Yell for Cadel!

To everyone who reads this I'm really sorry it's been over a week since I've done anything on this, it's just been so jam packed I'm sorry. Since I last wrote something a lot has happened, i've raced in marseille, I've made a really good friend in the Danish girl just because we have so much in common, I've had my birthday, sweet 16 in France, it's snowed on the peaks, I've ridden the Galiber and I'm not sure if you know the climb but in about 30mins I'm going to go a ride the Grannon (last ridden in the tour around 1994), It's said to be the hardest ride in this area (topping Alpe D'huez and Galiber) so I'm goign to go and try and put a good time down, I've made a lot of new friends, and I currently have the best 50m Freestyle time for the moment (sayign more about the dismal efforts of kids at the schoolr ather than my ability). I'm going to write 3 blogs and this first one will cover last week plus Galiber the second will cover Marseille and the third will cover the past 3 days.

The picture is of my school and the front gate, what a view though ey.





Almost the first writing on the road of the Galiber is "Yell for Cadel!"



I can't remember but I went for a 70 km ride in which i did 2 cols an HC and one which i'm not sure wether it was a 2 or 1, remi said 1 but i don't believe him. I went up to something like 2640ms high and when the last kilometre is at 12% it's hard to tell wether it's the alititude or it's just because your wrecked but you really can't breath. I'm not sure of my time but i wasn't overtaken on the way up so it's all good :)


Galiber is amazing, you watch the tour on the TV and it sorta doesn't look real, super humans do super human things in a world were the fans are crazy and the writing on the road just looks amazing, but when you ride galiber, it's so much more real. The writing is just crazy some of it's smudged or has run because of the rain but a lot of it's so clear it's amzing there still Armstrong/Basso comments and Ullrich comments it's awesome. Some writings been written over cause theres just no more space. The climb hurts, it slowly gets steeper and steeper, it zig zags a bit but more or less it jsut goes accross the mountain. The vegetation is pretty low and theres no shelter from the sun. It was a hot day when i did it and i cooked pretty bad on the way up, got a good tan line out of it though. At the time I was going up a Motor bike club was coming down, they just kept coming, it was sorta annoying but i just kept going so it worked out ok. The last Km was awful, I finished with an attempt at a sprint, didn't really come off well but it was still good fun.

The first week and a half of schools been fun, my class is pretty good if not a little weird, everyones really accommadating, and slowly i'm starting to have better conversions with them, the girls are cooler than the guys, the guys in my class sorta don't want to know me but i think it's because I hang out with the guys in the year level above, they're cool I ride with them, go to the gym watch soccer games, watch ice hockey games, run with them it's pretty cool it's a really social town it's awesome. English is starting to become boring because I'm not aloud to do anything sometime I get to read a paragraph or give the class a synomyn
(evidently I'm not aloud to teach them how to spell) and that's nice but it's rare. I'm getting by ok in class except when the teacher starts dictating then a classmate will photocopy their notes for me so it works out well.

For now I have to go got to ride then I'm running to the gym working out then running home, running here is hard as, a lot harder than cycling here, I've finally been able to run 5kms here with only one rest but I just cant breath I mean at home I can run 7kms on a beach with no stops but here it's just ridiculous. Anyway I will try and get at least another blog off tonight, the Marseille one hopefully, I've uploaded photos of Marseille race and Cassis to Uni however I'm having trouble uploading the pictures of Marseille itself but it'll happen soon.

Ciao for now
Cal

First 3 days at school

This Photo is what I see when i stand at the urinal at the toilets near the cantine :)

Well I've been putting off writing this blog because it's going to be long and I haven't had the time, but the longer I put it off the more I have to write about. Since my last blog I've made so many new friends I've lost track, I've been kissed on the cheek so many times it's ridiculous, I've had 3 days of school, got lost in Briancon for about 2 hours and ended up walking home (which was partially good as I got to see a lot of the countryside) and I've destroyed the english class :) Except we've started phonetics, it's bizzarre. i don't really understand it and the teacher keeps speaking with a weird accent, some words sound American, some English and some Irish, even a bit of New Zealander. Anwayz we'll do this in chronological order;

First day (Wednesday):

