I love a good challenge and an adventure, so we decided that Wednesday would be my day to get out of Montpellier by myself to visit a neighboring town. There was still plenty to do and see in Montpellier, but I am pretty confident that I'll be back at some point soon and I was up for a change of pace. My research over the previous couple of days made me decide on Nimes. It's only about a half hour away by train and it has some history. Kaitlyn and I had a quick breakfast together then each got ready for our separate days. We said bye and I was off!
I made it to the train station pretty uneventfully. I got there about twenty minutes before my train was set to depart, what I thought would be plenty of time. I went to the ticket machine, got the gist of what it said, and found myself on the payment screen. I inserted my American credit card - nothing. I tried it again - still nothing. I tried a second machine. Then I saw the picture next to the credit card reader was of a credit card with a very prominent chip thing. Damn! No big deal, I still had fifteen minutes and the ticket office was right there. I went in, explained my situation to the guy at the door, and he told me that there is a line and since they only have one English speaker, it may be a while. He gave me a ticket: Q6. I looked up at the thing: R46. I sang the ABCs to myself a couple of times to make sure that the guy gave me a ticket for an entire alphabet away. Yup! He was not the friendliest person in the world so I figured I'd just forget him and try to figure something else out, keeping the ticket in my pocket in case I was still there six months from now and they finally made it to Q6. I found a ticket machine that actually accepted cash! Too bad that the only form of cash acceptable was in coin form and I only had a euro or two, about twenty euros short. At this point, I gave up on that first train and set my eyes on the next one. I'll be honest, at this point, I was close to giving up and just spending another day in Montpellier. Determined not to be defeated though, I walked back to the grocery store in town to try to get some change. I cautiously approached the checkout clerk and asked her if she spoke any English. She shook her head no. I let the guy behind me in line go ahead while I pulled out Kaitlyn's phone, opened the Google Translate app, and explained my situation in a couple of lines. That thing was a life saver! She read the note, smiled (only my second smile of the week from a French woman!), and gave me 20 euros of coins in exchange for my bill. I grabbed a baguette and went back to the train station, bought my ticket, and then miraculously found my train. I found that showing a station employee my ticket and shrugging my shoulders while making a confused face is the international gesture for "I'm an idiot. Where is my train?"
The train ride was short and sweet. We didn't pass any scenery that knocked my socks off, just a couple of small towns, roads, and agriculture. There was a young child sitting behind me talking to his grandfather. I was able to understand a lot of their conversation! I was pretty excited to almost have the understanding of a 2 or 3 year old. The Nimes train station was beautiful, allowing it to fit in well with the rest of the city. The whole city was just amazing. It felt park-like. Everything was very clean and in great shape. Old mixed with new seamlessly, the restorations being done with the utmost respect for the past. The only thing on my to-do list for the day was to see the Arena, which is a smaller version of the Coliseum but in much better shape. I figured a structure like that wouldn't be too hard to find, so I struck off into the city. I definitely had some pep to my step thanks to the excitement of being off on my own far from anyone I know. The Arena was a short five minute walk from the train station. I did the super touristy thing of buying a ticket to do the audio tour. Yes, I'm a nerd, but I really liked it. I learned a lot about the Arena and about Nimes' history. I am incredibly tempted to go back at the start of the summer for the Feria de Nimes, a massive party and festival revolving around bullfighting, which is the primary use of the Arena today. By the time I finished, it was lunchtime to I treated myself to a massive bucket of mussels and fries across the street from the Arena. I topped it off with a couple of beers, enjoying the warmth of the sun and just everything about where I was and what I was doing.
I had four hours or so before my return train so I headed farther into the city, towards the hills on the other side. I came across the Maisson Carree, a super well-preserved Roman temple. They claim in was the best preserved Roman temple in the entire former Roman Empire. Best preserved amphitheater and best preserved temple too?! Whether the people of Nimes are really good at preservation or just hyperbole was beyond me. Either way, they really were in good shape. I continued on down this tree-lined main street with a canal running down the center. It was beautiful. That led to a park full of sculptures and ponds and little old men playing whatever the French call their lawn bowling/bocce ball. There was another old Roman temple tucked away in a back corner, this one in much worse shape. I knew that there was an old Roman lookout tower on top of one of the hills in town so I started hiking up the one next to me. I figured it had to be up there somewhere. Let the sweating begin! I actually didn't have any trouble at all finding it. All of the paths seemed to lead there, and there were signs guiding visitors to something so I figured that was it. That tower has taken some abuse over the years, both from the weather, people, and just time, but I hope it will be around long enough for you guys to get up there and see the view. It was cool imagining it as the Romans saw it, with the Arena and temples in sight and the old Roman highway from Rome to Spain passing just outside the former city walls. From up there, I saw the train station all the way on the other side of town and looked at the time and figured I'd better start moving. I made it with time to spare, allowing me to take a cheesy picture with a bullfighter statue, grab a cup of coffee, and find the old gates to the city.
Finding the proper train involved a lot of tapping on a lot of shoulders, pointing at my ticket, and making that same confused face while shrugging my shoulders. When I did find my train, I dozed off into a nap, only to be woken up by a young French boy singing "I love sexy bodies." I have no idea what song it was but I thought it was hilarious how he was chatting away in French and then in perfect, clear, non-accented English, sang that line. Who knows if he knows what it means.
I got to Montpellier as the sun was disappearing behind the horizon. I had Kaitlyn's phone so we had agreed on a meeting point earlier in the day. And to think people used to meet up all of the time like that! I went straight to O'Carolans, the Irish pub. Her friends Molly and Monica showed up first. They are awesome. Molly is from Canada and Monica is from California. Kaitlyn showed up a few minutes later. We grabbed a beer then decided on an Italian restaurant for dinner. I am convinced that being just a couple hundred miles from Italy made the food that much better. It was delicious. We were enjoying the night so much that we decided to stay in town after dinner, going to one of their favorite bars for a nightcap and some more talking while the girls spied on some bartender they were crushing on. Once their dreamboy left, their interest in the bar waned and we went to another restaurant to grab another drink and some crepes for dessert (more nightcaps!). If I lived in France, I'd probably be three hundred pounds. Finally getting our fill, we started the long walk back to the residences.
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