snail that you eat from the shell.
 (macarons, Mme Gwynn) |  (dinner, Mme Gwynn) |  (crepes, Mme Gwynn) |
Moving to what the students said, they were asked to relate something interesting they learned while there. Abril Garcia Campar said, “Everybody just stuck to themselves.” Calin Gwynn said, “I loved getting to know the history of the French revolution.” Carson Gwynn expressed, “Their driving was crazy. I was expecting it to be weird but that was crazy.” Olivia Hendricks expressed her confusion towards their way of communicating, “You had to say ‘Bonjour’ before you could start a conversation. It’s not like here, where you can walk up to someone and start talking. You had to greet them first.” Ethan Noble conveyed his fascination towards servers, “They do serving differently, you had to signal for everything. If you want a drink, you had to wave them over.”
The one thing all the students said was they recommend everyone take their next opportunity to visit France. They said it is eye opening and just plain amazing to see it in real life versus in pictures. Not one part of France was ugly to them. Every place was gorgeous, the food was amazing, and the people were friendly!
(Cave dinner with the group. Mme Gwynn)
