Roadside view in Switzerland

Gold-plated macarons

We didn’t exactly get up and at ’em this morning.  Checkout time for our airbnb was 11am and we barely made it.  Bob and Zoe had to run, and Lanie and I had to walk into town for various supplies for the day.  We’d had our whole picnic planned out based on items we’d seen in shops on previous days, but alas were thwarted by the fact that it was a Sunday morning and apparently the whole town shuts down.  Luckily we eventually found a large market featuring local foods that opened at 10am, and were able to procure various sandwiches, pretzels, fruit, and carrots.  Oh, and we found a bakery selling macarons and bought a box, which practically required us to take out a mortgage on our house.

Swiss picnic

In any case, at 11:00 we were on the road.  We’d considered taking a scenic route, but decided to stick with the comfort of our GPS and minimize the length of the drive.  As it turned out, it was plenty scenic in any case.  The most direct route between Colmar and Chamonix, in the Alps, is mostly through Switzerland, so we got to add a new country to our list.  We admired the rolling farmland and picturesque villages along the

Roadside view from the rest stop

highway, and stopped to have our picnic lunch at a rest stop with picnic tables under the trees.  We passed by several towns that have become namesakes for what they produce: Gruyere, Emmenthal, St. Bernard, Evian.  We eventually came upon Lake Geneva, an enormous blue-green lake with mountains towering in the background.

Hiking at the Swiss hotel

At that point the road abruptly changed.  Our comfortable highway disappeared and in its place was a narrow, two lane road climbing a series of switchbacks up the looming mountain.  It was quite…invigorating being on the cliff side of the car, with inadequate guardrails, and I’m sure it was not any better for Bob in the driver’s seat.  It didn’t take long for Nadia to start to suffer from carsickness, and the rest of us were a bit queasy as well.

Hiking at the Swiss hotel

Luckily when we’d summited the mountain we found a little Swiss hotel/restaurant with a parking lot and some amazing viewpoints that made an excellent stopping/recovery point.  We took a few short walks and admired the scenery before hopping in the car for the final half hour drive to Chamonix.

The scenery here is breathtaking.  The road and towns are on the floor of a valley, with dramatic, snow-capped peaks rearing up on either side.  Everywhere has a view, and our rented townhouse is no exception.  Chamonix provides more evidence that the French know how to build resort towns better than we do.  The buildings are lovely, the winding streets

View from our home in Chamonix

full of charm and flowers.  There are restaurants, cafes, and bars with outdoor umbrella-ed tables on pedestrian streets.  There is a bus that will take you up and down the valley and cable cars that will bring you high up on the mountainsides on either side.

We strolled into town along a pedestrian/bike path, alongside a rushing glacial river.  The girls

No screens in France!

decided they could use a relaxing night in, and we actually managed to find a sizeable grocery store in town, so we picked up supplies for them to make dinner.  Of course, we got rained on again on the way back home — and up here in the mountains, it’s cold when the rain starts.  (It’s even colder when you’re walking next to a glacial river.)  Nevertheless, Bob and I made it back in (this time bringing raincoats, which ensured that it didn’t rain again) for an adult dinner in town.  Tomorrow we have to arise early for the girls’ paragliding adventure!

Beautiful downtown Chamonix with Mer de Glace glacier in the background

Glacial river in Chamonix

Our decision to return the bikes early proved to be a good one.  Heading out to the patisserie for breakfast the next morning, we found ourselves getting rained on again.  (We still apparently haven’t learned our lesson about always bringing our raincoats.)  The rain continued unabated throughout our walk to the rental car company, but fortunately we were able to secure the car without incident.  Best of all, it had a built-in GPS!   Ah, the joy of always knowing where you are.

We decided to attempt on four wheels what we hadn’t managed on two wheels the day before, and set off once again up the Route de Vin.  Our first destination was the village of Riquewihr, and it did not disappoint. Nestled into the green hillsides, straight out of a fairy tale — like something you’d see in Disney World, but all authentic.

Pretzels make everyone happy

The whole Route de Vin is lined with wineries and vineyards, and Bob and I decided we had to at least experience a bit of it.  The girls had shown a propensity to linger long around this fountain containing many large goldfish and koi, so we set them up there with soft pretzels and slipped off to do a wine tasting nearby.  A good time was had by all.  And it didn’t rain at all!

The next village up the road, Hunawihr, promised a “stork and otter reintroduction center”.  (Storks are VERY big here.  They’re native to this region in the summers, but due to

Wine makes parents happy

various human activities had dwindled to single digits around thirty years ago.  The region of Alsace made a huge effort to save them and

Stork nest atop the church

achieved great results.  One of the things we noticed is that many buildings have a circular platform built out on to the roof to host nesting storks, and may of them are populated.  There is stork-themed merchandise everywhere.)

