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July 24 Coullioure--a tiny French coast town Hey, I'm back again. Really want to get the rest of these blogs done to alleviate the guilt, make more room in my head and clear off my computer desk at home! Sunday morning I got up bright and early at 6am so that I could catch a taxi to the train station bright and early. Really early I guess since I had to wait for over an hour. Better to be early than late though. On the whole trip I never missed a flight, train, etc. . . well until the trip back to Seattle but that is the last blog and you're just going to have to hold your horses and wait for that one! The train ride was fairly uneventful just took long as there was a 1 hour ride to Nimes and then change trains to enjoy the 3 hour ride to Coulliere. As I approached Coullioure by train (one of the very last cities along the French coast just before Spain) I saw a station that was apparently where my hotel was located. Only about 4 minutes away by train. Hmmmm.
Coullioure is a beautiful, small coastal town with a flavor of tourism but it felt like it was more designed for local tourists than anything you would see advertisied in a big full color glossy brochure in some travel agency's office. It's just a charming little town with colorfully painted fishing boats, a castle overlooking the harbor and a lighthouse hailing all sailors to it's port. In case you are wondering why you've never heard of it and wondering how I did. . . well we'll just throw out the Rick Steves name for that one. Glad he did though because it made for a nice stop. Although he COULD have mentioned that pretty much everything tourist-related closes on Sunday. Would've done it a little different. Not that big a deal though. Just didn't have a place to check my luggage. Oh and thank god that 2 minutes after the train arrived I decided to get my train ticket for the next day and clarify where my hotel was. The office closed 2 minutes after I was done with the gal and wouldn't have reopened until the next day. Got there at 12:30p. Discovered my hotel was indeed in the town the prior train stop and a roughly $3 train ticket was a heck of a lot cheaper than a $40-50 cab ride to get there one way. No intra-city buses on Sundays. Oh and there were only 2 trains remaining for the day going back to that town. The town was called Argeles sur Plage. And it was a nice place when I got there.
There was no place to check my luggage in Coullioure. That sucked because if you've diligently read and remembered my prior blogs (have you been taking the regular quizzes to make sure that you thoroughly processed my trip experience?) you would know I can at most carry that bag on my back for an hour (after 45 minutes the eyes do start getting a little watery). France is the only country that I ran into that had restrictions on checking in bags at train stations. You couldn't do it. Thanks to the fun terrorist stuff of days past and present. Thanks guys! So I tried to be tricky and ask if a few local hotels would "watch" my bag for a few bucks but no luck. Some stuff about laws and responsibility. So I trecked the few blocks into the center of the harbor town. Sunday, tourist office is not open. Darn it. Got creative and decided to tour the castle-chateau, which I'd wanted to do anyways, but I could check my bag there for a nice break from carrying it. The castle was cool and had lots of picturesque views that I took advantage of. After the castle I decided to make my tummy happy and put some food in it at a tasty beachside restaurant called the Copacabana. Unfortunately. . . or fortunately. . . Barry Manilow did not make an appearance to serenade me during my salad lunch. The waiter did insist I take the seat with the best view of the beach and I'm glad I did. You can see in the album pics I'm sure! The tuna, rice and crab salad was delicious!
After my relaxing lunch I sauntered 200 feet to a prime sunbathing spot on the beach and parked it for a few hours until I was crispy and brown on both sides. No deep frier oil though as I'm trying to cut back on the calories. Then onto the other edge of the harbor to check out the lighthouse. Pretty stuff I tell you. There were a few sprinkles in the afternoon but the clouds were moving fast enough that it didn't do anything. The day was gorgeious and relaxing and still quite hot in the upper 80's. I do wish I could have explored the town and big wine festival that was going on in a bit more depth but it was all good. When on the beach I was constantly serenaded by live orchestra music that was one block away. Their beautiful music alternated with the odd accordian player who almost nailed some romantic songs as he weaved through dining patrons of the seaside restaurants. After plenty of sun time I chilled at the Cafe Sole to wait for my train to arrive around 6:30p. They are an internet point but only WiFi. Note to self is to bring a blackberry or other small portable computer-like device to type this stuff out while there to save time and entertain myself. Would have come in handy!
Caught the train to Argeles sur Plage which is defintiely the more touristy resort version of Coullioure without all of the colorful boats or lighthouse but has the giant inflatable chicken head on the beach and casino/nightclub. The chicken, I'm sorry, rooster head was the advertisiment for the attached inflatable amusement area for children that didn't look that amusing. The casino/nightclub was just a casino at this time of year but the beach was beautiful, sunset impressive and restaurants full of tasty delicacies. Okay, I had a pizza but it was really, really good! After dinner I wandered down the long beach front to walk out on the giant spit and take photos of the progression of the sunset. Was gorgeous. Then back to the hotel to call it a night after a dip in the pool and a made a few successful phone calls to Kelsey, Carla, Eph and FastMike. Gotta use up those phone cards since they are only good in the country you buy them in. Plus I missed you guys! July 17 The Provence Area--Arles, Avignon and the Pont Du GuardOkay, I´m going to be honest. Outside of Paris and Chamonix, France is just not my favorite country. It is really nice and all, albeit very windy along the coast for the most part, the country and I just didn´t connect like I wanted to. The language probably had a little bit to do with it, or maybe it was just a lull in my many weeks of travel but I haven´t ruled it out as a place for a future vacation. Definitely must go back to Paris sometime. I´ll just say that with a rental car, Provence would be much easier to navigate with a navigator in the passenger seat! Big city to city travel no problem. The rest? Well, there´s a point where you just throw in the towel for sanity´s sake!
So I made it from Montpillier to Marsailles with no problem. Even found the car rental place quite easily. Was a little disappointed that my travel agent had gotten me another mini-van like chariot. Just bigger than I need. This time it was a silver Opel Meriva. And I´m going to be honest. My travel agent did not do her research for me on this one. She arranged a 3 day rental (the minimum) for me to pick the car up in Marsailles and drop it off in Arles where I was staying. Problem? The rental place in Arles was not open on my third day of the car rental. Oh, so only a two day rental now. I tried to be cheery about that and you know me, I´m a total positive optimist. So my very expensive rental was now for 2/3 of the original deal plus I had a $50 location drop off charge added to the pricey rental to start. The Rick Steve´s people and the travel agent insisted this was the best thing to do in Provence--rent a car. I´ll just drop the bomb now that when I got to Arles and made sure I knew where the drop off place was and to confirm the hours (open until 8p in the paperwork) for dropoff. Oh no! The sign in the local rental place says it closes at 4p. Yikes, that really cuts 1 of the days short. I confirm inside and the lady says the sign is wrong and I need to have the car back by 2p. Great. Okay, I better get all the driving I can out of this vehicle!
