Jeep Jamboree Upcoming

The next trip is a revisit to the Killington Jeep Jamboree in middle July. This will be a long weekend filled with 2 days of 4 wheeling exclusive to Jeep owners.

In preparation for this year's run I have replaced the stock bumper with a Rugged Ridge Modular bumper and added a skid plate to protect the electronics up front (swaybar disconnect and lockers). Well, actually it was mainly my brother who did the majority of the work, I was assistant to the installs. He wrote a post on exploringNH forums so I figured I'd link to it so you can see the work and how good the Jeep looks... It can be found here.

We'll see how tense I get with what little bit of experience I gained this time. I am aiming to stick with 2 of the easier trails again even if my brother opts for harder trails.

Machu Picchu Planning

Machu Picchu is a different planning and preparation experience than other trips I have taken. First of all I am not going to be leaving the basic vicinity of the city of Cusco aside from the actual hiking tour I am taking through the Inca Trail into Machu Picchu and then the return ride to Cusco, so I will not really need to do a lot of research on what is in the area. This means the days I am not on the tour will have a basic wing it approach but also will have a lesser degree of activity than I normally work with because Cusco is at approximately 11000 feet and I will need to adjust to the altitude.

I have booked my tour through http://www.sastravelperu.com/ on the recommendation of a friend of George's from Denmark who used this company last year. The process is a bit odd as they do not have direct online booking and for those who are squeemish about such things it may not be the answer for you. I was told the tour company was very good and attentive and checking their reviews online it seems to hold true overall. It seems like it would be a crap shoot to pick any tour company without recommendation so this seemed like my best option.

Of course booking was an odd proposition. The site has the instructions on how to book and most of it really wants you to download a Word document and fill in the information including your credit card number in order to get things processed. I am a bit squeemish about that and I dug around until I found a way to authorize the payment with a Visa card (and only a Visa card) though a site that several peruvian business seem to share for purposes like this. I was foiled later on in this process but we'll get to that in a bit.

I am taking the 4 day Inca Trail with special 5th day Option tour which includes three full days of hiking the Inca Trail followed by a short run to Machu Picchu before sunrise on the fourth day. The total hiking distance is about 27 miles. The tour of Machu Picchu is supposed to last about 2 and a half to 3 hours I think then from there you have the rest of the day to either hike further (there is another trail through Wayna Picchu or just hang about the area. After that the 5th day option has you staying later in the local area where they will get you to an overnight stay in Agua Calliente then get you to Cusco the next morning. It all looks very fun and of course strenuous but I am pretty sure I walked over 100 miles in France (and definitely certain I walked over 80) so I should be able to handle it.

To mention about researching Peru I should state the obvious. Don't drink their water. Bottled drinks only. They say not to drink alcohol at altitude unless you are used to it already. They say to drink lots of liquids like sports drinks the first day or two and to not do anything too strenuous or you could end up with altitude sickness which sounds unpleasant. They also say to be very cautious about what places you eat. I assume their health and safety board is a bit suspect if it exists at all. In any event I intend to ask the hotel which places are ok to eat in the area for the couple days I am there before the tour.

Speaking of the hotel I am using the Los Marqueses Hotel which appears to be run by the same people as the tour company or at the very least they work very tightly together. In this instance I had to fill out the Word doc and send it back as a PDF in order to reserve the room for my stay there so I ended up doing something I didn't want to do anyway. They said I needed to get it done fast as they only had one single person room left. I should also mention the responses from both the travel company and hotel to emails was a bit slower than I enjoy but I am sure they are busy and perhaps a bit more relaxed than we northeasterners. Either way everything appears to be confirmed for both the tour and hotel at this point.

Lastly, I had to book the flight on my own. I booked through Orbitz as they listed the best prices through LAN Airlines which caters to Central and South America. The flights from and to Boston are operated by American Airlines to Miami. From Miami I fly to Lima and from Lima to Cusco. The whole operation is 14 to 15 hours in either direction. The flight to will operate overnight and the flight back will deposit me in Boston near midnight. Not ideal and there will only be the shift from DST to not DST and back because Peru lands on the same time zone as Boston but doesn't follow DST changes. Amusingly DST ends the night I get back. I booked through Orbitz through Bank of America's Add It Up program so I should get $5 back from them somewhere along the way. Also through Orbitz they have a price guarantee if someone books for lower prices. We'll see if it matters but it would be nice to get a couple bucks back.

So that is the basic planning in a nutshell to this point. The follow ups will be about what I will have to purchase or borrow to manage the hike appropriately. I will likely get those in after the Denmark trip.

Jeep Jamboree Killington Part 2 and More Upcoming

With France safely behind me it is now time to prepare for what is upcoming. As with last year I am attending the Jeep Jamboree in Killington, VT for a weekend of 4 wheeling in the middle of July. I intend to update the Jeep's front bumper and install a skid plate to protect the front lockers and control arms before the trip.

After the Jeep Jamboree I am heading back to Denmark for another visit with George on his current home turf. I am trying a different airline for this trip again with KLM Royal Dutch. It means that I will be landing on Dutch soil for the first time. The flight was cheaper than I expected. It should be fun to have a bit more time there than my first visit.

From there I will have to wait until the end of October for my now yearly birthday trip. This time I am going in a completely different direction to Peru where I will be taking a hiking tour of the Inca Trail and Machu Picchu.

Where preparation for the Denmark trip will be a small bit of posting after the Jamboree I will be posting a lot more pre-trip information for Peru because it is partially an adventure just to get it to operational status.

France Day 12 Pictures

France day 12 pictures can be seen here.

France Day 11 Pictures

France day 11 pictures can be seen here.

France Day 10 Pictures

France day 10 pictures can be seen here.

France Day 9 Pictures

France day 9 pictures can be seen here.

France Day 8 Pictures

France day 8 pictures can be seen here.

France Day 7 Pictures

France day 7 pictures can be seen here.

France Day 6 Pictures

France day 6 pictures can be seen here.

France Day 13 and Epilogue

I got up just before 6 figuring I would leave the hotel at 7. I was ready by 6:30 so I watched a bit of BBC Global News then headed out. I got the train station in about 15 minutes and got to the train pretty much right as it was showing up. The train towards Charles De Gaulle was very packed in the early going as a lot of people may travel to the suburbs in the early morning. I got off the train and started to navigate the maze that is CDG Airport. I didn’t really like the setup as I didn’t realize all the shops were before security and I wasn’t going to try to go back through security to try to find anything. So basically I missed the chance to buy candy which I usually get at the airport and to see if there were any other things to be had there.

