Wednesday, January 9, 2013

Chartres and St. Malo

We arrived at St. Malo yesterday evening, after a long day of church tours. st. Malo is a quaint village filled with small oceanfront hotels, a castle, marinas, and many restaurants and shops. The village was almost completely empty, since the summer is when majority of its visitors stay. The hotel we stayed in, oceana st malo, was amazing and St. Malo was really beautiful even though we only got to see it at night.

We were scheduled to leave early in the morning, so we would not get a chance to see st Malo in the daylight. Due to an unexpected turn of events, we left the hotel a later than planned and the sun began to come out, allowing us to see the beautiful Oceanside scenery.After a few hours on the bus we arrived at Chartres, another quiet French town. We arrived at the cathedral de Chartres for our guided tour. The cathedral was constructed in the early 1200s, and is a gothic style cathedral complete with one of the best known labyrinths in Europe. It has been preserved impressively over the years, and was undergoing maintenance while we were visiting. Most of the stained glass in the church was original, as well as the carvings on the inside and out.  The church was covered in art illustrating everything from the key religious stories to who sponsored the church. In the Middle Ages most could not read, so the religious teachings were displayed in pictures for churchgoers to understand.One of the most notable pieces of this church was the sancta Carisa, a veil that has been carbon dated to the time of Jesus and believed to be worn by the Virgin Mary at the birth of Christ. To this day many Christian pilgrims venture to Chartres to see this famous relic every year.
After the tour of Chartres we had a chance to explore Chartres, grab a bite to eat and shop a little bit.
Tomorrow, we will be visiting the startup company that we will be working with in market entry for the remainder of the MBA project. We are ready to work and looking forward to using our Manhattan College minds to create some innovative solutions for this company.
- Grace Gilmore















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