When I picked up the car in Marsailles I decided to take about an hour to explore the city and at least drive to the top of the hill in the town where there is a beautiful church. After 20 minutes of going in all kinds of crazy directions that didn't seem to get me to where I wanted to go I decided to abandon the idea of exploring Marsailles. No problem, the signs for the highway were obvious. I did enjoy the hour and a half drive to Arles. The countryside is pretty and looks just like what you probably have pictured in your head--lush, green rolling hills and, as Elizabeth would put it, Asparagus trees dotting the landscape. I made it into the city without a problem and realized I had completely forgot to find out where exactly my hotel was. I drove into the center of the city and happily found the tourist information place right away and a convenient parking garage next door. The lady inside gave me directions on the free map and I was on my way. Thank goodness I had a rental car or this would have been a terrible hotel spot. They claimed to be right in the center of Arles. Well that isn't quite true. . . they are a 10 minute drive from the main part of Arles where the action is. Wasn't a problem for me though with my handy-dandy, soccer-mom van-o-mobile. I did take some time to explore the center of Arles and take some pictures but planned on a more thorough visit later in my stay. It rained off an on quite heavily and there were constantly threatening clouds hovering above so I didn't feel too adventurous.
I made it to my hotel no problem and set out to find some dinner. Food in this area (Provence, not just Arles) is a real problem. They weren't kidding when the guide book said that the restaurants are only open for two time periods. Lunch is noon to 2:30 and dinner is 7 to 9:30. No exceptions. I mean no exceptions. I stopped at a grocery store to get a snack as my hunger did not fit the restaurant time frame. There are no little cafe's or anything to fill in the gaps. You are either hungry in those windows or you will go hungry. After my snack I set out to explore a little but there was nothing open. Became like a ghost town. Very weird. So that night I spent most of the night calling my friends and family back home. Found out my mom decided to retire (finally!) and caught up with all kinds of happenings in the racing and social world I'd been missing. I do have to share with you how I explained the toilets to my good friend Kristi Brown though. . .
I had just shared with her that after going to the tourist office to find out where my hotel was I went to the public bathroom, a free one, to take care of my business. This particular toilet was a squatter (at least that is what I call this type). There are 2 foot wells and a hole in the middle. Squat and go. Well I won't go into a lot of detail but it takes me a little longer than the average person apparently to use this particular type of facility. Didn't know that I was slower but quickly found out when all of a sudden (while I was still going) there was a giant wave of water that came towards me from the front door of the toilet washing the floor. Picture a little individual outhouse, not stalls. That really caught me by suprise and I had just enough warning to make sure my pants didn't get wet. Then I realized that as the floor tidal wave was coming at me from the front, there was also a wall of water pouring down along the back wall. Inches from me. Thank god I didn't lean all the way back or I would have been very embarrassed walking out of that public water closet. I think they mean WC/water closet literally with that place! It was a very efficient cleaning process, just wish they had a warning sign up. Note to any traveler. . . make sure to always bring your own t.p.! So far I've always been prepared and it has paid off handsomely.
So that story got me to telling Kristi that I have never in my life encountered so many different types of toilets and different ways of flushing them in my life. I swear to god that no two are alike. Really, I'm not just being dramatic. Every flushing mechanism is different. Pull this, push that, twist to the right, step on the pedal. I should have kept track of all of the different ones because I must have had to flush about 150 different ways so far. Crazy! So my hypothesis on all of this variety is this. I believe that about 70 years ago they had a giant contest in Europe. They were bored with the way toilets worked and decided to have a giant contest open to the public to see who could come up with a different, perhaps better, way of flushing toilets. There must have been thousands of submissions as this was obviously a very fascinating contest. In the end, they could not decide on a winner of the new method of flushing toilets so instead they decided to incorporate nearly all of the ideas. As buildings were constructed and toilets replaced over time, Europeans used a lottery system and were required to draw a toilet flushing system from a large hat to find out which kind they would get. It is the only explanation I have to explain the variety. So I believe this to be the truth until I learn otherwise. We Americans must be either really efficient and organized having all of ours flush the same way. . . or really stupid in that manufacturers figure we can only comprehend about 3 different flushing mechanism styles.
Friday morning I woke up bright and early to a very promising day with cheery sunshine and fluffy white clouds. I went to take care of some business at the post office first--mailed two shoe-box sized packages home for about 33 Euro each ($43 USD) to my folk's house. Afterwards I drove the 30-40 minute drive to the Pont du Gard which is the giant aquaduct with a stellar view. It was a beautiful place with an engineering marvel to admire. If I remember correctly the water flows from it's source about 30 km to the center of the city with the entire channel for the water at a gentle and very consistent 1/2 a degree slope the entire length. Something like 150 gallons per minute flowed through it until about 40 years ago. The aquaduct is the largest section that is above ground crossing a large river span. The rest of it is almost entirely underground. Got some great pictures, wandered around and hiked a bit then grabbed lunch at the cafeteria before heading out. The rest of the day I spent exploring Arle's mini-colosseum, buildings, doing the Van Gogh view walk and shopping in stores. Window shopping really except for a great "bargain" jewelry store where I really had some fun! My timing didn't match the restaurant line-up very well so I grabbed some dinner at the grocery store and headed back to the hotel to eat and talked to lots of people. I fell asleep around 11p I would imagine and woke with the television on around 12:30a to discover that it is quite common to find free porn on after midnight. What a charming place!
Saturday I was determined to get as much as I could out of my car ( I had found out about the car rental return time too late in the afternoon on Friday to have rearranged my plans!). So I headed out by 7am to drive north about 45 minutes to an hour and do Rick Steves' recommended wine route. It is supposed to be beautiful country driving through small mountains visiting about 5 or 6 wineries in a loop around the mountains. His directions are to hop from little local road to little local road lacing together a lovely day of driving. I'm sure in the real world if you have a navigator in your car it is a purely marvelous experience. However if it is just you and your mini-van trying to drive, read French and navigate a map that does not display 90% of the little country roads in the other paperwork you are juggling. . . . well you get discouraged after an hour or two and give up! That just meant that I would have more time to spend in Avignon.
