22.08.2011
Monday morning and off I went to Paris! In Paris I had to change train station and therefore decided to leave all my stuff and explore a close part of the city. So, I took an afternoon stroll around Sacre Coeur and Montmartre, ate my lunch, enjoyed the view over the city, tasted French laisser faire... good times!
@ Sacre Coeur
city view including Eiffel Tower
at train station
Later, I caught the train to Beauvais where I was met by a local student who gave me a ride to their university campus LaSalle. At the campus, slowly the other students from abroad (one guy from Ukraine, two girls from Hungary and one guy from Geneva, Switzerland) arrived and we all got to know each other during dinner. The French themselves were around 10 people.
23.08.2011
In the morning, the represented student chapters presented themselves whereas in the afternoon different invited speakers taught various subjects. It was interesting to exchange experiences with students from all over Europe. And naturally, the talks were very interesting!
Later, we chatted over a beer and dinner.
Later, we chatted over a beer and dinner.
24.08.2011
Excursion day 1! We left the campus around 6am and drove to the area of Limousing in central France. The region is hilly and very pretty with lots of forest and small villages!
We ate some lunch in front of a church before we went off to our first outcrop! The outcrop used to be a rare metal pegmatite mine and now pretty much looks like a small cave. Because it's a cave, one gets a really nice understanding of the 3D geometric relations and the features of the pegmatites were amazing! Zoning on different levels, nice minerals...
Bushbasing thru thorny vegetation on the way to the old mine site
graphitic intergrowth
muscovite testacé
The second outcrop was another similar old mine site with same impressive mineralization!
entry to cave...
stunningly zone f-spars!
After these two visits, we drove to a small villages where we stayed the night. Chilling out, chatting. For dinner, we drove to a fancy restaurant place where we were served some French food including some weird duck stuff, red meat...;)
hanging out a place where we stayed the night
Sauvignac downtown;)
25.08.2011
Second day of excursion!
We visited another rare metal pegmatite. This time it was enriched in Li and we saw some extraordinary pelite singly Xstals! (No photos of that unfortunately...)
Mushroom in Li-pegmatite old mine site
After we visited a rare metal rhyolite, we had to drive back to Beauvais. This meant another 6 hours drive arriving at Beauvais around 11pm.
This was the end of the field trip and we had a jolly good last night together with all the participants of the conference!
This was the end of the field trip and we had a jolly good last night together with all the participants of the conference!
26.08.2011
In the morning, we drove into Paris together and we then split up. My train left from Gare du Lyon later during day. Hence, I dropped my luggage there and went for a stroll: Jardins des Plants (lovely!), Université de Pierre et Marie Curie (closed mineral exhibition), l'institute du monde arabe (favorite building in Paris!), Centre de George Pompidou and Tinguely/Niki de Saint Phalle well (to have lunch at the usual place;)), shopping a bit, taking metro back to Gare du Lyon.
flowers in that garden
gotta love that Jean Nouvel!
Tinguely and Niki de Saint Phalle creations in front of Centre de George Pompidou
The time passed fast and it soon was time to leave Paris behind and head back home to Zurich.
Great week! Intersting conference! Aweseome company! Brilliant organization! Nice rocks!
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