Villennes Sur Seine

Whoops, I completely forgot to post yesterday.

But you didn't miss much, I promise. We went into Paris to visit la Musée de Quai Branly, which has lots of artifacts from around the world and France's old colonies. I had an interesting conversation with my aunt about the ethics of the museum, because apparently some people don't like it since France "stole" everything... but then you can share cultures or something? Anyway, I didn't quite do my research properly because we got there and realized it was closed on Mondays. So moot point. BUT it's right near the Eiffel Tower, so we wandered around the park near there for a bit and took some pictures. And the weather has turned gorgeous, so it was quite lovely.
   We came back to Villennes early-ish and had a nice afternoon here.  Eliott came on a walk around the neighborhood, and we wandered down to Noé's day care to see if we could say hi through the fence. But the little kids were inside when we passed by, so no luck. Michael and Noé have really hit it off; they've been playing frisbee in the back yard every night before dinner, and sometime Noé even lets Michael "win". It's sweet to watch.

  And today: We went on another walk around Villennes with Clement, who showed us the downtown area and the swanky part of town. There is an island in the Seine with a bunch of very very nice houses, so it was neat to walk around it and try to peak through the fences without getting barked at by dogs. Well, so, I didn't think the dogs part was all that neat, but the houses and yards were!
In the afternoon Michael and I drove with my Aunt to a nearby town called St Germaine and explored a bit while she did errands. There was a very pretty chateau and simply massive gardens with a very pretty view of the Paris skyline. Michael read in the shade (it's gone from raining all the time to very hot) and I walked around town a bit more, hopping from shady sidewalk to shady sidewalk. Overall it was a very nice excursion!

Oops, backlit.

Now we've officially take photos in front of the most iconic Paris landmarks, I think.

In front of St Lazare train station

Mom, this statue reminded me of you.

And at the train station in Villennes

This is the church in downtown Villennes. It's really pretty!

So many stairs!! My Uncle and Aunt live basically a the top of the hill, and the train station is basically at the bottom of the hill...

There was a pretty garden on the island we walked around

The Chateau in St Germaine

Into the garden!

In front of the Paris skyline. In classic Us fashion, I think we blocked the Eiffel Tower with our heads. Whoops.