The plane turned out to be delayed more than an hour and so I ended up sitting at the gate for a very long time. The delay was due to fog over Paris and over Dublin apparently. When we landed in Dublin I had less than an hour till boarding rather than the 2+ that I should have had. This meant I again rushed to the gate even realizing that the places to buy stuff were before security again. I however didn’t believe I had any time. So, guess what? This plane turned out to be delayed for over an hour for “technical issues” so we didn’t board and I had no place to sit due to the late arrival for a very long time. I could have had a pint if they had posted the delay before I got in there but they didn’t.

After the long wait to board the plane we ended up not getting too far before we had another “technical issue” and had to pull back into another stand to get the worked out. I am not sure exactly how late we took off but I figure it was over an hour and possibly an hour and a half. The updated landing time was an hour and 15 minutes late if that means anything. The flight meal was ok, I asked for chicken and got the pasta with meat sauce (called Beef Bolognese with Pasta) but according the guy next to me the chicken wasn’t very good anyway. I had two cups of coffee with that expecting a longer day still ahead of me. The remainder of the flight was fairly uneventful. Since it was one of the older planes without the screen in the back of the seat and they were showing some newer Dustin Hoffman film I opted to watch Yojimbo on the laptop. I could tell the girl that was sitting across and behind me was watching my movie instead of the in flight movie. Good thing I do subtitles I guess. She was obviously very nervous about the landing because her boyfriend had to keep her leg from bouncing around the closer we got to the actual final approach. Though there was a bit of cloud cover it was nothing like in Dublin and the landing was very easy even for Boston. Oh yeah, they served a snack of Irish soda bread and jam with more coffee about 45 minutes before landing.

I was very near the front so getting off the plane was easy and for whatever unusual reason my bag was 6th off the gondola. I passed through customs without an issue and was home with relative ease after that. The late arrival (by about 1 and a half hours) made traffic that little bit lighter than it would have been if I got in on time so I guess that worked out.

If I didn’t mention this on the blog already, I have already decided I cannot visit France again unless I learn more of the language and/or go with other people. This doesn’t preclude a package tour but I am not sure what I’ll think of the package tour experience again. It would be better to rent a car if you are going anywhere outside of Paris to get to the locations near whatever city you are staying in. I would not advise a car in Paris. I got to witness Paris traffic first hand and it wasn’t pretty during the rush hours. They were brutal and blocked off whole intersections in both directions without a care. I personally should have skipped on Amiens or rented a car when I was there. It would have made that area more useful to me. I liked the Jules Verne museum but it wasn’t the Somme Battlefields. Live and learn for the future I guess. Additionally I will have to pay closer attention to holidays as they can really cause the country to shut down for tourists. I was surprised at the number of gift shops and cafes and restaurants that were closed on Victory Day in both Compiegne and in Pierrefonds. I am not sure how much of this is unique to France but it was less prevalent in the Scandinavian countries.

Anyway, France is a wrap and I’m still working on what’s next. There is a chance of a revisit to Denmark in the late summer to use up some vacation time I will have to burn before October 1st.

France Day 12

Today started out on the moderately early side. I realized I had all day ahead of me and was staying Paris all day. I had visited at least externally most all of the major sites in Paris and wasn’t really planned on what to do. I started out by heading back down La Fayette to Opera then crossing past the Louvre and doubling back to Notre Dame. This early in the morning there weren’t a ton of visitors and I was able to get inside with relative ease. I was hoping to visit the towers but it appeared they weren’t going to open those parts of the cathedral until some time later in the day so I decided that two trips inside the place after an external walk around it with relatively little change to what was open was enough for me. From there I headed back to the Louvre where along the way I decided to have a cup of coffee and a croissant at a café.

After having the croissant I had killed enough time to run through the shopping of the gifty places along the Louvre and I managed to finish off the rest of the shopping I had to do (I hope). From there I chose to head back to the hotel because the bags of stuff were rather bulky but before I got the room I had a quick lunch at the Quick (no pics included) then dropped off the bulky items and got them mostly packed into the suitcase. I rested for less than half an hour before heading back out again.

Back down La Fayette and to Opera my goal this time was L’Hotel Invalides where the Armories are. It’s sort of Frances poor man’s version of the armories in the Tower of London but after all there was a reasonably large number of items to view. Practically every bit of weaponry from older times was behind glass so I took relatively few pictures there as I don’t like the look of pictures of things behind glass or Plexiglas. They also had an exhibit that ran through WWI and WWII which was actually what I visited first and spent the most time in. It was again interesting to get the French perspectives on what we consider two wars they were deeply in need of being bailed out of. Having done the museums in Britain I know their perspectives already and to see the opinions of the French fighting forces portrayed in a positive light is of course unique. Either way there were still admissions that the French handled WWII especially as a national government at the very least very poorly even if they tried to portray the everyday Frenchman as more active when it came to the resistance.

There was a very high tech and new fangled exhibit on the history of Charles De Gaulle which on some levels was fairly successful and others was a bit awkward. The visitor was given a headset that would read frequencies from various points in the exhibit and follow along with movies being played. Since they had to follow along the movie was inevitably either halfway through or mostly finished by the time it was visited. It ended up making me less likely to wish to sit through half the movie then start it over again so that I hadn’t really the vim or vigor to see the exhibit as they had intended. After the Charles De Gaulle exhibit is where I visited the ancient weapons armory then I realized I was really done.

The day had me walk to the Louvre then Notre Dame then back to the Louvre then back to the hotel then back to the Louvre and beyond it to Invalides. I was very tired especially because the switch from destination walking to museum walking really took a lot out of my legs. As it was though when I had gotten back to the Seine on my way back towards the hotel I thunderstorm rolled in. I pulled out my jacket and put up my hood (I was again one of the few sans winter clothing in the heat) and made my way to the street where all the shops were across from the Louvre. Of course the rain picked up harder the further I went. When I found myself at Le Carousel (the place I had already eaten with the very helpful waiter) and I saw the same waiter was right there I realized it was time to wait out the storm. I had a couple Affligem and the special of the day which he suggested was the best choice. It was roast beef with mushrooms and au gratin potatoes. It again was very good as he suggested. A woman from Toronto ended up sitting next to me and we chatted for a while about various things. She’s obviously been traveling for a very long time and has been to France and to Rome for the past several years she said. She also turned out to be a former English teacher. This killed off the majority of the time that the storm ran across the city and then I made up my mind to have one more beer and see if I could make it to dark to get pictures of the Eiffel Tower at night. Unfortunately I realized after I was done with that beer that it was not going to happen and I headed back up La Fayette where I got into the hotel at about 9:15 or so. The sun really hadn’t set yet as it was. With that behind me I checked through packing and got myself ready for the return trip to Boston as best I could without accounting for the morning cleanup. Since I had scouted the train station I was pretty sure I knew what I had to do to get back to the airport and on my way eventually.

