Busy days!

Wow, I had an amazing day yesterday! I decided to walk down the long road at the end of the road I live on, and try to get to the shopping centre (the one with carrefour in it) which is just off that road. On the way, I found a really cheap clothes shop so to fit in better(!) I got a new french outfit. Because it was an intensely hot day, I decided to go to the park at the end of the road instead, and go to the shops on the way back. So I saw the entrance for cars to the centre and carried on walking straight ahead. Then I found what I hope will be one of my favourite restaurants- Nikko. A sushi restaurant! Which does takeaway! There are so many sushi places here, the only other place I've seen as many is London. Just goes to show how contemporary and cosmopolitan it is here! So I got one of their flyers and have been pouring over it to see what I'd like to get first! Because it's not in the centre, its really cheap too, which is always good! Their sushi menus start from 12 euros which includes soup, salad and rice!

So then I found the end of the road and walked along to find the entrance to the park. I nearly had a heart attack when I saw it, huge gold gates which were taller than a building, impressive flower displays surrounding statues, a HUGE turquoise resevoir/lake with ducks and geese running around. Bike hire just outside, which is useful (there's bike hire Velo-V over the whole city, and while you can ride on pavements I'm not much a fan of cycling) but it would be nice to have a cycle around the park at a nice, leisurely pace. For the time being, I decided to just have a casual stroll around the lake (for which you can hire pedal boats) and see how long it took to get round it, while seeing what was in the park. Cordula had told me that there was a free zoo there, which I was curious about, maybe it was a petting zoo or something small like that?

About half way round the lake (with much left to explore still either side of it) I saw a sign pointing towards the zoo. I first saw an area for bees, with an enclosure opposite which contained horses. Then I got to the main zoo entrance and saw a leopard pacing in the distance, giant tortoises next to me, meerkats, porcupines, so much! It was an african zoo (and there was really the weather for it yesterday! In fact, since the thunderstorms on the first couple of days, its been really warm.) Every animal you could think of from the african plains was there, some which I haven't seen for so many years, some which I'm not even sure if I've seen before! There weren't any hippos or rhinos, but it's entirely possible that I missed them, it was so overwhelming! The exhibits were gorgeous aswell, many animals in together; some big cow-type-things with huge horns in with birds and a girrafe, flamingos with pelicans and an island containing monkeys!

I then came across a massive greenhouse, much like the one at kew gardens, and saw a banana plant with bananas on a huge flower-type thing, it was really stunning. There were loads more gardens and flowers around, including a cactus garden and a... pond garden I guess!

Then I walked further and saw a huge enclosure containing deer, and one with about 200 terrapins in it and some goldfish. It confused me, until I saw a sign explaining that they had rescued some of them from the wild, and had done so for other animals that had been released by their owners, such as snakes, spiders and parrots. If you had a terrapin or other such animal that you could no longer care for, it could be brought to the zoo and they would look after it!

So I finished looking around the zoo and then carried on back around the park to where I came in, seeing a rose garden on the way. I walked along the river till I came to a metro station (I found one outside the opera hose, as well as a fabric shop!) and then got the tube to the shopping centre. Where there is a sushi place!

I decided to look round before going to the supermarket, and I was quite hungry so I had a wander till I found somewhere that looked nice. I really wanted a frappuchino, but there was no starbucks so I thought I'd get a milkshake from Mc Donalds or something. Then I found McCafe. Thats right, McDonalds pretending to be starbucks. Still, they do frappuchinos so I wasn't complaining (much, they were expensive! Only cos of the exchange rate though.)

Then I found a shop selling the most gorgeous clothes, which I'll have to visit again when the exchange rate is better! There were stunning coats too, so I might have to treat myself when it gets colder, the only problem will be deciding which one I want!

So then I went to carrefour, got shopping, got tube back to saxe-gambetta where I was supposed to change, but it was packed, so I walked back. It was only one more stop, after all!

This morning was very boring, but I met the manchester people again and we got lunch at my local supermarket and I suggested that we eat it in my kitchen, seeing as it was only 3 minutes away, if that. So they came and checked out my place, while we were eating, a french girl came into the kitchen for her lunch, so we switched to talking in french so as not to be rude. One of the girls, Louise, asked if I wanted to do something tomorrow, so I'm going to have a wander with her and maybe find something new.