Avignon was a perfect little town with its fortified city walls, Papal Palace and famous bridge. The views were picture-perfect and nothing felt hurried or overly touristic although it was definitely a tourist town. I toured the palace, the bridge, walked to the pond with a view, the public gardens and lots of shops. In the end I bought a postcard or two and an idealized watercolor painting from a local artist that I fell in love with. A worthwhile stop--a must see for anyone in the area. After that I headed back to Arles to drop off my car, buy my trian ticket to Coulliere for Sunday and enjoy some local cuisine for dinner. Dinner was some perfect local wine, a tomato and mozzarella salad (caprese) and ravioli provencale. Delicious! I must recall for you the woman that I wrote about in my notes who was also dining at the restaurant. Hate to sound judgemental but I must pull a fashion police badge on this one people. So this woman of about 65 years is sitting a table away from me with her similarly ackwardly-dressed partner as they pour through some travel maps. She was wearing an outfit that I can confidently say none of the designing particpants ever imagined as a potential outfit combination. Do I start at the top or bottom? Atop her head sat a white Annie Hall/Diane Keaton knit cap turned up in the front sans the flower in the front, below that was a rocker-chick junior high black t-shirt with cut butterfly sleeves. The sleeves would have preffered to exist on a snazzy hypercolor shirt from the 80's. Not to be outdone by the sleeves, the front of this top boasted a very large glitter rose across the bust. Rounding out the bottom portion was a very tribal black and white African-Queen print mid-calf-skirt. In an effort to still appear practical I will say that her khaki-ammo green colored hard core hiking Teva-style sandals with yellow socks did the trick. Her other half did make an effort but did not take the first place trophy with his Mr. Rogers rainbow pullover cardigan over a faded striped casual button-up. His brown cords did match his brown hush puppies perfectly so I must give him props for that. Now after gleefully dissecting other people's clothing choices I must beg and pray you do not scrutinize any of my outfits in the pictures. I did throw the first stone!
Oh one last note before I end Provence and the car adventures. . . the music on the radio was great. Loved 96.8 the FUN station with their C89.5 music mix of great French house and techno as well as SKYROCK that bills themselves as a hip-hop/rap station without apparently knowing exactly what that means. Think mix between WARM 106.9 and KLSY. Love hearing more country-specific stuff and it least I got a decent amount here. June 21 MontpillierAhh, Montpillier! Not much of a tourist town in my opinion but didn´t matter to me. Just needed a day to hang out with a friend. Hello again Tiffany from Venice from Washington! What a relaxing and fun stop on my trip this was. Nothing touristy. Hostel, lunch, beach, dinner, bar, sleep, shop and move on. More details? Well here you go but it´s a quickie!
So I took a very early train--5:55am to Montpillier from Nice and made it there about 11am. Tiffany and I had lunch with Anne-Marie, her friend from school in Dublin who was leaving that afternoon. After lunch T and I went to the Monoprix (think Fred Meyer) and got beach stuff. Then we headed off to a local beach. If anyone asked me to tell them how to get there I would be clueless. A tram stop, a bus for a long time and then through some back parking lots and the like of apartment buildings. The beach was heavenly. Just right. Not too crowded with people and it felt very local. Not touristy like so many of the other beaches. T and I talked for 3 or 4 hours on the beach and laid out catching up on all of the happenings since Venice. Quite the stories we had to share! T insisted that we have some of these special doughnuts they sell from this cart on the beach. Of course they were doughnuts filled with nutella so how could I say no?? Yummy!
After our beach time we split up to shower and then met up at the Creperie de la Comedie so that we could fine tune Tiffany´s flirting skills with this cute waiter that she´d been working on for the last few days. Well actually, longer than that. She did an abroad program in Montpillier prior to her stint in Dublin so this was like a home away from home for her. And I guess she´d flirted a bit with him before. We enjoyed some tasty crepe-dinner items and then a tasty crepe-dessert of bananas, whipped cream and. . . nutella! Yeah, I will need to go through some kind of 12 step program when I get home. In the end she managed to casually invite him to the pirate-themed bar called Barbarouse after he was done with work. We got there at a good hour and there were a decent amount of people there and enjoyed some mojitos and had some good times. Then Youamu, the waiter, showed up and they had a very nice time hanging out. Tiffany blames my encouragement for her success but I think nature was just taking it´s course. We all parted ways later and called it a night.
The next morning, Thursday if it matters to anyone but me, Tiffany and I met up for breakfast, a little shopping and lunch then I headed to the train station to go to Marsailles and pick up my rental car to explore the Provence region of France. See, now that was the shortest post yet!! See you soon in Seattle Tiffany!
June 18 The French Riviera--Part 2Okay, so a little diversion in my blogging chronology but I´m back on track for you! So I knew it would be hard to top my Monaco Grand Prix experience but I still had to check out the rest of the French Riviera. So Monday morning I got up at a reasonable hour, beating my drunk Irish roommies and got ready as loudly as I could. I think they were still drunk and didn´t hear a thing darn it. I caught a train to Antibes which is west of Nice along the coast on the way to Cannes. It was really windy in Antibes but the tiny coastal town was pretty and I walked along the entire waterfront and feel like I checked out about half of the stores in the center by only walking on 3 streets. The town of Antibes was just pretty, not much to it. It was a Monday so all of the museums were closed but I don´t think that I would have gone in anyway. Just kind of breezed through the town.
After my brief stop in Antibes I hopped back on the train and continued my way to Cannes. You know that town that gets famous once a year for the big film festival? Yeah that festival ended Sunday night but I guess there were still a few more movie screenings because I did see some red carpet photo op moments but nobody even remotely famous looking that would be in front of the camera. Basically the town was a little disappointing because there were so many tents and display things erected along the waterfront that I really couldn´t see anything. The beach was blocked, the promenade was cluttered and it felt like the circus had just left town but forgot their tents. Was an eerie ghost town feel. Looked into some of the stores to see if I´d be tempted to shop but this is the pricey town with celebrity shoppers with wallets and tastes a lot more exhorbitant than my own. So after a couple hours in Cannes I headed back to the construction zone that is Nice.