France Day 11

Today I got up at 7am on the dot even though I hadn’t set an alarm. I am not sure why but I went with it. My plans were to take the RER to Versailles and see the palace and the gardens there. The RER has a line that runs along the river then eventually ends out at Versailles where it is a 5 minute walk to the palace. It was very easy to get there once off the train but I had to get to the river to do that part. I opted to walk down La Fayette and then head to the river at Opera. I made one small incorrect turn but righted myself after a short bit and found the entrance to the station in front of the Musée D’Orsay. I showed my pass and the guy gave me free tickets to get on at that stop and because there was no ticket needed to exit at Versailles also a ticket to get back off when I returned. The RER is the Paris commuter line system to the suburbs. The Metro is the in city subway. The Corail runs intercity trains and I then there is the Ter line system which seems like it does the same as the intercities in the form of routes but also makes a lot more stops along the way. All of these are headed by SNCF which is the main France rail company so far as I can tell.

Getting out at Versailles the weather wasn’t terribly great. It was not really cool but not really hot and damp. It had rained overnight and was not raining really by this point but was misty and foggy rather. The first thing I can say about the palace of Versailles is it is very, very crowded. There were so many people here it could have been Disney. In any event I had a small struggle through an undisciplined line to buy my pass to all the sites and then I entered the palace. The pass covered an audio guide and I would have liked to get one but there was a very huge and undisciplined line already waiting to get them. If it had looked orderly I would probably have tried to wait it out but I cannot tolerate lines that shift and people try to shove ahead and the like so I just chose to skip it completely.

All of the rooms of the Palace were jam packed with people and with guided tours either from tour companies that bring people in or also I think from the palace itself though I suspect those were probably in French only. Through the way I heard tours in Spanish, Italian, Chinese, Japanese and German along with English and French. It seemed that each new room you could enter had another tour guide telling his particular story about that particular room for his particular tour. In any event the place is absolutely huge and though I am sure a fair portion of it has been restored from the original it looked in very good shape overall. Some of the rooms like the Hall of Mirrors were very spectacular. There was similar hall in a previous castle I had visited but this was much more impressive in its effect. I think it might actually have been the city hall in Stockholm…

The wander through the apartments probably took me something along the lines of an hour and change but would have been shorter if I was not always getting blocked by people. After the apartments I went out and started walking through the gardens and fountains area. This is gigantic in scope and made the gardens behind the palace in Compiegne seem like small change in comparison. While in the gardens I ended up having lunch at one of the little outdoor restaurants in the garden. I had a pizza and beer. It was decent pizza, the dough was thicker than the other one I had. I ate that fairly quickly and for whatever reason service didn’t make me sit around for another 20 minutes after I was done. I was very surprised by this. From lunch I wandered the gardens a bit more then headed to the Marie Antoinette apartments which are two sets of smaller buildings off set from the rest of the palace. They were included in the price of admission I paid as was the gardens. You can buy each individually or get the whole pass which is cheaper in the long haul which is why I got the whole pass. I saw a lot of people shelling out money for more tickets at the smaller ticket booths in these locations seeming surprised that what they bought didn’t include these other places. The Grande Traison and the Petite Traison were each in turn smaller than the other and not remotely as big as the palace but there were still a lot of rooms in these seemingly smaller buildings and a lot of wealth as well. There were more gardens here for this area as well. In scope it seemed Versailles encompasses several New York City blocks when including everything I did and didn’t visit.

When I was finished with Versailles I got back on the train to Paris except that they had to shut that one down due to a malfunction of some sort so I got on the next one. All trains leading out of Versailles head to Paris anyway and make the same stops. It just delayed me about 20 minutes. I was in an empty car practically until a pile of high school age kids came in and made it the noisiest car on the train I think. In any event they got out before I did so the last few stops were much quieter.

My mission after getting out of the train was to find the touristy shops to buy things at. I had a relatively good guess where to go but I was not 100% certain. I crossed back over the river and headed towards the Louvre guessing that the street opposite it on the far side from the river would be the place to look. I was right. I had already bought some stuff at Versailles and I bought something here, but the main reason for this was to know where to look on day 12, which is ultimately my last day in France because I head the airport early on Thursday. Then it was a matter of turning my way back into Opera which I had found almost by accident and the turning up La Fayette and into Chabrol where I got to the hotel at about 5pm. By the time I was pulling in the sun was actually out and there was a very unpleasant humid heat. I think I drank about 10 glasses of water then washed myself up a bit because I had 3 layers on from the start of the day weather.

I rested up a bit then opted to go out and find dinner. Before I got food I wanted to replenish my Euros on hand so I walked back to a BNP ATM on La Fayette which unfortunately was a lot further away than I thought, probably about halfway back to Opera, maybe further. Either way I got my money and headed back towards Gare de L’Est and looked at a couple of the places I had considered for dinner the night before. It was still early by French terms but there were some people in a couple of the places and I chose one that had 3 people eating. One person solo and a couple (that turned out to be German) and a few people drinking. I actually didn’t get the name of the place. Since I was early and there were very few people in there the waitress was very attentive and very nice. She realized that I spoke English as my main language and tried to accommodate me as much as she could with English though she was a bit limited on that front as I am with French. In any event I chose a set menu of three courses. For starter I chose the French onion soup, if only on the guarantee I knew what it was. For the meal I chose Chicken with Romanin sauce not really knowing what that was, and basmati rice as an accompaniment. The soup was very good. It was actually my first every French onion soup (I am not a soup person) and the cheese was very stringy and the crusty bread sopped the broth well. I enjoyed it. It wasn’t too salty. The chicken turned out to have a very light brown sauce on it. I could not tell totally what the flavoring was supposed to be. It was definitely very savory. I found that I liked the flavor the more I ate it though perhaps my initial reaction wasn’t as good. When I finished this my meal came with a dessert and I chose the glaces (ice cream), two scoops – chocolate and vanilla, and I had an espresso to go with it. By the way if I haven’t mentioned it an espresso is what you get when you order a coffee after dinner. I think I might have before but I don’t want to make is seem entirely like I am espresso hound no matter how much I like espresso.