Wednesdays are a shorter day. They start at 8 and finish at 11, but I'm trying to get out of Italien so that would mean I would start at 9 and finish at 11. I'm learning italien in Francais, it's so weird, I have no clue wether they're speaking Italien or Francais and they're a lot better than me in Italien than I am in Francais. Anway we also had Francais, that's fun I have no idea whats going on but I'm pretty sure they were talking about different types of literacy. My francais teacher doesn't speak english so it's going to be a fun first month or so. Then we had my favourite subject Anglais :) My teacher is cool though he can't understand what I'm saying because of my accent. I have two different types of Anglais teachers; an Anglais prof and an Anglais Specialte Prof. Specialte is like an extension class so we do a lot of talking and tryign to perfect pronunciation I ahd great fun making the class say words with 'H's in them or with 'TH' sounds because they cant do it Thumb becomes umb and Hate beomes ate its hilarious, they laugh along with me and make me say weird things, I made them try and say She sells sea shells by the sea shore. It was funny except i had to say a French tongue twister which ended with the class in fits of laughter including the teacher. Then I had to wait an hour for Marie who had a class before lunch while i had a free, I just played cards with a girl from my class called Joy, you don't need language to play cards :) I've got a lot of girls in my class actually, it's very different from Melbourne High, today (Friday) I was sitting next to a girl called solane and it was so odd, I had to check myself, I mean I was in France, speaking French (Well trying to at least) sitting in a class with girls and copying off a stunningly good looking girl. It was amazing! Lol but na all the kids in the class are accomedating, the guys are a little weird and I tend to hang out with the older guys because they're more into sport and stuff but everyone is really cool.

2nd Day (Thursday):

I Was looking forward to school for the first time in a long time. School here is great because you get to chat with new people and meet new people, c'est bon. The classes were the same except today I also had Histoire and Maths. By the way maths sucks in any language. Na actually it wasn't too bad I had no clue what we had to do but once someone translated it was easy as, we had done it at MHS about 5 weeks before. Histoire was hard, the teacher was dictating and I could only pick up a few things and by the time I had understood then translated a sentence she was already 4 sentences further on. But it was ok I copied off the girl sitting next to me and then translated it during a free period. Thursday was my first day having lunch in the cantine. Its very american. You get your tray and pick up your food then sit in your groups of friends. I met even more new people and Marie wasn't there because she had a 4 hour break in the middle of the day so she went home. I had lunch with a few of her friends and their friends. It was fun, hot food is amazing! and the food was actually pretty good, the kids I hung out with were funny turnign their nose up and stuff that I thought was amazing compared to when I make my lunchbox (credit must go to mum who does make amazing lunchboxes) and it consists of a Vegemite sandwhich and a piece of fruit for lunch. We're have carbonara and sausages next week lol. By the way just to give you an idea of my time table Lundi: 7h Mardi: 4h Mercredi: 1/2/3h Jeudi: 6/7h Vendredi: 4/5h. Some weeks I don't have certain classes so it all depends on wether we're doing week A or B and I'm tryign to get otu of Italien which is 2h per week.

3rd Day (Friday(Today)):

I've just realised how long this is and I'm sorry, it'll be over soon. Today was long and tiring. Nothing much new happened at school today. I'm starting to become decent friends with some of the kids in my class which is nice, plus me and Lise (The danish foreign exchange student) are pretty close jsut because we have stuff in common. At school we only speak French to each other but we had a free today and we gave up and just layed in the grass chatting in English, it was nice to finally have a decent conversation. Anyway after school i tried to get back home by public transport, it did not work, I got so lost and ended up walking home which took 40 mins and I was 2h later than what I would ahve been had I got it right. Remi and Michelle were ok about it, while they were worried (especially Michelle) they knew eventually I would find my way home (It's not big enough to get lost). And people here are nice so they will help me, which they did. They figured it was a good lesson. I felt guilty but at least I now know what to do.

Anwyayz I'm wrecked and I have to get up in the morning to go for a group ride up the col du galiber. I apologise for all my spelling errors, i'm very tired. If you have any questions don't hesiatate to e-mail thefryer_99@hotmail.com (by the way its an _ between fryer and 99)

Ciao for now

Grenoble

First off here's three more photos from tuesday's ride and 2 of Alpe D'Huez

It may look like I'm not wearing a helmet but this climb was closed off to cars for the day and we were going at about 15kmsph and I put it back on after the steep part (3km) and I definetly had it on for the descent.