By the time I got back it was approaching dinner time so I made my way down to the waterfront, well close, ended up about 2 blocks off of the waterfront at this fun Irish Pub called Ma Nolins where it was quiz night. I found in time, especially in France, that the Irish pubs were a perfect place for me because basically all of the English speaking folks hang out there and everyone has a great time! Thank god because I was not getting anywhere with my French speaking skills! I sat on the outside patio as I have tried to do every meal in Europe since we just don´t have enough of that in Seattle and began to chat with a fun couple from Dublin who have been married for 8 months. They told me abuot a little town to go to that is about an hour bus ride from Nice that was a perfectly preserved old town, very old French castle-ish feeling. St. Paul du Vence. Thank you to whatever your names were--that was the highlight of Nice! After they left I was joined by these two charming gentleman from Britain (everyone sounds charming with a British accent you know) who had met yesterday on business with clients at the Grand Prix. They had gotten to hang out on one of those amazing yachts and had some great stories to share. Alan and Dominic. They were fun and bought a few rounds of beers.
After awhile Dominic left since he had an early flight in the morning and Alan and I continued chatting about work things, his family, two kids etc. Nice guy. Then I decided to go but wanted to see the waterfront at night and take a few pictures so he escorted me since it was right on the way to his waterfront hotel. It was a nice time that ended with an unexpected kiss from a very cute married man that I did NOT reciprocate (even though it was a very tempting thought!). I just wrote it off that he had had a bit too much beer that night. Darn, if only he hadn´t been married! Oh well, it was flattering and fun if nothing else! After that I headed back to my less than appealing accomodations to call it a night. Around 5:30am the final 2 roommates staggered back to the hostel yelling and screaming in the street. You could hear them a mile away I swear. They rang the doorbell, called all of the cell phones in the room and woke up the entire neighborhood. Then they got into a yelling match with the hostel dude who told them they were "banned from this hostel". I had to laugh with them. Like anyone would ever go back!
In the morning I was just glad none of them had gotten sick. There were so many bottles of liquor and wine around it looked like an alcoholics paradise. By this time I had decided for sure I was not staying here the entire 5 days so on Tuesday first thing I did was buy my train ticket to Montpillier to meet Tiffany from Washington that I met in Venice. (I´m actually chatting with her online right now as I write this blog!). After that I found the bus to take me to St. Paul du Vence and had a scenic hour long bus ride there where I felt like I saw how most of the people in that area live. Nice and normal. The town was wonderful. Up on a hill, it reminded me of one of the Italian hill towns but with a French flavor. The place is pretty much all touristy now so there were a ton of shops with lots and lots of art. Very cool paintings and watercolors. Almost bought one but when I went back to get it the guy had closed the shop for lunch and I really didn´t want to wait two hours to get it. Lots of great photo ops in this little cozy town. It was just what I needed from France! The rest of the night was uneventful but it didn´t matter because I was just looking forward to heading to Montpillier and hanging out with Tiffany. . . June 10 The French Riviera--Part 1Ooh, now to tell you about one of the other highlights of my trip. . . granted there have been many! On Saturday I spent pretty much the entire day on trains--like 10.5 hours. Can´t believe I was able to sit still that long. Did get some good napping done and in Geneva (passed back through) I picked up a book and read all but the last 30 pages on the 6.5 hour train segment to Nice. When I walked out of the train station a guy my age asked me if I knew of any hostels in the area so I let him follow me to mine and he was able to get a room. Don´t know if in the end that was a good thing or not for him because I can say for sure that the Hostel de Alize in Nice is the nastiest place I´ve ever seen. Thankfully the owners credit card machine wasn´t working so I could decide in the next day or two how long I wanted to stay. The location was okay, not that great and not quite as advertised. A bit too close to the ghetto. Sorry mom and dad--you would not have approved of me walking alone late at night there but I didn´t have any problems luckily.
The inside of the hostel which occupied half of the second floor was in shambles. You had to walk over tools, by half torn down walls and by gross stuff like mildewy walls. At least the room wasn´t as bad. When I got there there were 3 sets of bunk beds and the only bed left was a top one. At least it looked sturdy. I have this paranoia that I´ll crash down on someone in the middle of the night or roll out of bed, even though I don´t think I´ve ever rolled out of bed. Silly I know. There were no lockers in the room or a place to keep your valuables so I locked things as best possible. I wasn´t too worried with the people that were apparently my roommates though because one bed had over 80 Euro in cash on it and another abour 30 and another had an ipod and digital camera. Wondered if these people ever stayed in a hostel before. . . Turns out they were 5 students from Ireland studying in France who hate France and where they are studying. Four girls and a guy. I ran into them as I was on my way out for dinner but didn´t see them again until the morning when they were the loudest people I have ever heard in my life at 7am.
I went to a little bar/cafe on the Promenade Anglais for dinner and had a tasty chicken salad. Then I headed out to the recommended Saturday night hot spot in the Let´s Go book which hasn´t steered me wrong yet. Well they were a little directionally challenged in Nice. Actually, I think that it is more that there were not very many people in the town yet. There wasn´t much going on anywhere. I found some clubs marked "prive" meaning private as I´m sure you can figure out and I had no problem walking in. They were happy to have people fill their places. I didn´t stay too long at any of them. Was a fairly unexciting and disappointing Saturday night in a city that was supposed to be filled with my kind of nightlife. Let me just say a little more about the state of the city before I get into the fun of Sunday. There are two main drags where all of the action is in Nice outside of the long prominade that goes along the waterfront but doesn´t have anything on it. One goes parallel to the waterfront a few blocks in and the other is perpendicular to it. Those are the places that have all of the shopping, the restaurants and places to stroll that you read about. They were all torn up and chain-link fenced off their entire lengths. And it was all dusty, loud construction the entire day. Yuck. Thankfully there are other towns to visit on the riviera!