While I was eating I had fancied the notion of going back to the Eiffel Tower to perhaps get some pictures at night to finish off the evening but when I stood up I realized that my legs had completely finished off their day and were on protest so I headed back to the room to call it a night. The Eiffel Tower from my hotel is about a 45 minute walk, probably more and I wasn’t going to make it back easily in the dark even if I got there. I will attempt to do that on Wednesday if I can but since I am a morning and not a night person I cannot guarantee anything on the matter.

France Day 10

So I didn’t really rush to get going this morning because either option really sort of left a later exit. I had reserved the car with Alamo but I was not sure how likely I was going to be able to pull it off and then also get back to Paris from Caen. The rental place didn’t open until 8am and if I had to go straight to Paris I wouldn’t really be able to check into the hotel until 12 at the earliest.

I had the hotel call me a cab after I checked out and he appeared to use some roundabout method of getting to the train station but after all was said and done the fee was cheaper than I expected (I wasn’t going to walk with baggage to the train station, far too long a walk timewise with stuff in tow). When I got into the station I asked what times the trains left for Paris in the afternoon and the girl showed me a schedule that went pretty far into the night at worst case. I was told I wouldn’t need to reserve any seats on any of the trains I chose.

Armed with that concept I walked about a block away (not far really) to the Alamo rental place which is actually just a small part of Citer who is a French car rental place. In any event the guy was on the phone but I explained my intentions and he said that it was doable. The time to get to Mont Saint-Michel he said was really in the 1:30 range not 2 hours. It was still before 9am when I had the car rented and was on my way. The car was a Citroën C3 hybrid diesel that I chose purely on the fact it was an automatic. It was a sluggish car at best being a hybrid economy vehicle but the mileage (kilometerage?, fuel efficiency?) did appear to be pretty good after all. I think the trip turned out to be 250 or so kilometers from Caen to Mont Saint-Michel and back. That’s rounded. I am not sure of the exact. The guy from Alamo/Citer gave me basic directions to get to the highway then told me the signs would get me there. He was spot on. It really was an easy drive and I was actually in the monument by 10:10am.

As I said in the phone posting, the moment I rounded a corner past a hedgerow I saw it from a fair distance still but it was striking to look at. I really did swear in awe. I drove a bit further to look for a pull off to take a picture from and eventually found something, though much closer than I had initially seen it. Without getting into a long boring history lesson (You can look it all up on your own if you are interested. Wikipedia would work fine.) Le Mont Saint-Michel is a very old abbey and monastery that was also used as a prison by the French for many years. Legend has it that the idea to build the abbey was provided by a vision from God somewhere in the 9th century. In any event the island is a large granite island and the structures are built atop that, giving the whole its massive appearance. It was built and rebuilt a couple times and was used as a fortress during war where it was never captured. It also has survived the World Wars and several natural disasters amongst other things. The bay around the mount will draw out and in with the tides giving the appearance that is totally accessible by land (without the artificially built bridge that now serves as the way in and a car parking area) when the tide is out as it was when I was there. I would have loved to have had the time to stay long enough to see the tide come in. Aside from the man made bridge the whole island is then surrounded by water and the pictures of it that way look very spectacular. I will take what I can get though because this almost didn’t happen I figure.

I again had to conquer the issue with money and now this tops the Pierrefonds expedition in total cost but I believe in this instance every penny of it was worth it. I walked through the whole of the moment, went through most all of the gift shops at some point and of course did the abbey tour using one of the preprogrammed audio guides. Actual guided tours provided by the facility were only done in French it seemed plainly obvious. The place is truly incredible and I am very glad I got there as early as I did because by the time I left at about 1:30 or so (maybe a tad later) the parking lots were absolutely full and there was just a ton of people around. I really liked the abbey tour and guide was even informative. I was able to listen to all the audio and I liked it in general. I walked all around the ramparts and was able to get a lot of pictures from many different angles. They said the abbey was not off limits for taking pictures as well so I chose to ignore my basic rule of not taking pictures of the insides of churches and the likes. The ramparts and the town itself are a veritable maze to wander through. Along the way I bought myself a hot dog at a small shop. Well, closer to the end really. In any event it was a hot dog on a cut of French bread. It wasn’t bad but I couldn’t help but feel I tasted mostly the bread (which they had toasted after the hot dog was done). I liked it but it was a quick meal on the go because if I sat somewhere I’d want a beer and I was driving in a foreign country for the first time (aside from Canada which doesn’t count).

When all was said and done I probably should have stayed about an hour longer because the train that I ended up taking to Paris didn’t leave until over an hour after I got to the train station. The drive back from the monument to Caen was a bit squishy. I missed a turn on the way out but I was able to wing it a bit and make an educated guess or two and have a lot of luck on my side (for a change) so that I ended up on the A84 sort of by accident and was heading back to Caen probably only losing about 5 or 10 minutes time. The return into Caen was partially a worry issue for me because I had to refill the tank and the directions out were easy but I had no directions in. They don’t use exit numbers here and it seemed rare that the signs actually mentioned the names of the highways. I picked the first sign that said Caen Centre and tried that. It brought me in through about 4 rotaries (roundabouts) and eventually I found that I was coming in from a completely different direction than I had expected but fortunately one that I recognized from the cab rides and walking. I was able to negotiate past the train station, past the rental place and find the gas station he had mentioned then turn around and park somewhat close to the place with relative ease after all. I even put diesel in it for them when I filled it up. The guy was surprised I was back so soon but I told him I had no traffic and did not really eat lunch there so it worked out well. I had about 3 and a half hours there and I got to do what I wanted to do. He said ok and took the key and I was on my way.

Getting to the train station I found that I should have made it about 4 and a half hours but by then it was already too late. Better to be safe than sorry I generally figure. So I listened to The Edges of Twilight by The Tea Party on the cell phone which killed the intervening time perfectly then boarded to the first class car sans reservations because I was told I could. The car was pretty close to full at the outset and the first stop of Lisieux (again) filled it up even further. I was glad there were fewer stops on the way back than there was on the way out.

