Day Two: French Beaujolais Wine Region

Hey Everyone,

After waking up and having a little sleep in because I missed breakfast I was feeling ready to take on and explore the Chateau. This day we also got to go on our included picnic lunch in the vineyards. The weather was pretty cloudy but that didn't faze us! Sharni and Jess went and picked up our bottles of local wine and picnic basket from downstairs as we got ready. You can always count on Sharni to be responsible, set the alarm and get everything organised!lol I quite liked letting someone else organise me and be prepared as that was usually my job with my friends back home ha She always had everything I didn't remember to bring overseas which was soooo handy ha Jess never got hangovers so she was always up buzzing around and making us laugh with her non stop crazy stories that went on for ages ha I loved her making me laugh and it felt good to listen to some of the silly things she would come out with or get wrong like I did.

There was a map in the picnic blanket that apparently lead us up to the top of the vineyards where lots of the Contiki crew groups went to have their picnics. However, me not being much of a hiker wasn't too keen on the idea and thought I'd rather just sit and relax with our little group. I sussed out what the girls wanted to do and to my surprise they were keen to do the same thing and just find somewhere nice to sit and have our picnic lunch. We looked around the Chateau which had a pool and chairs surrounding the grassed areas. Jess and I carried the picnic basket as we walked along to find a place to sit. We didn't get very far as we were lazy but everywhere was beautiful so we just sat down and started talking. This was the day that the six of us girls (Sharni,Rachael,Tara,Tamara,Jessica and I) became super close.

Jessica and I walking with our picnic basket in the French Wine Region

 

Tamara,Rachael,Me,Sharni,Jessica and Tara at our picnic lunch in the French Vineyards



The day we all became Contiki besties



Me eating my picnic ham and cheese bread roll



On Contiki there was hardly ever wi-fi and if there was it would only take 4 people to get connected and the rest of us would be locked out lol There was no wi-fi on the bus and hardly anyone had international sim cards or phones that could access the internet without being charged over the top data roaming fees. This made the trip so much more sociable and we actually got to know each other better than we ever could have if we had been sitting around having lunch or on the bus with our iphones in hand on facebook!lol I liked that we made our own fun and entertainment purely off doing the most random things and talking crap the whole trip (usually whilst consuming alcohol lol). 

We sat in the French vineyards for ages and really got to know each other whilst eating camembert cheese, bread sticks with ham and salad and they even packed us Mars Bars!We talked about everything from jobs, relationships, friends/family back home, Contiki expectations and the people on our tour. We all basically told our whole life story in a nutshell that day and connected. Makes me sad even writing this as I miss these girls so much already :( We ate and drank our beautiful bottles of wine and by the time we stood up I was already quite drunk lol I decided to get another bottle as did some of the other girls to take back to the girls room and drink. That day in that room we told secrets and stories about out lives that I don't even think some of our closest friends would know about us and I even shed a few drunk tears. It just felt like we could trust each other and this was only the fourth day of the trip. We ended up getting drunk and I was already smoking. As Tamara says (once Karissa's got the smoke in her hand she's in for a big one!) lol

Drinks in the girls room

After drinking bottles of French wine we headed down to dinner with the rest of the Contiki group. We were all so noisy and got some funny looks and smiles as we laughed loudly and made a mess of our food at the table. That was probably the day that Taylor became close with us also. He sat with us at dinner and made us piss ourselves with laughter at everything he did and said!He would definitely have to be one of the funniest people I have ever met and he can make us all laugh without even saying anything. His facial expressions were sooo funny!lol That was also the first time Taylor sang his theme song 'Tay Tay Bootay Tay Tay' theme song (some of you might have seen this on my facebook videos). I also got to see a talented and serious side of Taylor that day at the Chateau when he let me listen to some of the songs he had written and composed al by himself.  

Our drunken dinner (Taylor joining our group)



Couldn't find a spoon so started eating using an ice-cream scoop I think



After chatting for what seemed like hours we decided to go down to the bar and continue drinking. We played drinking games with cards and got rowdy and had so many laughs at people stuffing up the game!My favourite part of the game was when we were playing categories of fruit and Jessica yelled at Tamara to skull when she said Coconut??We all looked at each other and she said 'well coconut isn't a fruit it's a nut!'baaahaaaa We all pissed ourselves laughing!Things got crazy and we ended up on the conversation of being 'turkey slapped' I pretended to demonstrate this using my hand Tamara and accidentally chipped her front tooth with my ring!OMG I felt so bad but all Tamara and I could do was laugh. She still says to me that she will always remember me by looking at her tooth oopppps!

That night I actually made up a dance with Tamara and Jess to Man eater (Nelly Furtado) which we decided was Rachael's theme song because she'd already hooked up a fair bit over the first few days lol Ashleigh and Sally you guys would be so surprised hearing this as I never used to get up and dance with you two because I'm not confident with that kind of thing. Tamara, Jess and I were cracking up at ourselves and dancing like idiots pretending we were in a film clip or something while we made Rach walk into the room and we sang man-eater.I think Hamed still has the video that we didn't know he was recording on his phone actually. I would pay to see that so funny!I also called mum and dad for the first time on the trip after I had tried about 8 times and couldn't get connected. Eventually Hamed showed me how to dial the number using all of the codes and I called home even though it was 3am in the morning Australian time!

I remember mum answering and she sounded so tired!lol I chatted to mum and dad about what I had been up to for so far on the trip and got a little emotional hearing their voices. Something that I still can't seem to shake. Every time I hear their voices or have to say goodbye I either cry or feel like crying. Dad told me no matter what time of the day or night it was in Aus he didn't care as long as he knew I was alright and safe.

Another Contiki bus full of about 50 people came and stayed and partied with us at the Chateau that night too which was fun to meet even more people. Before beginning Contiki I didn't realise that we would see and meet up with several other Contiki buses full of people, sometimes on several occasions. This was yet another cool thing about Contiki that if you are travelling alone you don't get to experience. We went down to the 'Cave' club that night and Jess and I were chucking cartwheels and being crazy until more people started to arrive. I got kisses that night too and Hamed told me that it was 'Contiki' and we established that we were allowed to hook up with other people. I had many talks with Rachael about how not to get jealous about the thought of the person you were keen on hooking up with someone else as she had almost always been single. lol We also had a deep and meaningful alcohol fuelled conversation about how much we loved each other already!ha

Me and Rachael down at the Cave Club in the Chateau

The French Chateau was such a relaxed place to be in a beautiful spot. This stop on the trip is one I will always remember....

Love the drunken Backpacker

xxx