Dude, Where's my Car?

I went to a little city called Valence (Vawh-lawnce) yesterday. It's about an hour and a half southwest of Grenoble by train. So, my friend Patrick from CEA and I left around 8 yesterday for the small, very beautiful city of Valence, but like both of my recent day trips, I'm completely pooped by 3 o'clock.

It is a beautiful place, small canals line the roads, there are two huge public parks that are full of flowers in the spring, and they have gorgeous architecture (which I'm getting really into and I might take my lazy Sunday to learn more about European architecture!). Like this, for example...

It's just a random house, but I decided that it is one of the ugliest, and most interesting, buildings I've ever seen! Also this lovely piece of architecture...

It's called le Maison des Têtes (the House of Heads) because, as you can see, the exterior is covered with carved heads and faces. It dates back about 300 years! This is one of my favorites of the gazebo in the first parc we went to...

There are about 100 more pictures, but let's not get carried away. One of my favorite things about French cities, and I mean every French city, is their storage of cars. Now, I really thought that people just didn't use cars that much and road the tram and the bus like I do, but lots of people have cars. What I didn't realize was that most French cities have parkings garages UNDER the city. Cars just inconspicuously disappear underground. The French don't simply plan there buildings well, they plan the whole city, that's what I call brilliant city-wide architecture. Americans, the cars don't just disappear, the French are just better city-planners.

Mon copain est maintenant en le Royaume-Uni!! He'll be eating crumpets and drinking cider by tonight. Mwwahaha, he's now in my circle of death.