From St Lazare I had to reverse navigate my way back to Gare du Nord where it would be a straight walk to the hotel in less than 5 minutes even including the luggage. I did find that there was indeed an underground route to the RER magenta line which would go to Gare du Nord. Actually I think it is just the E line which on the maps is colored magenta and the E line stop that connects with Gare du Nord is called Magenta. Either way when I got to the ticket counter outside the metro entry it was closed and there was only a ticket machine which wouldn’t let me select English though I could kind of figure out what was going on sort of. I was lucky enough to have a French woman behind me who realized I didn’t understand French well enough and offered to help me. The machine did not take bills. I only had copper change by this point and was expecting to pay a person with a 5 Euro bill. So I tried both of my cards and the machine would accept neither. The lady was very nice and paid my fare for me. I offered her the 5 but she refused to take it. I thanked her profusely and got my way down to the train where I had to wait about 5 minutes for it to leave. St Lazare is a terminus and works east only from that station. Gare du Nord is only one stop away. It is at least a 4 minute ride. I would expect the walk is not terribly long but I wasn’t about to try it with luggage in tow.

After issuing out at Magenta I wended my way through till I found the Gare du Nord exit near the Grande Lignes I was expecting and headed straight for the hotel. The woman at the desk remembered me and gave me my key. While I was begging for a different room and got one, they sent me to room 49, right across the hall from 47. It may be slightly smaller with a larger bed (only one) but you still have to climb up and down 49 steps to get to it (not great with luggage in tow). I really only just dropped off my stuff and turned right around to get something to eat because by the time I was in the room it was already 8:10pm. I was pretty tired and very hungry. My plan was to try the Café Indiana again because I was pretty sure they were serving food and I was right. I may have spotted a couple places to use Tuesday and Wednesday as well as I am now entrenched in Paris for sleeping quarters until I leave on Thursday. I had the steak again and didn’t take a picture of it because it was a repeat. Unfortunately, the waitress didn’t ask me how I wanted it cooked and I got it murdered to death. Fortunately, I was very hungry and was able to eat it anyway. I accompanied that with two Affligem and then followed with an espresso and the Apple Pie Indiana which was a sort of dry American style apple pie with crème fraiche on the side and vanilla ice cream too. I wasn’t sure how they expected me to eat it since the ice cream and crème both came in little plastic cups. I opted to dip the pie in the crème and then ate the ice cream separately.

A note about French service. When they ask you if you are done they for some reason don’t even remotely consider bringing you the bill. They just wander off and leave you there. I can’t even conceive of the concept in America where they are dying to get people out of tables just to get rid of them or to clear up space so new people can come in. In America we are agreeable to the concept because unless in party of some format we don’t really need to hang around the restaurant after we are done. I witnessed this waitress just forgetting about several people (most of whom were French) as well as myself. I and the guy at the table next to me had to flag down another server to get our bills because she apparently even decided to go out and smoke. This of course is not a solitary incident. You have to specify that you want to pay blatantly or you will sit for another 20 minutes for no reason at all. Personally it kind of offends my northeastern sensibilities but when in France…

A Citroën and an explitive

I did manage to rent the car. It was a diesel hybrid chosen because it was auto. The drive was a straight shot. When Mont Saint-Michel came into view I said, "Oh *explitive sort of meaning wow*," because it is very impressive. This post by phone.

France Day 9

I of course had grand plans for Day 9 because my intention was to get to Mont Saint-Michel. I got up early for a Sunday and walked down the bus stop and found it didn’t start until 9am. Fine by me, the walk to the stop is only about 10 minutes. I walked back and had the buffet breakfast by which I mean I had some cereal, a croissant, glass of very pulpy orange juice and a cup of coffee. When I finished this I walked back to the bus stop and rode the bus into St. Pierre Station then walked on to the train station. At the ticket office I found out that for some reason far beyond my comprehension the first trip to Mont Saint-Michel starts at 2pm and it takes about 2 hours to get to the city of Pontorson where you would still have to take a bus for 9km. That means not arriving to the monument until past 4pm. The places closes at 7pm if I am lucky then it would be a two hour ride back to Caen but the likelihood that a train was coming back from 7pm to 9pm was near impossible. Then I would most likely have to taxi back to the room for the return. So basically, France defeated me again.

I ended up wandering the city of Caen for the rest of the day. I was in town by 9:15am and did not get back to the hotel until after 3pm, so I did make a full day of it. I walked through just about all of the main part of the city and saw all of the major churches and revisited the chateaux as well as found an open air market happening down by a pier on the river where a ferry apparently lets in. The market was all either food stalls many of which smelled very good or the typical flea market junk or counterfeit clothing and watches that you always find. It was unfortunately still very early when I was walking through it and I didn’t end up buying any food. I can’t bring any of the produce they had home either so while some of it looked very good I skipped past it all.

From the market I found one of the two abbeys in the town. This one was smaller and on the eastern side of the city and was closed for the day because it was Sunday. I am sure it is an historical place and was attached to an older church. The abbey building however looked newer. There was a large park in back of that and I walked through that for a bit. I walked back through the town and revisited the chateaux to see if there was anything I missed but really just passed through it sort of quickly. The museums were closed for Sunday. From there I took sight of the other large church which was St Etienne and also had the other abbey on it. Also closed but this time for the lunch period of 11am to 2:30pm or something like that I didn’t bother to go in. It was just past noon when I got there. I walked back to the center of town where in search of lunch I ended up eating at Quick. Which is the French version of McDonald’s. Unfortunately, their name may be a bit misleading as I had to wait for about 5 minutes for my Double Cheese (Doo-blay cheez) burger. Though she gave me the fries and drink right away. The place was fairly busy. The girl didn’t speak any English. The food was better than McDonald’s maybe by the slightest bit but not much really if at all. By the way the chronology for today during the wanderings is a bit of a blur to me. I went all over the city eventually and it was a very nice day out (yes, people here were still wearing their winter jackets) and I enjoyed the waking. I am just not 100% sure if I went from A to B to C or A to C to D to B, etc. In any event I walked a real lot and visited about every site to see in the city I am pretty sure, recognizing that aside from the chateaux everything was closed.