Now I've had to big days so I'll split them into two different blogs the first is I met my host mother yesterday. Me and Remi after school drove down to Grenoble and picked her up from the train station. I saw some amazing sights like water falls and glaciers. These glaciers have been there all summer and apparently you can go summer skiing on it. They're blue and they just look crazy. When we go on rides we stop in little towns to fill up waterbottles from these wells, the water in them is clean and comes from the glaciers in the mountains. It's the best water I've ever tasted it's fresh and a little sweet.

Anyway we drove down through the mountains and I noticed a sign pointing to Alpe D'huez turns out we drove right past it's base. We were running a little early so Remi took a little detour and we drove the first 3km of Alpe D'huez. It's crazy. It is absolutely amazing. I saw the corners with the numbers on them and people who have won the stage that has finished on top. The turns are fairly easy maybe 2% but then it just kicks up ridioulously it's amazing and there's writing all over the roads. People supporting Andy Schleck and CSC were out in force this year. Anyway I'll be riding it in a week before the snow sets in. :)

Grenoble is just like any other town its about the size of Bendigo but theres a lot of cafes. It wasn't a nice day when we were there but it was still cool seeing it. We met Michelle at the train station and she's really nice. Her english isn't as good as Remi's or Marie's so I enjoy speaking to her becuase I have to speak French I can't revert to English. She's fun and very motherly we did a wash before she came and the lothes were out drying I checked them when we got home and they were still dry. About an hour later a neat pile of my folded clothes were sitting on my desk, I couldn't believe it they must have dried about 2 minutes before I felt bad but she was fine with doing it and she'd done everyones at the same time. I've really lucked out with my Family, they're all really cool and I hope one day I can show them around Australia.

Anywayz Ciao for now

Second Day

Don't worry my posts will calm down after the first week it's just theres so much happening atm.

Today I went for a three hour ride which included a hors categorie climb of 12kms at an avg of 8% with about 2 kms of 2/3% in the middle so its a nuts climb, those of you that are cyclists will understand that those of you who arn't all you need to know is it hurts. It was a great ride and I got to really mash ont he peddles up the hill giving a motor bike a startle around a corner. It passed me and then slowed for the corner so I went around it. Then coming home there was a 3 km stretch of ride slightly downhill and dead flat so I gunned it and Remi sat on the back we flew. It was amazing countryside and probably the best training roads I've ever seen. It was like a postcard.

The Photo to the left is of me at the top of the climb, it's a deadend with a spectacular view behind me, just about everywhere I look it looks like that.

After that i went into the town with Marie and we met up with various people, some I knew some I didn't. It was fun I hung out with the local gym junkies, they were cool and we got ice cream and I kept getting pulled away by other groups of people to walk around with them I lsot Marie more than once but it was cool everyones so relaxed here and everyone knows everyone. I reckon i hung out with just about half the town this arvo. It was fun just relaxing and chilling with kids my age. I got burnt to a crisp though I'm so gone it's ridicoulus. Because the air is really thin here it's easier to get burnt i guess.

Anyway first day of french school tomorrow i'm shit nervous, merde. It'll be good fun though. Toddy left today I hope he gets to Renne ok.

Anwyayz Ciao

My First day!

This was my first full day and it was crazy. I met so many new people and got so many kisses on the cheek it's very odd but the girls here are classy and good looking so it's all good :P. The first thign that struck me about French people is that they're all classy and almost none are overweight with an extradonairy number of good looking girls and they're all outrageous.

The photo to the left is of me on ym first ride in France, the alititude killed me we went up 1600m and tomorrow we will go up 2100 but yeh there is a glacier in the background and summer has just ended.

First off my family;

Marie (Host Sister): She is funny, out there, likes to joke and is at this moment attempting to marry me off to a nice Danish girl who is also an exchange student living in briancon. Shes taller than me and bigger. She has taken on the role of older sister pretty quickly. Shes great and is very good at english except she refuses to speak it to unless she needs me to explain soemthing about the language or how to pronounce an english word. Shes a very classy cat.