Dinner time for the ROUSs

Anyway, this place was way more fun than we had anticipated.  There were lots of different aquatic-related animals on display.  None of the bird habitats were enclosed, so there were storks, ducks, geese, and cormorants wandering around and flying through the air everywhere.  We saw giant hamsters (not actually sure if they fit with the aquatic theme) and these large aquatic rodents called ragondins that we couldn’t identify but

Nest-building stork

decided were most likely the famed Rodents Of Unusual Size.  There was this cool “parcour” walk that never would have flown in the US because of the likelihood of some tourist falling off into the water.  (All of us managed not to fall off into the water.)  When we climbed the observation tower above the trees, we saw that the treetops were full of stork pairs, preening and working on their nests.

On the parcour course

Very creepy sea lion

Best of all was a really cool show that featured various animals that fish.  We couldn’t understand a word of the presentation in French, but it didn’t really matter.  The presenter brought out, in succession, storks, cormorants, otters, a sea lion, and penguins.  They jumped into a tank of water with clear sides.  Instead of doing human-taught tricks, the staff would throw live fish into the pool and we could watch — above and below the water — while the animals caught them.  It was fascinating, particuarly when watching the

UFC championship: cormorant vs. eel

cormorant do battle with an eel.  (The cormorant won, but it took some time.  After appearing to swallow the eel, the cormorant opened its mouth again to eat a fish, and the eel re-emerged and had to be caught again.)  I’m sure from the fishes’ perspective, it was much like being thrown into a Roman gladiator ring.

We made an attempt to make one more stop in Ribeauville, where we were considering doing a hike to some castle ruins — but there was a

After seeing what happened to the eel, you’d think Lanie would keep her distance.

festival going on and we couldn’t find parking.  (One downside of the GPS was that before we realized what was happening, it had led us down into the very narrow warren of cobblestone streets that seem to only be made for pedestrians.   Luckily it was also able to get us out again.)

All that remained to cap off a great day was another trip to the park for Zoe to run, and a sunset dinner in Colmar, followed by delicious gelato.  Tomorrow, onward to the Alps!

Colmar sunset

Leg 1 – the Metro

This morning we bid adieu to Paris and moved on to Colmar, in the Alsace region on the border with Germany.

I have to say, we were feeling pretty good about ourselves midway through the day.  We’d arisen at 7am and gotten out the door by 8, without (as far as we know) forgetting anything.  We successfully walked to the Place Monge Metro stop, figured out how to buy five tickets, and sauntered on to the #7 train just as it pulled into the station.

Half an hour on the train and we’d arrived at the Gare de l’Est to catch the train to Colmar.  We were especially pleased that (a) we could take a train in just over two hours, while it would have taken five and a half to drive, and (b) we’d found some kind of budget train line (OUIGO) that got us all there in less than 100 euros.

The canals of Petit Venise

Our luck continued to hold.  The train became available for boarding just as we arrived on the platform.  The OUIGO app I’d installed on my phone was able to pull up our tickets, and they scanned successfully, even without wifi.  We had four seats facing each other with a table in the middle (plus one extra seat across the aisle), perfect for holding the cheese and baguette feast we’d brought along for breakfast, and afterward for playing hearts.  We watched the French countryside whiz by outside the window as we sped comfortably east.

Rosti lunch

The train arrived on time, and there was wifi in the station that allowed me to send a message to our airbnb host saying we’d arrived.  He responded that he was at the apartment ready to receive us.  All that remained was the 1.5-kilometer walk from the station to the apartment.

That’s when it all went horribly wrong.

The first problem is that one of the wheels on our very large roller suitcase (which we’d brought instead of our usual backpacks because of the per-bag fee on WOW Air) has broken off, meaning Bob has to carry our very heavy bag.  (We know it weighs 20.2 kg, because we just squeaked by on the WOW limit of 20 kg.)  Still, we were fairly cheerful setting off, our google directions in hand.

Then we couldn’t find our first turn.  (Later we discovered it was a street that was blocked off by construction and incorrectly labeled.)  This started a nightmare of wandering back and forth, up and down, asking directions and then getting lost again.  We didn’t have a detailed map or a functional phone and it was extremely hot.  On the verge of despair, we finally found our way to a street on our directions only to be blocked by construction again.  In the end, the ten-minute walk took us well over an hour and we almost got blocked inside a construction site.

Finally, joy of joys, we’d located the address.  It was an old-fashioned house, with a set of modern apartments behind it.  We didn’t know where to go.  After knocking on all the doors and ringing the buzzer for all the apartments, in desperation I left the family sitting in the driveway and set off to find wifi.  Here our luck improved again, with a McDonalds right around the corner.  Upon getting my messages I found that our host had left to get lunch and would be back soon.  (Apparently he drove around in his van for a while looking for us, without success.)

