Told Him I Knew Too Many People in Biarritz; True, Too.

First of all, Biarritz is gorgeous. Secondly, it is a bitch to get to and from London Stansted Airport.

Thursday morning I woke up around 9:00, as I do, ate breakfast, finished up writing a letter to Jacob, and popped into the post office to mail it. Then I finished up packing for France and headed out to the train station to catch the 11:13 train to London Paddington. My flight wasn’t until 6:30 that night, but I had read that it takes quite awhile to get to Stansted, and everyone knows that for international flights you have to get to the airport quite early. So off I went to on the train merrily towards London Paddington. I ought to have been reading for Irish Lit, but instead I took along Betsy and the Great World and began to read that as we rolled towards London. I love my Betsy-Tacy books. Honestly, it’s like opening an old friend to read—and lately I’ve felt in desperate need of old friends.

We got to London Paddington around 1:00 in the afternoon, then I had to navigate my way through the tube system to Liverpool Street, where I switched onto the Stansted Express going to the airport. I managed it all without too much difficulty and around 2:30 we were pulling up to the airport. So, slightly earlier than I had bargained for, but at least I had gotten there without much trouble. Unfortunately Ryanair.com, who has the cheapest flights in the world (before taxes my flights cost me two pence, or four USA cents) doesn’t open their desks until exactly two hours before the flight is scheduled to leave, so I got to sit around the airport for awhile. I got a bag of crisps and a chocolate croissant from Pret-A-Manger, then I settled back into Betsy and the Great World. Betsy, like me, gets homesick (though she gets it much worse than me…usually). I was doing quite well until I got to the line, “‘Life is just too short,’ Betsy wept, ‘to spend a year away from home!’” Then I sort of broke down weeping myself, so I called my mom. We talked for a good twenty minutes, and by then the Ryanair.com desk had opened so I got my boarding pass and went through security. Past security were all the duty free shops and I browsed them for awhile, almost buying a fake-pearl headband, then settled back into my book when Shea called to tell me that she and Margaux were in the airport, just coming through security. We met up, got a little more food at yet another Pret-A-Manger, then headed to the gate. We had a relatively easy flight (I read more Betsy and the Great World and was delighted to rediscover that she spends a few months in Munich. I’m going to Munich for Spring Break and had absolutely no idea what to see there, but now I can be like Betsy!!!), and when we landed it was a warm clear night in the South of France, in the Aquitaine, in Biarritz.

We got a taxi which zoomed us to our hotel (how they go so quickly on such narrow streets I’ll never know), punched in the night code, got up to our rooms, and fell in love with Biarritz. The hotel was somewhat similar to Hotel Patrizia, where I stayed the first few nights in Italy, except cleaner, with slightly softer beds, and an actual shower. I had a single and Shea and Margaux had a double. My room was all light blue with a headboard (if you could call it that) embroidered with anchors. We changed into lighter clothing then headed out into the night. It was only 9:00 PM on a Thursday, but Biarritz was dead. There was no one out. We finally found the center of town where a few brasseries and bars were still open—there were people—but we didn’t go in. We also passed a few discoteques, but again, didn’t go in. Instead, we found the beach. We rounded the corner onto the Grande Plage and my heart just soared. There was a palais which Napoleon had built, all lit up, and—most importantly—a lighthouse! Jacob and I search out lighthouses and all I wanted was him next to me to enjoy this beautiful, beautiful sight. The lighthouse was even a functioning lighthouse, with an extremely bright light flashing in circles. We walked down to the edge of the sand, but only Shea actually went running towards the water. After awhile we simply walked back to the hotel. I watched a little T.V, something with James Blunt (apparently he was performing in Paris, which made me think of the “1973” song, which made me think of this one time that Jacob called me from the car and just held the phone over the speaker when that song was on, just to get it stuck in my head), then I fell asleep pretty much instantaneously.

The next morning we were up by 8:00, because the hotel served breakfast at 8:10. We went down to the little, bright dining room and our hostess (who, it transpired, spoke no English—thank goodness for my meager French!) seated us and brought out warm croissants, baguettes, butter, jam, and the rich, dark, flavorful coffee of Europe. The whole breakfast reminded me of Italy, and of Spain. In Spain we had the best coffee and my mom and I kept getting refills—that was how I felt with this. It almost—ALMOST—made me miss Florence. I noticed later that the hallways of the hotel smelled like Roberta’s house, and even my room smelled like summer in Italy.

