Paris - The view from my window

I moved to Paris to take French classes at the Sorbonne.

Velux 5 Oceans starts

La Rochelle - It's been an exciting month watching from my balcony the bustling activity in the Race Village surrounding the trawler port. Today was the culmination of the preparation -- the start of the around the world solo race.

La Rochelle Year 2 - The view from my window

My submission for Andrew Sullivan's feature.

La Rochelle France. 8:45am. Facing northeast. From the 4th floor (American), 3rd floor (France). From the kitchen / living room, having breakfast. The trawler harbor of La Rochelle France with the stern of the French meteorological survey ship France I which is the centerpiece of the Musée Maritime de La Rochelle.

Train Crash

Today I was in a train crash. A German ICE high-speed train from Frankfurt to Paris. A truck had fallen onto the tracks. We were doing 60 mph I believe. Much less than the 180 mph we would be doing later in France. I thought I was going to die but I only sprained my back. Not much more I want to say about it. The photo speaks for itself. A month later I would be feeling fine.

Ice train crashes into garbage truck

 
Raw news footage from YouTube (below). When you see the broken out window, that's where I was sitting. It was car #1 at the front of the train, derailed by the impact and sliced open along its entire length on the side where I was sitting. Interior filming at the 3:54 mark is from my car #1. You can see the path of destruction down the side where I was sitting.

August vacation 2010

During two weeks I added Bergen, Flåm, and Oslo Norge; Stockholm Sverige; Vienna Österreich; and München Deutschland to my travel map of Europe (France travel not included in map). The last day of the trip was a disaster.

Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series

La Rochelle - It was a weekend of extreme sports in La Rochelle. The Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series came to town.

La fin du semestre, la fin de l'année

End of the semester and end of the year. End of Level B1. Here are my classmates and one of my professors. I'm going to miss everyone but I've decided to come back for at least one more semester in September. Some of my classmates will be there too.