finally, our two insane and wonderful weeks of eurail-ing had to come to an end.
we knew it was time. it's always hard not to wish i'd had another day here or there, another three hours to spend in that one park i'd walked by but hadn't had time to explore, another 7 euros for that one museum i never made it to. but the 3 of us learned, over the course of this trip, not to underestimate how draining backpacking could be. don't get me wrong: marit's phone shattering, tamar's bank card not working, several of my well-worn staple clothing items falling apart-- these things weren't what tired us out. this year's been an exercise in dealing with the unexpected, and i think we're all pretty proud of the level of tenacity and resourcefulness this year has given us.
what was tiring was simply constantly being on the go all the time, never quite relaxing. there are always those weird australians (i've met them everywhere) who stay in one hostel for weeks or months on end, setting up camp, but make no mistake: a hostel isn't a home. padlocking our belongings 24/7, navigating train transfers, switching to a different language and different geography and different everything every 3 days, screenshotting map directions before leaving a wifi area, constantly being on the lookout for public bathrooms, trying to figure out how many times we could adorn the same 4-euro pita with toppings at maoz falafel in barcelona before "unlimited toppings" turned into "please leave now"-- that's what got exhausting. awesome and fun and a crazy, crazy, crazy adventure that we missed as soon as we were all ensconced in our familiar lives and routines at home once again...but exhausting.
with all that being said, though, marit and tamar and i were heartbroken at the thought of this being over, the downside to our magnificent year of new places and new people and new adventures obviously being that wherever there exists a hello, there will inevitably eventually be a goodbye. leaving places never gets easier, ever. and this time, it was really ending. so we decided to make the best of our final day of the gap year, fittingly spent in paris.
on sunday afternoon, we boarded our train from barcelona to perpignan, in southwest france, and then from perpignan to cerbère, a town right on the franco-spanish border, where we were to catch an overnight train to paris. somehow our travel agent at the gare de tours had booked us the least sensical path to paris possible, sending us on a zigzag through southern france and wasting us a few euros and a few hours. it was impossible to be upset, though, because the whole situation was just too comical. and in any case, i fell 100% in love with the town of cerbère during our three (!) passes through it. forget the côte d'azur, the basque coastline is where it's at.
like, can't you just imagine renting a ramshackle little cottage in the summer and wandering through tall grass down to the rocky beach and maybe driving along the coastline over to spain for the afternoon once in a while? ahhh. someday.
we arrived in paris at 7 a.m. freezing (we were dressed for spain, not for france!), sleepy, and disoriented. tamar was taking the train that night to the netherlands to meet her cousins and fly home from amsterdam-schiphol, but marit and i were staying the night at a hostel in montmartre before flying home out of cdg the next morning, so all 3 of us made the early-morning trek to our hostel, where we stashed our luggage and abused the breakfast/wifi privileges.
tamar packed and retrieved her other suitcase from a family friend's apartment where she'd stored it these 2 weeks, and in the meantime marit and i took a walk along the seine, exploring l'île de la cité, talking our way into getting free admission to la conciergerie, the prison in which marie antoinette was jailed, and viewing the outside of la sainte-chappelle. then we met back up with tamar and headed out on a quest for hot chocolate at angelina on rue de rivoli. we took to go (not tryna pay an extra 7 euros to sit in the tearoom, no matter how cute it was) and drank it in the jardin des tuileries.
such a lovely, parisian afternoon. we were happy with ourselves for making use of this last day. tamar was pleased to be back in paris, where she'd spent the springtime studying french, and it was also really satisfying for marit and me to feel at home in paris. at this point, we both felt like we knew the city well and didn't feel that crippling pressure to see everything, do everything; instead, we felt comfortable, familiar with the city.
in late afternoon, we dropped off tamar at the train station. saying goodbye was tough. although tamar and i had only known each other in person for two weeks, it felt like an eternity! there's nothing like traveling with someone to cement a bond, and it felt like we'd known each other for ages.
our hostel was just around the corner from sacré-coeur, so marit and i felt compelled to visit. i had never spent much time in montmartre before, so i was excited to visit the sacré-coeur for the first time.
it was phenomenal. being inside of the church felt like stepping out of time. definitely a special space.
afterwards, we enjoyed the view from the top of the hill, took the very last selfie of the gap year (!!!!), wandered around the quartier, and bought some groceries for a late dinner at the hostel before packing up and getting to bed early because we're #responsible #teens.
there couldn't be a better dernier jour than one spent having hot chocolate in the park and wandering around montmartre. it was after getting home from paris just over a year prior to this that i knew i absolutely had to do everything possible to make this gap year happen. that i got to spend the very last day of the year here felt like some kind of cosmic manifestation of my gratitude.
it all worked out. it all worked out. it all worked out.
x
M
p.s. how fitting it is that i'm finally getting around to posting about this.... on bastille day!
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