The next morning ALNOR awoke with a roar and exclaimed “Ughffruuguggg!” Lijah said, “Oh ALNOR you’re awake… How are you doing? How did you sleep last night?” ALNOR grunted a reply, “Not well…” I felt a bit guilty, but I had packing to do! I couldn’t let that poor llama of a man distract me from the impending free breakfast! We slid down the stairs in a fashion that only men running to food can perform and proceeded to ravage the buffet. We drank all 6 different kinds of juice and I got my hand slapped by a large bald man as I tried to grab another croissant. Luckily there was no hot milk seen all morning. After breakfast we jumped aboard a metro and went to the Sants station. At 916am we left Barcelona and eventually Spain in the quake of our quest to France. By 12 noon we were officially in Cebere France being hassled by five policeman asking for passports, by 13:02 we were in Perpignan enjoying the Beautiful vineyards, by 15:14 we were in Montpellier looking out over the blue green sea and the estuaries along the coast of the south of France, by 17:34 (5:34) we were finally in Marseille and able to check our bags and explore.
We decided that in an effort to save some money we would forgo the purchase of a hostel for the night and try our hand at sleeping in the train station so we Locked our bags up and left the station in search of mischief and French people. We walked around the city shrouded by the dark of night and admiring the bustling streets and baroque architecture. In our wanderings we happened upon a mysterious waterfall and a creepy locked park / graveyard behind it. As we turned the corner looking for a way in we saw a massive lit up castle cathedral on the crest of a nearby hill. We were drawn to it like moths to a flame. This must be the infamous Notre Dame du jardin Castle place thingy! We exclaimed, and we began a dead run toward the landmark. It was much farther than it seemed though, so our run soon turned into a jog which turned into a walk and then a crawl and then a nap. Eventually we made it to the top of this super steep hill and were on the giant steps of this majestic palace. The view behind us was breathtaking and we sat on the steps for a good while taking pictures and talking about how we were actually in France, in Marseille. While we were sitting there a man came over to us and I was more than half expecting to be hassled for money. It was a ruff looking Frenchman with a wool sweater and sailor’s coat on. He was toting along a half empty bottle and smoking in a charming manner. As he approached I could see he was also wearing a big French smile and his eyes were full of love and bourbon. He introduced himself as John-Philip and ask where we were from. He told us about his work as a carpenter for boats and that he loved this place at night because it is so peaceful. He was waiting for his girlfriend to come in by train and so he had walked up here to have a drink and a smoke. He was incredibly pleasant and gave us a great picture of the friendly and nonchalant attitude of the French. Its interesting because being in a new country I was kinda paranoid or apprehensive about the French people and this short chat put me at ease. Later we walked up to the gate and I tried to climb it while Lijah pointed out the blatant scattering of security cameras. What would I do without him? After the Castle we explored the city a bit more and eventually returned to the train station to get our checked bags before the station closed. We had planned to sleep in the station and then catch our train to Lyon the next morning but this particular station was completely open to the elements and the elements were cold this night. We toured the whole station looking for a place to bunk down for the night but the whole building was fairly equally cold. We were also a bit worried about the dozens of uniformed military personal with machine guns and muzzled growling dogs. We figured that if we were able to stay the night here we could survive anything. We found some chairs in a corner, put our sleeping pads on them and our feet up on our bags and tried to sleep. We caught a half hour hear and there. I slept a bit more than Elijah did considering I am able to zone out most loud and annoying noises in depth of my slumber. Eventually though we were awoken by a woman walking about and talking to herself. She did not smell very lovely and she spent about 5 straight minutes laughing out loud and talking in French to a poster of a man smiling and giving a thumbs up. She was clearly not all there. So we talked for a while and I discovered a drink called orangina from a vending machine and then we ended up figuring out we had free wifi and talking to the fam online. The train left at about 8am after a long cold night and then we were off to Lyon. We were able to get a few hours sleep on the train but that’s about it.
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