So I had heard before I left for my trip that they were beginning to set up for the Grand Prix in Monaco. I knew it would be cool to see and likely a very pricey endeavor so I didn´t look to see when it was. Figured my luck would hold out as it has for all of my trip (minus this hostel). Well it just happened that the final day of races was indeed this very Sunday. So I decided to go in the morning after my loud roommates went on and on about it and said they got scalped tickets. I left around 9a to go to the train station. There was a long line of people to go into the train station and signs saying to the Grand Prix. I had to ask 2 people where to get the train tickets because they had their normal entrance blocked off. As I was on my way this lady asked me where to go and I said¨"follow me." What a great thing that I did because we chatted a bit and she said that she was with her son here and they were going to try and get some tickets to watch. They are from Calgary. The ticket to Monaco (another country by the way in case you didn´t know) was only 6.80 Euro round trip. Good deal eh for a 25 minute train ride? Worked for me.
So after we got our train tickets we went to get into the big line which was actually the line to get into the train platform. Donna, as she introduced herself, had her son Bob waiting in line and he was easy to spot as he is a tall fella! While the line looked long we made it onto the next train and were on our way. We chatted the whole train ride and decided that we would spend the day together which was a lot of fun. Donna was a 72 year old fun lady who seems more like a spunky 40 year old than anything. Bob (or Bobby as Donna would call him often) is a 39 year old law student. They have traveled Europe together a lot and back in the day Donna traveled around Europe doing crazy things for like two years. Bob also restores and collects cars so we had a lot of stuff to talk about. They told me the craziest travel story I have still heard on my trip and it had only happened the day before in Nice. Let me share it with you!
Bob and Donna are traveling this trip by car and have driven all over the place. Saturday they followed their GPS deal instructions to get to their hotel in Nice. Apparently it took them straight into the worst part of town. As they were in that bad place a guy stepped out in front of the car forcing Bob to stop. The second that he did someone yanked open Donna´s door, grabbed her purse and in ablink of an eye he was gone with it. They had no chance of catching up to him. They headed straight to the police station to file a report. The police said that there was nothing they could do but contact them if someone turned it in. It really sucked for them because her purse had both of their passports and her wallet and money in it. I guess the Canadian Consulate is really hard to work with and never seems to be open and they would have to go through the one in Rome to ge anything done. Bob came up with an idea and asked the cops if they would write a note in French that said something to the effect of cash reward, no questions, no cops, just return the passports. They refused to do it and would not recommend they go back in that part of town again.
Bob was on a mission as their trip would really be stifled if they didn´t have their passports, let alone getting home easily. So they went to their hotel and asked the receptionist if she would write the note for them. They said that the receptionist "got all James Bond" with the note and wrote it in a very attention-getting way. So they drove back to the spot using their GPS memory to find it again and started showing the note to a group of young teens in the spot. They said that they read the note out loud all shocked and dramatic as Bob flashed 200 Euro in cash at them. They huddled together and then told Bob to wait. They ran into a building and then came back to get Bob. They took him to the basement and into this big room where there were like 200 bags or some ungodly amount. Donna´s purse was the first one. Bob looked in the purse and saw that the only things missing were the cash, a credit card, not the debit card luckily, her reading glasses and lipstick. Go figure, they must be well-dressed and well-read theives. They they headed off. Pretty crazy story huh? You do what you have to do!
But back to our main adventure story. . . Monaco was beautiful and just filled with everything racing! The streets were packed with vendors selling everything car and sponsor-related. It didn´t take us long to find ticket scalpers and sellers. We asked around and looked at some package deals and found things ranging from 800 Euro tickets in the stands that included a meal and drinks to the standing room only section that we ended up buying for 100 Euro each. We didn´t know at the time that they were standing only or exactly the section where it was because the guy was a little intentionally vague. So we walked around to try and find the place. It seemed like we were walking farther and farther away from where the action was. In fact we were, we were headed up the hill to the bluff where the castle is and the church where Princess Grace is buried. There were a number of places up on the rocky hillside we could have climbed and perched but they didn´t seem that easy to get to and necessarily comfy. So we kept heading up to the very top of the place trying to find places where there were NOT tree branches blocking. The trees where pretty for the landscape but not for watching the Grand Prix! We would take take turns on our way up staking out a good place while one of the others would look farther ahead. We finally found a great spot where we could actually see about 2/3´s of the course. Now we were happy. The people who paid big bucks to sit in the stands had to endure the hot sun and only got to see cars whiz by a second at a time. We had a prime vantage point that we shared with a German guy named Horst.
Once we had our place staked out Bob went and bought us some lunch and lemonade and we watched a 20 lap race and then hung out waiting for the big final race at 2pm. Horst, our non-English speaking German new friend, was a hoot to watch watch the race because he was very seriously into the Grand Prix. He guffawed and huffed and through his hands up in the air and groaned about every pit stop. He timed them all. We thought they all looked pretty speedy but he felt otherwise. Fernando Alonzo won the race in a McLaren and the long time favored multi-time champion Ralf Schumacher came in 16th. It was a fun race to watch albeit 2 hours and really, really loud. Good thing we had bought ear plugs. At first when they were doing their warm up laps it didn´t seem like it was going to be very loud because the cars were well spaced, but as soon as the real race began the noise would get louder and louder. Was deafeningly loud.
After the race we grabbed a few beers and then did some shopping, had some dessert and then they took me up to the Casino and the Paris Hotel on the other side of the bay. We saw so many Ferrari´s that they started to look a little too common. There were lots of other impressive new, pricey and old classics being shown off by the rich and elite up there as well. Made me wish I had a secret stash of money somewhere. Of course, then I might never end my traveling days here in Europe! We sat at a cafe outside of the casino and enjoyed some wine (their treat--they insisted the whole day since they knew I was budget traveling) and chatted with a guy who used to race Ferrari´s until his mother asked him to stop because he has 2 kids now and she didn´t want anything to happen to him. Great people watching there and people meeting. Oh yes, and I did go into the casino for a minute but it wasn´t really that exciting. Not glitzy and flashy like Las Vegas. It´s a more refined, cigar smoking gentleman´s casino. What a day!! Okay, you´ll have to wait a few to hear about the other days in the French Riviera although none of them were quite as spectacular as this! June 08 Chamonix--the French AlpsI´m sitting here in Ibiza Spain at the moment during the siesta so I thought I´d take advantage of the shade and the one euro per hour cheap internet here to update you on my second destination in France. . . Chamonix! I arrived in Chamonix by train in the late afternoon. The views from the train were beautiful as we made our way to this tiny spectacular town but as I have said before, it is very challenging to take a worthwhile picture while the train is moving. It is really quite a shame because there are so many diverse landscapes you see along the way. I had a little trouble getting all the way to this town because the woman at the train station in Paris told me that she could only get me to the town that is about 35 minutes away. When I got to that town I had to buy a ticket that got me to Chamonix. She should have and could have sold me a ticket to my final destination as it is all the same national French railway lines. What sucked is that the layover between the two trains was 10 minutes and the line was so long at the station I missed the train and had to waste an hour and a half at this nothing little town that didn´t even have any views. I was a little frustrated but happy when I finally arrived.
