Daily Life in Nantes, My Best Friend’s Visit, & Visiting Paris and Switzerland

International’s Women’s Day, International Day of Happiness, the first day of spring…. March sure has been an eventful month so far. The month started off with my best friend’s visit! Lindsey and I met up in Paris with her friend Alli (and now my friend too!), and we had a grand old time playing tourist in one of my favorite cities. Plus I got to experience Lindsey’s first time in Europe with her! It was a quick trip to Paris, but overall very, very fun. I also got to eat my first croissant since I’ve been vegan (aka my first croissant in 5 years) at this amazing vegan bakery in Paris called Cloud Cakes. Despite a bumpy trip back to Nantes, and a major lack of sleep, Paris was a success.

My wonderful companions in Paris. It’s always so inspiring to be around strong and driven women- especially while celebrating International Women’s Day!

Vegan croissant and vegan chocolate peanut butter muffin… so, so delicious!

It was also so much fun to show my best friend around Nantes: to show her French culture and my life here! I love living here so much, and it was so much fun to get to share that! The weather was rainy and cold, which made our trips to get oat milk lattes from Starbucks frequent, but nonetheless it was so much fun to spend the week together.

I will say, however, how strange it can be to mix my life from back home with my life here in Nantes. I also felt this way when my parents visited- and this is in no way a reflection of them, but rather a reflection of some personal changes that I’ve been going through since I’ve moved to France. I love living here so much, and I am planning on coming back here (France) to live indefinitely in the very near future (more updates to come on this). This being said, it has been difficult for me to adjust to these big changes, and to figure out just exactly how to balance my life back home with my life here, especially because I’ve changed so much in these last few months.

My big life changes aside, my daily life in Nantes is superb. Each day usually consists of going to class in the morning, coming home and working on my blog/ doing homework/ planning trips/ tying up loose ends with things back home and at UNO, and then going to spend some time exploring the city or hanging out in one of the beautiful parks here in Nantes before going to the gym, and then coming home to relax or see friends in the evening. It’s a pretty good daily routine, filled with lots of walking, time spent outdoors, creativity, and delicious and healthy vegan food (and coffee, lots of coffee).

Nantes in the Springtime is so beautiful. This photo was taken at the Chateau des Ducs de Bretagne; it’s always so surreal to get to walk by this beautiful castle that casually sits in downtown Nantes.

I stayed in Nantes a lot during the beginning of March, but this past weekend I traveled to Basel, Switzerland with my favorite travel buddy, Stephanie (the main person I’ve taken trips with since I’ve been here!). We had an amazing albeit low-key weekend exploring the sites of Basel which mostly consisted of walking, and sitting, by the beautiful river. We stayed at a very nice hostel as well however were a little sleep deprived due to our very loud, snoring hostel roommates, including one who slept in my bed- forcing me to change beds at 11 PM in the dark. Despite a few interesting guests, we still managed to make some friends in Basel, and thoroughly enjoyed our time in the beautiful Swiss sunshine. Switzerland in springtime was a definite win, overall.

The views in Switzerland were spectacular- we spent a lot of time by the river, and had some fantastic picnics there. Pro tip: grocery shopping in Switzerland is much more affordable than going out to restaurants!

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