After eating I was undecided what to do. I sort of thought of looking for a café to have a beer but instead though I would try to walk back to the hotel. While on the bus ride into town I kept close eye on the way we went and found that there appeared to be a path that came down the hill and along the road and allowed a pedestrian to walk across the street up a distance and make it to town. I initially took the wrong street and had to backtrack a ways when I realized my mistake but on the second attempt I found the correct street and took the path and it did indeed come up to the street that the Memorial bus stop was on which lead right up to the Memorial. I returned to the Memorial because the place was so crowded on Saturday I stayed out of the gift shop after finishing the visit and my guess paid off because the place was only an eighth as full at best as it was on Saturday. I browsed the shop and bought a couple things then went up to the cafeteria and bought an iced tea because I was very thirsty by this point. Of course my politeness made me let someone order in front of me though I probably arrived to the counter first and it turned out to be one of those orders from hell. All I wanted was the iced tea. I could have been done in seconds but ended up having to wait for about 10 minutes. Yay me. After I sat and drank the bottle and then rested my legs for a very few minutes I walked back to the hotel and typed up stuff.

I got here just after 3pm and I started on the plot that I had hatched in my brain not to be completely defeated on Mont Saint-Michel. I got online and searched the rental car sites for the area and the Alamo site claims they have cars that are automatics available tomorrow. So I put a reservation on it (no money down) and I am going to try to get there when they open tomorrow and rent a car for the day. The drive from here to there should be about 2 hours or less down the A84. I have seen estimates as low as 1 hour 17 minutes but 2 hours to be on the safe side. It was something like 68 miles anyway but I am not sure of road speeds and all of that. From there I should be able to stay a couple hours and then drive right back to the rental place and then hop on a train back to Paris where I can check back into my hotel there. I am sure that all sorts of hell will go wrong, most likely that I won’t be able to find an automatic (I’m not about to pay for the clutch on a foreign car to learn how to drive stick with no one to show me), or who knows what else. If they don’t have a car I can drive then I will just get on a train to Paris and call this area quits. I know I won’t be able to stay too late in Mont Saint-Michel if I can get there but I am going to try anyway. It will amount to being more expensive than the visit to Pierrefonds including having to purchase fuel I am sure. The reason I am not taking a train to Mont Saint-Michel on Monday then heading straight into Paris is that I have no means of keeping my luggage on a train though I could store it in a car for the time after I check out. The hotel is so far out of town there’s no way to get in from the train, get the luggage if they would store it here and then head back to the station without far too much time being wasted. Lastly, the train station in Caen is too small to have lockers. I did a quick sweep but there’s nothing there for that or I would have considered that option (heck it would be the cheapest on one day of rail pass travel) as the best. So basically I am expecting total defeat number 2 but I have my war face on and I will try what I can to win anyway.

On a side note, the French apparently play rugby, or so the TV shows…

After resting for a while I went down to the hotel restaurant and had lunch. This time I had the upside down tomato pie for a starter and then the sliced duck with red wine sauce for the main course. Both were good though the red wine sauce was perhaps a bit sweet for my taste. To follow I had an espresso and the pineapple carpaccio which was very thinly sliced pineapple with a syrup of some sort over it. I liked it but I was actually trying to have the apple pie with vanilla ice cream. I didn’t have the heart to argue with them.

My only hopes are tomorrow works out the best or signals its failure early. Renting the car then not getting there would be worse than not renting the car at all.

Still No Picture Posting

Sorry, but this place worked out as bad as the last one when it comes to internet connection speeds so I won't be able to post the rest of my pictures until I am back in the states.

France Day 8

Start to finish today was a long one. I got up before six to make sure I was completely packed and ready because I would be taking several hours of trains to get to Caen (kind of pronounced like Khan from the Wrath of Khan but in that French cut off way). Reception didn’t open until 7 but I was pretty much there only a couple minutes after. I was not the first person there as someone was already having breakfast. I checked out and had the hotel call me a taxi which I took to the train station. He seemed to have started the fare before he got there but how can I argue with a guy that doesn’t speak English? In any event it wasn’t near as expensive as the rides to and from Pierrefonds. When I got the station I booked the trains I needed to Caen. One to Gare du Nord and from there I apparently needed to get to Gare St-Lazare where I would be able to get on a train to Caen. There was about 50 minutes to make the change from one to the other.The first train was an express to Gare du Nord and only took about 45 minutes from Compiegne having no stops. I tried to do what research I could on my cell phone through google to figure out how to get to St-Lazare. It turns out there is only one stop of the magenta line (not kidding, magenta) from Gare du Nord to St-Lazare. I was able to twist my way through Gare du Nord and find the metro station and more specifically the magenta line and purchase a ticket. Of course the metro at St-Lazare does not exit into the main train station but I was able to orient myself fairly quickly and get into the station where even though it wasn’t supposed to head out for half an hour I was able to already board the train to Caen because it was waiting at the track (voie).

I got situated and went through day 7’s pictures to orient them correctly as I hadn’t done that yet while I was on the train then I thought about writing the early events to that point but opted not to and instead tried to just relax and watch the countryside. There was a stop at Lisieux which had a very impressive moment apparently called the Basillica of St Therese up on a hill. I was surprised to find out it was built from 1950(something) to 1970(something). I am not sure if it was a rebuild of something destroyed in a war or if it was a completely new building. In any event the google search that provided that information from the phone made the concept less interesting to me so I didn’t read too deeply on it. There is also a very huge looking cathedral in that town but I wasn’t able to get pictures of either due to train movement or placement of the train in the station. I suppose it goes without saying the town had a huge church. So far I haven’t been to a town or city that hasn’t had several in France. The whole train ride was moderately uneventful but I did meet an American couple from Florida and gladly gabbed in English for a while with them. They have been to a few more places than I have. They were very nice and were also heading to the Normandy area though one stop up on the train line.

After disembarking I was able to get a taxi to the hotel. The map made the trip look really far and I wasn’t about to go searching for buses at that point. The ride wasn’t terribly expensive but I was right to not try to walk this one as there is a point where we crossed a highway with no apparent walking paths around it I could discern. The hotel is really just outside of town and meant for someone who has a car it seems. When I checked in they were still cleaning rooms because they had a full day the day before (probably due to the fact that the Caen Normandy Memorial is right up the road and it was Victory Day yesterday) so I was only able to drop my bags off and get on my way back out the door. My pictures of the new location do not start with the room for this reason, it wasn’t really cleaned yet. Fortunately, as I said the D-Day Memorial was right up the street in walking distance so I visited that for some time. It was interesting and in some respects it didn’t mince as many words (there were actually English signs and boards) about the French involvement in World War II. I had sort of expected some euphemistic texts but they admitted the French rolled over quickly and then ended up collaborating with the Nazis along the way. The monument is of course an international type thing and there were sections on the British and the Americans and their involvement as well. The was a movie about the Battle of Britain that was actually in English with French subtitles and in the area where they had letters from various soldiers in the war the audio sections from Americans and Canadians were read in English as well. I was a bit surprised at this but I was happy for it.

