from Germany to France

On Tuesday, September 25th, I took a ten-hour train ride from Munich to Marseille. I had a bit of a predicament as my train would not arrive until 9:45 pm and there would be no train out to Narbonne available until the next day. As I hadn't ever been to Marseille and didn't know anyone there, I had two choices: a) sleep in a train station (which is really NOT recommended in Marseille), or b) find my way at night (in a city I don’t know) to a hotel with my GIANT luggage by myself. Neither of these choices sounded that great to me. So, a few weeks ago (when I was still in Texas), I decided to try a third option.

I’ve recently been introduced (by people in my program) to the idea of couchsurfing. Through this method of travel (and the website, www.couchsurfing.org), you, well, couchsurf. The website has a network of people in cities all over the world willing to host surfers, willing to just hang out with new people, or trying to surf themselves. It’s a network built on trust, and there are services such as identity verification, location verification, and references, which you can plainly see on a person’s profile. The idea of staying with someone you’ve never met scares a lot of people, but if you do it the right way and are careful, you can meet a lot of really cool people (who also like to travel). Or so I’ve heard.

I knew I wanted to give couchsurfing a try (I set up a profile in June), but I didn’t think I’d do it so soon. I decided that the best way to go about my Marseille issue was to couchsurf! I put up my “want ad” for a couch for the evening, and I got a lot of offers. I ended up choosing a man, we’ll call him Julien, who has a daughter about my age and had been to Texas. He had all the possible verifications and over 40 positive references from people of all ages, so I decided I felt safest with him.

When I arrived Tuesday night, he welcomed me, helped me with my luggage to my apartment, we shared some tabbouleh to eat and talked a while about my travels in Germany and his recent travels to the States. I then had a bedroom to myself and got a good night's sleep! He gave me the option to sleep in the morning or to take a tour of Marseille by motorcycle before I went to the train station. Guess which option I took?

Like my chubby bunny cheeks?

Motorcycle helmets are obviously NOT my look.*

It was a kind of dreary morning, but I was lucky because it was predicted all week that it would rain that day but it didn't! Here are some picture highlights:

my first look at the Mediterranean :)

Les Goudes, a little fishing village just outside of Marseille

the Île Maire, an island just off the coast

Between the cities of Marseille and Cassis, there are

the Calanques, which are similar to fjords.

Callelongue, a tiny fishing village in a small calanque

(called the "Calanque de Callelongue," love that!)

a little view of Marseille from the gare (train station)

All-in-all, it was a great little visit! We took our tiny tour of the Calanques/fishing villages (he wanted to show me something I wouldn't normally see as a tourist) and stopped to have a coffee (him)/chocolat (me) in a café where he assured me I'd get to hear a native Marseille accent. It was a great first couchsurfing experience - Julien has hosted many, many people from all over and all ages, and he just likes to meet people and share some of his city (he's from Marseille, born and raised). He's a big fan of couchsurfing and is very involved, and he told me some of the "rules" of couchsurfing (such as never, ever to go with someone without lots of references/verification if I go alone). He's already contacted a woman in Perpignan who would love to host me for a weekend. He was very generous and friendly, and I couldn't have gotten from/to the train station without his help. I have no idea how I would have handled my little layover situation without someone friendly to help. I am very thankful to him, and I will definitely be couchsurfing again!

It was also really good to be somewhere where I can use my French! I would also love to go back to Marseille for a day to see the Vieux Port and more of the city; perhaps I'll take a little Marseille/Aix-en-Provence trip sometime during my stay in France!

*Note: I did NOT drive!