So as you might have seen in the aerial photo´s from my parasailing experience, Chamonix is a fairly small town nestled in the valley of some spectacular mountains. Mont Blanc (yup, like the brand of pens) is the highest point in all of France and the second highest point in all of Europe. You´ll hear about that high point in my next chapter. Mont Blanc is the centerpiece of the town but all of its neighbors are equally impressive. My hotel was not even a 5 minute walk from the train station and smack dab in the middle of the town. The room had a very lodgy feel and the best shower I´ve had so far in Europe! May not sound like a big deal but there have been a range of sizes, temperatures and sometimes a lack of the opportunity to hang the shower wand up to use it as an actual shower. This one was so cool that it even had a temperature dial so you could set the exact temperature of your water before you even turned it on. I discovered that in the 75 degree weather of Chamonix I prefer a shower set to 37 celcius. It´s perfect. In the winter the area is very popular for skiing and is quite pricey so they go all out with the amenities. But traveling off season made it affordable for me!
Of course being as I got there about 3 weeks before the season really begins there wasn´t a lot to do in the town and the majority of the stores only open from about 10-12 and 2 -6. Restaurants opened for dinner at 8p. Gave me a chance in my down time to get online to update you on other parts of my trip though. So my first night there was pretty lowkey. I perused the little streets and took pictures and turned in on the earlier side. The next morning I took the cable car up to the top, well almost the top, of Mont Blanc. The ride was beautiful and it amazed me how many people freak out as they load people into the cars asking the conductor if it is really safe to have this many people on board. Gee, you would think they would know how many it can handle if they run the cars 40-80 times a day every day of the year. Those same people jump and scream when the car passes over a support tower too. Ahh, tourists! I passed on the first car that was able to take me because it was packed. It paid off because I was the first person on the next car and had a perfect corner view. We actually had to take 2 different cable cars and then at the top of the runs there is an elevator that takes you up to the highest point you can go to without being an adventurous mountain climber.
As you can imagine the views were marvelous and the skies were just perfect. I think it was at this time that I started obsessing with the cloud formations in my pictures. All through France I would stand somewhere waiting a minute or two if necessary waiting for the wind to move the perfect clouds into my viewfinder. That´s the beauty of traveling alone--no one tells you to hurry up and take the picture. The weather at the base of the mountain in the town was probably 72 when I headed up and at the top of the cable car it was 10 degrees celcius and at the top of the elevator climb it was 1 degree celcious. After about 10 minutes I was chilly enough that I was ready to head down for a hot chocolate at the cafe. The air was so clean and fresh there it was invigorating. But as soon as you went to climb the stairs to see another viewpoint it hit you that the oxygen level was a lot lower and you felt terribly out of shape. Was an odd contrast.
When I went down I had the gal at my hotel call to arrange a parasailing tandem deal for me. Because it was off season none of the offices where open and my French language skills would get me nowhere on the phone whereas pointing at signs and brochures in an office usually gets the job done for me if they don´t speak English. She set up a 1:30 appointment so I had just enough time to grab a bite. Which was a good thing as you´ll hear soon. I met Patrice, my tandem flight instructor who´s done it for 15 years at the base of Mont Blanc. I could tell which person was the guy I was meeting because of his enormous backpack. We took the cable car 2/3 of the way up the mountain, just the first run, and climbed to the edge of a cliff. Patrice was a fun guy and we chatted and chatted the whole time. In the summers he is a parasail instructor and in the winters a ski instructor. He moved here15 years ago after 1 vacation here. He was hooked. I thought it was amusing that his wife of 7 years has never parasailed with him and won´t even watch him.
He spent about 5 minutes opening up the sail and getting all of the lines in order, harnessed me up and gave me my helmet and we were ready to go. The harness is really a chair that you sit in that even has a zippered back pocket for your bag and a strap for your camera that you keep tucked into your jacket so you can pull it out for those perfect aerial picture moments. I am actually not very comfortable in high places like the upper levels of stadiums and the like, so I thought that I would be a little apprehensive about running off the edge of a cliff. Apparently not! I was so excited to go that when he said lean forward and run I just went for it. I didn´t really get the full sensation of jumping off the cliff edge because as we neared the edge the sail caught the wind and jerked us back and we were airborne. What an awesome rush!
Once we were up we kept circling up and up and up for a long time catching the thermals that zip through the valley. It was amazing how high you could go taking advantage of nature´s power. He said that this was the best weather day and the best winds so far this year.The first thing we took a good look at was the giant glacier that was next to our take off point and then we headed to the other side to view this little farm up on one of the mountains that you can only see by parasailing or by a 4 hour hike. I guess the guy who lives there likes visitors and makes a really good cheese. Patrice told me where to go to get some of the cheese and I did later--tasty. We floated over the town and he gave me lots great information about what everything was. He obviously really enjoys his job. When he or I weren´t talking he would whistle little ditty´s. About halfway into the flight he taught me how to steer and do some maneuvers--turning, climbing higher, going faster, slower, decending and then a few stunts like the death spiral. That´s why I was glad to have had a bite. You have to stare at one spot on the ground, pull one of the handles and lean hard the other way and you spin and spin and spin. I know we did at least 15 rotations and if we had done just one more I know I would have been sick. But of course I didn´t say anything!
