Hardelot - Day 2

Today was great!

We got off to a good start with Mrs Pape having to come round and wake all of the children up - after most of us fell asleep immediately last night. After breakfast, we set of to the town of Montreuil and the journey was much faster than yesterday - not a single 'How long?' to be heard!  We are all, however, becoming very good at the game of Pontoon, with most of the coach joining in with the game to pass the time during the journeys!

When we got to the town, we walked right around the ramparts and the teachers were quick to make sure we didn't get too close to the edge! 

All of us on the ramparts

 After, we all decided we wanted to explore a hidden doorway we found (Mia's idea!), we walked to the top of a very steep(and muddy) hill.  Miss Salmon, who before leaving the dormitories told us not to worry about our wellies and chose to wear her UGGs, slipped and slid her way up the hill, and ended up in a puddle of mud herself, with soaking wet feet and very muddy Uggs!  We all decided to paparazzi her, so there are lots of great photos and videos for when we all get back to the UK!
 

The hidden doorway we decided to explore!

Hanging about near the mud!

 
We carried on the walk after Mr Fuller guided Miss Salmon and Elsie out of the mud, and came across lots of doors in the side of the collosal walls.  The boys (mainly Chris and Jake) decided they were to keep the zombies locked away and so proceeded to knock on the doors and run away at full speed!

Chris, exploring the 'zombie' door!

 We then went back to the coach and ate our lunch; soon after that we wandered back into town as we still had time to spare before the next activity. We found a gorgeous water fountain where we bought and wrote our post cards, so hopefully you will receive them soon.

The fountain where we wrote our cards.  The sun even came out for a while!

The church was made ENTIRELY from chocolate!

Eventually, we got on the coach to the chocolate factory - the part of the day we had really all been looking forward to the most! The smell of wonderful Cacao beans being crushed into chocolate made us all go crazy, and want to eat it all up. After a while it started to smell like Marmite though, which was weird! We soon got a tour of the what the Cacao bean is and they gave us a tour of the process of how to mould and make chocolate.

Crazy Jacques showing us how to make a bunny from a mould!

It was a great way to end our Chocolate topic, and we could answer most the questions - the tour guide was very impressed! We then got the guilty pleasure of trying some that we had seen being made (the dark was the  most popular); we entered the gift shop where we tried some Cacao beans (most definitely not as nice raw as when its actual chocolate!) and bought some chocolate (for every one apart from Sean, Erins dad - sorry dad!).  Most of us managed to spend the majority of our money here, so be prepared for some great chocolate-themed gifts! 

When we got back to Hardelot, Mr Fuller took us outside and we got to play in the games room and on the low ropes course.  Miss Salmon took the role of looking after those who just wanted to chill out in their rooms, while Mrs Pape managed to fall asleep!

You will all be relieved to hear that every one of us has had a shower and changed our clothes, so we won't be too smelly when we get home!

Just finishing watching Brave (Mrs Pape's choice!), then off to bed - we know the teachers are hoping for another night like last night!

- Cameron Class & the teachers.

(Today's blog was mainly written by Mia and Erin, with a bit of input from Miss Salmon!)