It was a bit cloudy and cool that morning, even though weather.com had said it was supposed to be warm and sunny, so we put on pants and I put on my white tunic top, and we headed out to see the Musee de Chocolat, and in general to explore the area (Margaux, on chocolate: “I would eat a chocolate-shaped poop I love it so much. Err… a poop-shaped chocolate…ew.”) We walked forever, just looking at the ocean below us and at the little pretty houses, when we came to a sign that pointed to San Sebastian. Immediately, I wanted to go, because that is where Jake Barnes is in the end of the Sun Also Rises (not to mention in St. Jean de Luz, another close place) but we found out that San Sebastian was forty miles away, and St. Jean de Luz was half an hour by car, and that buses to Spain only ran one way…we were a little confused about that. Anyways, we stayed in Biarritz. The sun had gotten through the clouds and it was beginning to be quite hot, so we went back to the hotel and changed into our “resort wear.” I wore a white skirt, my Juliet shirt, and my grey flats. Then we decided to head over to the Grande Plage for picture taking. We ended up taking about a million pictures on a cliff overlooking the beach, and even some old French guy stopped and tried to talk to us, and took a picture of the three of us. He must have been about sixty-five, he was balding, and he looked slightly like Edgar from Aristocats, but he kept talking to us about going to Copa Cabana Discoteque that night. We declined. Finally he left and we headed down to the beach, where there were more pictures to be had. It was about lunchtime, so we went to a little sandwich food stand by the beach for lunch. I got a croque monsieur, an Orangina, and an apple tart all for 6.50 euro! We took our meals back to the seaside and ate while watching the ocean, and a bunch of Spanish schoolkids who had just arrived. After lunch, we went to Hotel de Palais, which used to be a residence of Napoleon and the Empress Eugenie, then we headed back in the direction of our hotel, and yet a different beach. On the way there we stopped by a little restaurant/patisserie, and I got a chocolate éclair, which of course made me think of eating in Paul’s with Jacob, and the coffee éclair he got. Sigh. The patisserie was fantastic though, and we decided to go back for dinner and eat in, because the restaurant had a lovely view of the ocean.

We spent the next few hours lounging happily on the beach. I continued reading Betsy and the Great World. She was in Venice. It made me slightly miserable. I tried to call Jacob, but my phone wasn’t getting any reception on the beach. Furthermore, the entire area looked like Cinqueterre, which was beautiful, but also slightly heart-string tugging. Still, it was very nice to have Betsy Ray with me on my travels. And goodness, it was nice to be reading on a beach again, and to feel the sand and the sun and smell the salt air.

We left the beach area around 5:30, took more pictures at la Roche de la Vierge, a memorial for the French resistance of World War II, then ran into the old French man again, who again tried to get us to go discotequing (and again we declined). We went back to the hotel to freshen up a bit, then headed back out to Miremont, the restaurant/patisserie. We had a bit of trouble with Margaux trying to order just tap water, but we secured it, and I got a Quiche Lorraine, in honor of Jacob. We spent the evening sitting by the ocean, watching the sky gradually darken, then we decided just to go back to our hotel. We watched the French Top 50 Song Chart (there were some good, some bad), then I feel asleep.

The next morning progressed similarly to the one before, waking early, eating breakfast. Then Shea, Margaux, and I checked out of the hotel and got a taxi to the airport. I had planned to switch from a 7:15 PM flight to the 12:10 PM flight that Shea and Margaux were on, except they wouldn’t let me do that without paying 352 euro, which I wasn’t about to do, so Shea and Margaux went on past security to their flight to London and I was stranded in the airport without recourse—I couldn’t even get my boarding pass until 5:15. I called my parents and began to cry, mostly with homesickness than with anger over the flights, and unhappy at the grim prospect of sitting alone in an airport forever. I cried and cried and begged to get on a plane to New York JFK, then I calmed myself down and walked back to the terminal. Immediately, an English woman came up to me and asked if I was alright, she had seen me talking on the phone. I explained the situation and she said, “Well, I’m just picking up a friend from the airport—her name is Charlee, and we are going for drink in Biarritz if you want to come with us.” So, I did. Kirstie, as her name was, and Charlee, and I went to a brasserie and got wine and spent five hours drinking and talking. They were both incredibly nice—didn’t even let me pay for the drinks when I offered. They had lived in St. Jean de Luz, close to Biarritz, for about a year, but before that they had been friends in London, and had grown up in Bath! It was such a fantastic afternoon that I hadn’t even hoped for hours before; very Sun Also Rises. Kirstie drove me back to the airport at 5:00, and we exchanged e-mail addresses, then I got on my plane and was off to London! Got back (nearly didn’t get back into the country because I didn’t have my letter saying that I was a student; must remember to take that for Spring Break), then trained home to Bath, where I arrived safe and sound at midnight.

"Told him I knew too many people in Biarritz; true, too." ~Lady Brett Ashley