The whole flight lasted about 35 minutes which is a bit longer than the 15 to 20 minutes it was supposed to be. He got caught up in our chit chat which worked out well for me! The landing was really easy. As you approach the ground you put your legs up and slide your seat that you sit in on the ground and then stand up fast to get the sail to settle down. What a great adventure. That is still the highlight of my trip so far and that includes spending a day in Monaco watching the Grand Prix and loving Ibiza in Jackie´s Grand Prix of clubbing adventures! The rest of my time in Chamonix was very relaxing as I just explored, took lots of pictures, finally got to eat some cheese fondue and absorbed the idea of a vacation. The only disappointment I had was that the concrete luge runs were not open on weekdays and I really wanted to do that. Oh well, guess I need to leave something to go back for! Also, I was about a week early to take the cable car that connected the top of Mont Blanc to Hellbronner Point which is technically in Italy. Would have been cool to do that because from there you can see three countries and have a greater view of all of the alps. Wednesday I left Chamonix and the land of the French Alps to go to Geneva, Switzerland and then the Swiss Alps! Paris--Part 2Back to Saturday in Paris. I had talked to some gals at Montmare who inspired me to do the night cruise along the river at night to see everything lit up. The cruise was nice, the Eiffel Tower looked beautiful and the hour long opportunity to be off my feet was very nice! I didn´t realize that they had changed the lighting on the tower with the millennium and every 15 minutes or so when it gets dark enough there are thousands of little lights that sparkle all over the tower. Looks really amazing. Like fireworks going off. Turns the tower into a giant sparkler. The cool effect didn´t photograph well though. After that I went back to the hostel to change and get ready to go out. I hadn´t actually gone to any clubs in Paris because I was either hanging out with Antonella and her friends or was feeling sick. I was good to go at this point!
Was really excited and looking forward to going to this ultra-underground gothic club called the BatCave which is in an underground cave. But, after watching what people were wearing in the city I was actually feeling a little less than goth-prepared for a trip there. Normally I wouldn´t care but there are some amazing clothes here and people are really well dressed (even though some if it is in outfits you would never see me wear!). So I decided to go to a giant barge that has 2 nightclubs on it that was near my hostel called Batofar. I knew right where it was on the map and confirmed it with a few people. I asked the guy at the hostel front desk how far it was and he said a 10 minute walk. Sometimes those maps are very deceptive so I asked and confirmed a few times and he assured me that it was at most a 15 minute walk. So I headed out around 12:45 walking in an unfamiliar part of Paris by myself. 10-15 minutes my ass! I kept checking my map to see if I was lost but I was on the right track. I finally made it to the barge a full hour later. I had one incident where a guy came up to me and started talking to me that made me uncomfortable. I told him to walk on the other side of the street and he did so. The rest of the walk was uneventful, just painfully long!
The club was cool. There are a number of boats and barges with small to large clubs on them and I was tempted to stop in a number of them but headed straight to my goal. There were 2 entries to the barge but one looked more like a staff entry and the other had the velvet ropes, bouncer and a line of about 10 people so that made my decision for me. If I had known which door ahead of time I would have gone into the other door because it is more the kind of music I like to dance to. But I am very glad I choose door #2 because it was a fun experience entering into a new world of music for me. It was a big night on the barge because they were having an album release party for a very popular French (of course) hard-core reggae/rap/hip-hop artist. We´re talking some down and dirty beats. I wouldn´t have normally gone to it but I am really glad I did because it was alot of fun and I got into the music. The barge was completely packed full of people and it was like a freakin´ sauna. What was more noticeable than the heat and tons of people was the fact that 90% of the people were smoking pot. It was funny that there were tons and tons of signs up saying that anyone caught with illegal drugs would be promptly escorted out. Yeah right! There were blunts ablazing everywhere! The 10% who weren´t smoking definitely had a contact hight. I hung out where the concert was and listened/danced for a long time.
It was great and I really got into the music. It was funny that the performer made a bunch of remixes and turned everything in to reggae including Justin Timberlake, Nelly Frutado, Coolio and Eminem. Wouldn´t normally go for that style of remix but it worked in that environment. Apparently with the right tools you can make anything reggae--did I mention Kylie Monogue? After awhile I went up to the front of the barge to chill out for awhile and get off my feet. After awhile (my favorite personal ironic moment of the trip so far) a smiley, big, black, bald feelow started talking to me. He looked like a giant teddy bear that could kick somebody´s ass. He said his name was Lulu, which I had to hide my giggles on the inside because the name didn´t work for his appearance, and he was a 27 year old cop. He told me that he was a cop and, because of the abundance of weed around, I asked to see his badge. He was legit. Then he asked me if I smoked "reefer" as he offered me a fat joint. What an ironic night!
Sunday I got up around 9 even though I didn´t get home until about 5:30a and took the regional metro train to visit Versaille. It was beautiful and I hope to one day see it when it is not so wet. It didn´t rain the whole time or anything but it takes some of the fun out of tromping around the enormous gardens and outer estates when it is all slippery mud. I ended up doing the little train that goes around the grounds to visit the far reaches and a little old lady from India who has lived in CA for the last 20 years asked if she could join me. She was a hoot. She is 72 and her name is Damu. She was complaining that all of the people on her trip (her sibling, a spouse and a friend) are all "old" and didn´t want to go out and do stuff like come to the palace. She reminded me of my grandma grace. And she kept up with me as we covered the fountains and some museums. She said that she used to climb the mountains in India every year for 2 months before she came to the states and I think she still climbs something in CA to keep in shape. I sure do meet the most interesting people.
After I got back I called Antonella because she had wanted me to go out with her and some friends to see Spider Man 3. I had to decline because, if you notice, I haven´t mentioned going up in the Eiffel Tower yet. I needed to do that. I kept waiting and waiting for a time when it wouldn´t be raining but that time never came. So I headed off to go to the top of the Eiffel Tower around 6 or so and didn´t have to wait for more than 3 people in line. Guess that is a benefit to the soggy weather. The views were very nice albeit I needed to use my umbrella on every level and the landscape was a little blurred by the raindrops. I still enjoyed it. After I decided there was no way that I could miss going to the Pigalle area where the Red Light District is so I went. I got there when it was still light and wanted pictures at night when the neon lights class it up a bit. So I had dinner in a cafe there and watched the hookers and their clientelle while enjoying a so-so tourist menu dinner. Guess they can´t all be award-winning meals! The entertainment of people watching kept me amused though. Quite the range of working girls (and some who were very definitely boys in the inside).