When I was done with the Memorial I had spotted a bus stop across the street. I checked the times on it and I had a few minutes so I took a short foray to see if there was actually a way I could walk into town. The distance isn’t really that far to the center of town it is just blocked by that highway so far as I could tell even after venturing to it. So I walked back to the bus stop and got on board. The Memorial stop is a terminus and starting point so I was able to tell the bus would be there in a few minutes because he was sitting at the end of the line coming in when I got back there. I rode the bus into the town to pretty close to the Caen Chateaux which was a fairly interesting old fort and castle which if it was still standing would have been from around the early times of the Normans. 11th century at that latest. The castle was however destroyed by bombing in the war and recent efforts to excavate have turned up a bit of interesting stuff around there. This area was all free to enter and I wandered around it for a bit trying to get everywhere I could and take all the pictures I could. I found the free Museum of Normandy inside and went through that. It was a collection of archaeology from the Norman areas here in northern France over time. I liked it a lot even though the building was small. It did house a lot of artifacts and surprisingly there was English translations for the placards on most everything here as well. The fortress walls also house a museum of bad art, sorry I mean modern art, but I didn’t remotely consider going in there.

By the time I was done with the fort and the ruins and the museum it was getting close to 5pm and I was unsure how to secure my bus back to Memorial if it was even possible. I started backtracking the route as best I could with aid from the GPS (it’s amazing how things look very different on foot than they do in a bus) and managed to find the Sabron stop where the bus had let some people on while heading into town. Across the street it had a return bus stop that did indeed head to Memorial and I only had to wait about 4 minutes for it. I took that and then I walked back to the hotel to relax a bit and get some of this written. Fortunately the hotel does have a restaurant and they serve dinner starting at 7:15 (yes later than the Campanile) and I will have to make use of that (or I would have to walk down to and eat at the restaurant in the Memorial if they stay open that late.

It occurred to me that I hadn’t consumed anything at all since the night before by the time I got to the room and I immediately drank several cups of tap water (by the way the only tap water I haven’t liked here is the Ibis Amiens. I am not sure if it was the water itself or their pipes but the hotel seemed newer so I will lean towards the water itself. After that I found the brewpot and made some Nescafe provided by the hotel to at least have something going into my stomach and then set about to writing this. The hotel again has wifi which is nice and I tested the speed of uploads and it looks like I might be able to get day 6 up if I am lucky but I doubt I will be able to get the 300+ pictures from day 7 up with the speeds I appear to be getting. Still it is better than nothing.

After relaxing a bit by watching the BBC on the TV in the room, The Weakest Link – a show I’ve never watched, I went down to the hotel restaurant for dinner. There was a already a fairly sizeable crowd of older Brits who apparently were in the area on a tour of some sort occupying the room. Nonetheless it was easy to get seated. Today I opted to have a started because I was starved to go along with a Leffe and the bread they gave. The starter was listed on the English language menu as eggplant crumble and it was very good. It was sort of like it sounds, a bread topped eggplant dish. I liked it a lot. For the main course I chose to have the sea breem with citrus sauce. It also was very good but perhaps I was so hungry I wouldn’t have noticed. In any event the sauce wasn’t very citrusy but I liked it. It was accompanied by haricots verts and boiled white rice. I wasn’t expecting plain boiled white rice but it was cooked correctly and an enjoyable part of the meal. I opted not to have a dessert because I had the starter and just finished off with an espresso which was a bit small for my taste before heading back to the room where I made a tea to finish off the night.

For the sake of mention for those who would understand and care on the BBC apparently there is a show called Tonight’s the Night and Captain Jack from Torchwood is apparently the host. I assume it is a basic talk/variety show but it was mostly over when I turned the TV on. They were having a contest to have an “alien” film a scene in the Tardis for the show at a later date. Then he finished off the show by singing and dancing. It was a bit strange because he doesn’t have a distinctive voice. It was not however surprising.

France Day 7

So, May 8 is not really a big day for Americans but it apparently is a holiday for the French. Victory Day it seems. I had to check that on my google calendar where I had added French holidays. Why do I know this, you ask? Well, because after I got to the bus station and time for the bus to depart for Pierrefonds was overdue by about 45 minutes I started to wonder if I was going to be defeated yet again. I went back into the train part of the station and they were able to get across that, “today is a special day in France.” Special day indeed. The day that we had officially saved their bacon from having to speak German for the rest of their lives. The day the end of WWII on the European front was made official.

So the only way to not be defeated today was to bring to bear on it the one thing that will generally win. I threw money at the problem. This in the form of taking a taxi from Compiegne to Pierrefonds. Not going to get into the pricing but suffice it to say that this will be the most expensive single castle visit I ever make even counting for inflation in the future. Nonetheless I had to consider it the price of success over defeat. I was not up for a second total defeat and not so soon after the first.

Pierrefonds is a very small town whose dominant feature is the Chateaux. It rests on a hill overlooking the main square. There is an older church down by the main square as well. The Chateaux was originally very old however King Louis XIV didn’t like it for some reason and had it torn down. Well it wasn’t completely torn down but a large amount of stone were taken from it to use for other projects and the castle pretty much looked like a ruin for a long time. Some time after that the French set to restoring it to its former glory though since the restoration I do not believe it has been occupied. It is a very large and beautiful castle and they suggest it is the castle that Cinderella’s Castle for Disney is based upon. I am not sure if it is true but I certainly could believe it. The externals do show a bit of age and some preservation work really does appear to be in order but it is a pretty grand site.

