I think it has actually already been a few weeks in my head since I left for France--the past two days were quite the travel marathon, but I made it to the dig house safe and sound, installed myself in my tent, and am already hard at work and having a fantastic time.
The flight from Paris to Boston was completely uneventful, though incredible long, and for some reason my knees ached like hell for the entire flight. From Paris, I had a connecting flight to Bordeaux, which I alllmost missed. But didn't. So that's good. Then I caught a bus to the Bordeaux train station, and thanks to a very amiable bus driver with a remarkable curled moustache (handlebars! but not waxed or anything; I'm not quite sure how he trained his facial hair), I made it to the Bordeaux train station, had a sandwich and a beer, and caught the bus to Sarlat. From there, I got picked up by one of the dig directors and we drove the five minutes to the town of Carsac, where the dig house is.
This part of France is incredibly beautiful. All of the buildings are made from the local limestone, which is a rich buttery yellow, and glows ochre in the sun. All that limestone comes from the cliffs that crop up everywhere--and in most of the cliffs, there are caves--hence the hotbed of Neanderthal activity. The field where I pitched my tent is full of wild mint and dandelion greens, so it smells fantastic whenever anyone walks across it. The house that contains the lab, bathrooms, and dig director bedrooms (and encompasses our eating space) is that same yellow limestone, and has a fig tree and an apple tree..and tons of nettles, which had to be dealt with today, among the rest of the hours and hours of chores that we did.
It was fun, though. A local dog named Gary (!), a big, floppy black-lab-hound type fella came over to play for a lot of the day. I think he lives across the street, and he kept showing up to play fetch with his squeaky hedgehog toy. So I raked, cut, swept, fixed, wiped, tidied, and lots of other things...and ate bread and cheese and sausage, and drank wine and Orangina and beer, and this is already a fantastic month. The other students here are all very nice, and we're all getting along quite well so far. There are even a couple of guitars for me to play, so I'm a happy camper. Literally.
Only a couple of people went to the dig site today since there was so much work to be done on the house--I hope to be able to spend time digging soon, though.
I've already taken a few pictures--I'll post those as soon as I can, and talk more about the dig house, the dig and the people--but it's almost dinner time and I'm on a borrowed computer, so this is all I can manage for now.
sausageeeeeeee
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