After dinner I wandered in the shops and visited the less than thrilling Erotic Museum. Thought it was interesting that on all 7 floors--yes there are 7 floors to it that should have been crammed into 2--it was 90% single women visiting. I knew that I was most likely going to go to this area and I wanted to shock people a little. So I dressed as conservatively as possible--my crucifix from the Vatican, a scarf and mousy hair-do--and thoroughly enjoyed walking into the sex shops heading straight to the fetish section and asking if I could try crazy outfits on. Every time I walked in the guys working there would look at me like I was going to freak out in a few seconds the minute I realized what kind of store I was in. The look on their faces when I held up some crazy stuff was priceless. I did end up buying 2 things for clubbing but not such crazy stuff as you might think! My night ended at a reasonable hour because in the morning I had an early train ride to Chamonix! June 02 Paris--the city of rain. . . Part 1Yippee, finally made it to writing about a new country! Don't get me wrong--I'd give anything to go back to the Greek Islands and Italy again but I feel so far behind it is an accomplishment. Hopefully you've noticed that I have spent about an hour and a half putting up pictures for everything starting with Greece all the way through the French Riviera and Montpillier. Now to try and catch you up on what happened when I was there. So we'll tackle Paris. . . the city that I believe is much rainier than Seattle. It rained every day I was there. The one day there was a 6 hour sun break I ran all over to get as many pretty pics as possible--most of what you see on the site.
So, Wednesday morning I flew from Santorini to Athens and then Athens to Paris arriving in the early afternoon. Know I had mentioned my not having a hotel room for Paris before and at this point I still didn' have one. I had tried every place I had a name for but came up empty handed. Really sucked because there are 3 months that are really hard to find hotel rooms in Paris and May is one of them. I ended up using the travel agent in the airport to help me find a room in a great location (luckily) for Wed and Thu night. Fri-Sun wasn't an option for them as they were booked. It was on the pricey side but at least I had a room at it was pretty nice. The hotel was the Ascott Hotel located by the opera that is closer to the Louvre. That was a low-key night for me and I enjoyed a tasty dinner by the Opera House and talked to a guy from Singapore who used to live in Vancouver BC and an old lady from Aberdeen. Small world some times. Then I went for a walk down the Champs-Eleeyes, stood under the Arch de Triomphe and took the metro to see the Sacre Coure at night and the night view of the city. Was mostly drizzling this night so didn't get an umbrella yet but still felt damp.
Thursday I woke up feeling really crappy from a new cold. My folks thought I sounded a lot worse than I was when I called them but I got better pretty quickly and it wasn't like the Florence cold. I made calls to a new set of places and found a reasonable hostel, with a room to myself, for Saturday and Sunday but could find NOTHING for under 150 Euro for Friday. So I called Antonella who I met in Venice and she said I could stay with her Friday. Pays to make cool friends in cool places! With that hurdle under my belt I set out to explore Paris. Bought a Museum Pass and covered as much of the Louvre as I felt like seeing in 3 hours and then moved onto do the Rick Steve's Paris walk covering the Notre Dame Cathedral, Conciergie (prison), Palais de Justice, St. Chappelle Church and Deportation Monument. There was a bread festival with cheese and bread tastings in the area and that was fun. I had a spinach and salmon quiche on the island in the middle of the Siene and then later a crepe with nutella in the Latin Quarter. Quite the full day.
That night I met Antonella at her apartment and she made tasty pizzas for dinner which we enjoyed with her other friends she invited because they could speak English too. Yeah, the French language and I are just not connecting but they liked the practice and are really good. Florence met us at the metro where I arrived and then Jeremy and Audrey showed up a bit later. They were so much fun to hang out with and we talked and talked all night. Jeremy and Audrey both sing in a choir with Antonella (she's a music teacher and would like to be a choir director very soon) and they sang some of their songs for us. They were very impressive and have beautiful voices. You can tell they love doing it too! We all decided to meet and go out to dinner on Friday at a place they promised me was great and very local Parisienne cuisine and then try to catch Antonella's friend giving a concert.
Friday was the sunny break so I ran all over taking pictures. Then I went to the Orsay Museum where all of the impressionist art is. After 30 minute there they turned on evacuation alarms and made us all leave the museum. I think there was a suspicious abandoned bag that caused the crisis. I'd seen almost enough and didn't want to wait in a line for what I hadn't seen yet. So grabbed my stuff and headed to Antonella's. Her apartment is really cute and she had a guest bedroom ready for me. Her 2 roommates didn't mind my overnight visit which made me feel better about it. She had a rehearsal to go to so we agreed to meet at the restaurant and I headed off to climb the Arch de Triomphe since it was still clear skies. Great views. That was the closest I'd gotten to the Eiffel Tower at that point and the best view if it so far. I got to the restaurant area early because it was by Les Halles, a big shopping mall, and it gave me a chance to pick up a little gift for Antonella as a thank you.
Met Florence, Jeremy and Audrey at the restaurant at 8 and then soon Antonella, Aldrich (hope I spelled it right!) and Gerard showed up too. It was a packed table and we had a lot of fun. There was a lot of conversation in French so I had to mentally fill in the blanks and came up with some fun conversations I think they had. I enjoyed some tasty duck with orange sauce, pureed beets, potato slices and veggies the enjoyed my chocolate carmel molten cake thing for dessert. Yumm! Then we walked around trying to find the place for the friend's concert. It was a good thing I am a responsible tourist because they needed my map to find it. There was no room for us to fit into the concert place so we went to a bar they go to often and hung out and met 7 or 8 of their other friends. It was definitely a fun night.
Saturday Antonella made me a lovely breakfast and we parted ways as she left for a trip to the countryside for a friend's birthday and I headed to my hostel to drop off the luggage. Then I went to the Montmare neighborhood, went inside the Sacre Coure church and had fun sampling wines and food at the local street market. I thought it was kind of funny that all of the French street vendors get very offended if you don't stop to talk to them every time they say hello to you. You can't though or you would never make it more than 3 blocks in a day! That afternoon I visited the Luxemborg Gardens and Palace as well as the Pantheon.
Okay I'll wrap this up at a later time. . . my butt is tired of sitting. On a positive, think I've almost mastered the French keyboard which just means it will be confusing when I get back to an English one. Take care all!!
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