When I got to the town I immediately headed up to the castle and it was dead quiet all around. Fortunately I wasn’t finding any gates blocked. I did have the basic fear that with the buses being shut down then there was a chance the monuments could be closed as well. Fortunately as I got to the main entrance after walking the path around and up to it I could hear voices, there was apparently a group tour of some sort there just ahead of me. I had received a discount card for entry from the Compiegne Palace visit I had made the day before and I presented that to at least save a couple Euro off the total price of this trip. There were no guided tours in the place but I was able to buy an English language guide book for a couple Euro. A lot of the place was open but a fair amount was closed to the public as well. Unfortunately there was no entry to any of the high towers to see out of or whatnot. I would really have liked to have been able to do that. In any event I scoured the entire area that was open and since I never found any signs that said no cameras or pictures I took as many as I could. I had to double back on a couple places because I was unsure if I should at first but decided what the heck, there wasn’t even a lot of employees there.

It is obvious that a lot of the building has been rebuilt, especially from the inside where the walls and floors are often in much better shape than you’d expect. Especially the stairwells are all a lot more even and easy to walk up and down even though they are spirals.

If I had to guess I spent over 2 hours up around and through the castle and after that I walked back into the town and then tried to find some vantage points for more pictures. There weren’t as many as I had hoped and I had no access to one whole side of the castle from as far as I could see (unless it would have been a very very long walk. After doing this for a bit I returned to town and found a place to have lunch called Le Commerce. The menu seemed to be mainly salads and a few seafood dishes. I was a bit nervous about how I was getting back so I opted just for a salad which I guessed on. It was Le Commerce also. It was a ham and cheese green salad with a hard boiled egg and a baked potato on the side. I skipped on the potato but ate most of the salad and all of the bread they gave me. The French are obviously very into their bread and if you do like bread this is definitely a great country to visit to experience great bread. I had always thought that the people walking or riding bicycles with their baguettes was a cliché and didn’t really happen at all. However I have been able to witness that it is for real. People will buy bread and walk around and munch on a giant loaf as well as apparently buying fresh bread to take home every day. Back to the story at hand, sorry. After the salad to buy some time I ordered a desert which was coffee ice cream (again with frozen coffee beans) with chocolate sauce and whipped cream. They put a little frou frou drink umbrella on it even. I think the French are also serious about their coffee ice cream and it is very good. I did actually get a picture of this dessert. After that I bought some more time with a coffee which actually wasn’t an espresso but was obviously made by that sort of coffee maker. Nonetheless it wasn’t bad at all.

When I finished the meal completely I asked the waiter that showed he could speak English if he could help me get a taxi in as many words. They were very pleasant and called me the cab without making me dial and try to express myself over the phone. I left a bit bigger tip than I am sure they usually get since their prices were service included according to the bill. It wasn’t a very long wait until the taxi arrived and I had him drive me back to the hotel rather than the center of town which yielded no savings. It was still relatively early in the day but I needed to relax a bit and I figured I could get this much written anyway.

I was then faced with the fact that the cleaning people still hadn’t gotten to my room and I was waffling on what to do when the lady pushed the cart in front of my window. So I decided to head back into Compiegne center and see if maybe any souvenir shops were open. Of course, it being a holiday and all we wouldn’t have any of that. I did a few laps of all the major areas and there wasn’t a souvenir except postcards to be had. I ended up walking back to the gardens of the palace and then out beyond them where there are some very significant walking and biking paths. I walked pretty deep out through some of the wooded area then came back in through the main open area that I have several pictures of from the palace’s back door basically. When I had gotten back in front of the palace I decided that I had been walking for some two hours already and I should head back to the room. I mulled the idea of sitting at a café and having a beer but decided against it because I was afraid to lose the momentum I had walking and lock up. I got back to the room a bit after 5pm and decided to use the tub to soak my feet in hot water and watch the Easter episode of Dr Who I had yet to watch. It being an hour long I paused when the water got to be only tepid and finished in the main room. Since I was now very far from town and unlikely to walk back I would have dinner at the hotel again. The service was very nice but not a one of them spoke any English. Nonetheless at least I knew they would serve food and I could have a couple beers.

I ended up ordering the Pavé du boeuf with pomme frites mainly because I was uncertain if the turbot which caught my eye would be fresh enough, after all I’m not really near the ocean in Compiegne. After ordering the beef and getting it truly rare I am sorry I didn’t try for the turbot after all. The beef was really good and chef cooked it to an almost uncooked state for me. One of the best representations of rare I have had in a very long time. Don’t get me wrong this wasn’t the Kobe beef from Japan but it was a very satisfying piece of rib steak nonetheless. I would guess if they could provide beef that good I would have enjoyed the turbot. I wish I’d tried the beef yesterday, then I definitely would have had the turbot today. I accompanied the beef with eventually 3 bottles of Affligem Blonde. After that I headed back to the room to finish out the night and prepare for more travel on Saturday.

I figure I will give you another couple France tidbits because I have a few minutes. One, there was a mantle in Pierrefonds that had two reliefs of squirrels on it. It made me notice that I have not seen one squirrel of any sort since I have been in France aside from fake ones. Even when I was walking through the woods today I was on the lookout for any but there was not a one to be found. I find it a bit strange since the other European countries I’ve visited had squirrels of some form or another. Two, when you are walking in the cities or towns always keep an eye out where you step because the people that walk their dogs do almost nothing to pick up after their droppings. It seems sort of fortunate that I have not seen a very large number of people who own dogs but those people obviously don’t care about keeping the sidewalks clean for other pedestrians. I find it almost as disappointing as the graffiti near all the train tracks and even in a few other places but at least dog dropping wash away after time. They don’t seem to be doing anything to get rid of the graffiti. So far the cleanliness of France is in very stark contrast to the cleanliness of Sweden and even in all the grim overcast and rain that I saw there I felt their cities were more tidy. Of course I’ve mostly seen Paris through grim overcast but I don’t think it’ll change my opinion much on the cleanliness to have some sun on it. You’d think for a country with so much pride in itself that they would have more pride in the way they keep things. I will say at least they clean up most of the trash on the streets and garbage removal looks prompt.

I fear I may have to go to Paris Gare du Nord then on to Caen to get to my next stop but I am hoping I can sort it out pretty quickly and be on my way early in the morning on Saturday. Hopefully the Friday holiday does not spill over to Saturday or I may cause an international incident. If you see me on the news, that’s why…

As with the issue last night, no pictures posted unless Caen has a reasonable connection speed.

Bandwidth Limiter

If I had to guess I would say the hotel here has a bandwidth limiter on their wifi so I can't get pictures uploaded right now. I tried 4 times with Day 6's set and was unable to get any posted. Hopefully Caen will have something otherwise I won't be able to post pictures until I get home.