Remi (Host Father): He's a good guy, it's that simple he's awesome, much like my own dad, always wanting me to learn and making me say words over and over again untill I get them right, he's smart and I heard him talking in english on the phone making a business deal and I pity the dutch dude on the other end. I think the dutch guy just gave in in the end. He's smart and patient and relaxed. He will be a lot of fun.

The House: It's quaint, cute and cosy. It's all wooden but it's nice, it reminds me of a ski lodge. i has a deck and a small backyard which is on the side. The family owns two cars one of which i gather is Marie's as it is a baby blue volkswagen buggy.

My first day started with me sleeping untill 11.30 adn then remi and I went for a small ride. Just 30kms but we still had a total of 300ms of elavation in total, remi is ok but he grinds so that goes against him up the hills. The when we got back some of Marie's friends and some how gotten into the house and were packing the fridge with pizza's and ice cream for that night, turned out we were havign a small party in my honour :). As one of the girls described latter that night I was the princess of the night (one of the girls stuffed her english up so for the rest of the night I became a princess).

That night about 10 of us sat on the patteo and ate pizza and chatted, well they chatted I just looked confused. We eventually got a system working with my french and their english we got by and it was a very enjoyable evening. Marie's friends are all great. They all smoke which was a bit odd but apparently its the norm here, no one offered me a ciggy and they all respected the fact that I didn't smoke which was very cool of them. For some reason their smoke didn't affect me and it wasn't too bad.

That night I went to bed absolutely wrecked.

as always photos are on Facebook

Ciao

On arrival

Well I got to France without any difficulties. We flew into KL and spent about an hour there and we met up with some other exchange students who were French coming back from Sydney. They were funny and we had a laugh with them, they're English was very good. Then we spent about 10 or 11 boring hours cramped in a plane. i tried to sleep as it was about 4 in the morning in Aus but the stupid stewardess lady kept waking me up every hour to offer me food which I didn't even want.

The photo to the left is of our row from KL to Paris In Order from Left to Right we have; Roman (French kid, he was really nice) Emi (Sydney girl who was way too excited) Jorja (Who despite her looks isn't emo and is actually really cool just got unlucky with her natural hair colour) and Karlee (A country bumpkin from near Warnabool, she was awesome and a little quiet)

We got to Paris and I had this Sydney girl sitting next to me getting very excited I think she'd drunk one to many caffeine drinks on the plane and she was going off, it got annoying but it was also slightly contagious. We got out of the plane and then we hit customs. We had a group of 4 of which two had Aus passports and 2 had EU passports. Because it was the last day of the holidays for the french the EU passport lines were packed and the 2 girls on the AUS passports got through quick as while me and the hyped up Sydney girl were stuck in lines. After about 15 mins in the line she hit a major low which I found quite funny and we had some troubles battling the french who seem to have no concept of line cutting and rope jumping, it was bizarre. After 50mins (I'm not kidding it took just under an hour in a hot sweaty line) we finely got out and then realised we Had another struggle, getting our luggage. My bag weighed 30kgs and as i hauled it off the carousel i hit about 5 people who went down like a sack of potatoes, I was so tired and sick of it that I just didn't care, although having said that it was fun competing with them and trying to get the trolley out of the airport was like go karts (I upended at least two other trolleys).

Then we all had to wait as our group of 4 slowly disintegrated as people were whisked off to connecting trains or planes and finally I was the last left. The STS organizer lady took the train with me to Paris and then took me to the big train station (it's massive like imagine Spencer street then triple it and add a shopping centre). She said she'd wait with my baggage and gave me free roam around Paris for an hour and a half. It was amazing, Paris is so beau. I saw Bastille and the river Seine, I nearly fell asleep beside the river, it was a perfect day, sunny and no wind and about 24 degrees.

After that i got on my train and had an uneventfully train trip down through Italy and ending up in OULX (Italy) where Remi (My host Father) and Marie (My Host Sister) met me. The only interesting thing was when the ticket inspector asked me for my ticket he started speaking to me in Italian, so I guess I look more Italian than French. Once Remi and Marie picked me up we drove back to there house and had dinner. I will describe the house, Town and my host family in the next blog.

If you want to look at photos I've uploaded them all onto facebook, if i'm not one of your friends add me and if you don't have facebook then get it.

For now Ciao