The girls spent some time and money in this visually appealing but exorbitantly expensive candy store.

Finally the good luck gods returned.  The apartment is spacious and lovely (though everything is blindingly white, so I’m very afraid of messing it up).  After a little recovery time, we headed into the nearby town center and were agape at how beautiful it was.  We’re near the neighborhood called “Petit Venise” because of its canals.  Every street seemed more quaint than the last.

The architecture, food, and culture here is more German than French.  For a late lunch/early dinner we found ourselves at a restaurant that almost exclusively served many variations

on a local specialty called a “rosti”, which is a baked meal based on potatoes, bacon, and onions — Zoe’s dream come true.  Nadia tried spaetzle and was pleased with the result.  Bob and I shared a carafe of local Gewurztraminer.  The girls found tiramisu-flavored soft serve.  We found another pleasant park for Zoe to run laps around.  Life was good again.

Top of the Arc de Triomphe

When I reflect back on Paris, I think the thing that will first come to mind is…stairs.

Stairs to the Arc de Triomphe.  Stairs to the Eiffel Tower.  Stairs to the top of the towers in Notre Dame.  This in addition to all the regular stairs one comes across during a normal Paris outing — stairs to the second floor apartment, stairs to the Metro, stairs to the Seine.  Combined with the miles and miles of walking we’ve done each day, I surely have calves of steel by now.  I think the children are nearing mutiny and I’m starting to dream about spiral staircases.

This is a bonus set of stairs we got to climb at Notre Dame, to see the belfry.

I was actually prepared to skip the Eiffel Tower, when I saw the size of the line.  (Who knew so many people would be willing to take the stairs?  The line was only marginally shorter — and the tickets marginally cheaper — than the elevator.  I was assuming we’d waltz right in past a long line of elevator people.  I guess that’s Europeans for you.)  Nadia was downright eager to skip it (and ended up only making it to the first level).  Bob was clearly of the same mindset as Nadia, but apparently took it as a test of his manhood to force himself to the top of the tower.

SuperZoe!

At least the stairs didn’t seem all that tiring, because of the adreneline rush you get from climbing inside a flimsy-seeming metal cage, surrounded by views of dizzying drops.  This helped us make rapid time up to the second level.  In the end we were happy we’d gone up and happy we’d done it the hard way.  (See Lanie’s post for photos.)

Breakfast at the local patisserie

I shouldn’t complain that much, though, because Zoe has it much worse.  She has to run almost every day for her cross country team, lest she feel the wrath of her coach, Fergus.  Fergus apparently doesn’t accept any excuses about how you walked 15 miles or climbed 8000 stairs today.  So at the end of our long days, after the walking and climbing, when I can barely hobble across the street to the creperie, Zoe usually has to go out and run five or six miles.  We found a lovely park near our apartment (the Jardin de Luxembourg) where she can run around the perimeter and we can keep tabs on her as she goes by.  Bob has been valiantly running part of the way with her,

On the Batobus

but eventually he loses steam and she has to do a couple more laps on her own.  (Our days are so long that usually we barely fit the runs in before the park closes at 9:30pm.  Luckily it stays light until almost 10:00 here!)

As I mentioned in a prior post, we completely failed in our usual plan to combat jet lag, which involves staying up until 7 or 8 at night then sleeping twelve hours or so and waking up to a normal schedule.  Instead, on our first day we ended up being awake way too late, then slept until noon on Day 2.  Of course, this led to us being unable to sleep at a normal hour that night.  At 2:30am

At the Jardin de Plantes

all the children had wandered restlessly out of their various bedrooms, and Bob and I were still up as well, and this does not make for happy parents.  So I’ve been setting the alarm gradually earlier each day, starting at 9:30 on Day 3.

To give our legs a bit of a break, we bought tickets for the Batobus, a boat that lets you hop on and off at various sites along the Seine.  We

Palais de Decouverte

were able to hop on the boat at the lovely Jardin de Plantes and ride it over to the Champs Elysees, Paris’s famous luxury shopping street.  We took in the massive, glass-walled Grand Palais (constructed for the 1900 World’s Fair).  Tucked on one side of it was the Palais de Decouverte, a science museum.

We figured it would just be a small place, but it turned out to be quite impressive (as well as being housed in an amazing palace).  Our main problem in

Pasteur defeating disease-causing bacteria

science museums is that Zoe likes to read every word of every exhibit, while Nadia tends to glance around for 30 seconds and declare she’s ready to move on.  Since Zoe is working in a microbiology lab this summer, we let her spend a fair amount of time in the excellent temporary exhibit devoted to Pasteur.  Fortunately for Nadia, most of the other exhibits were only in French, so Zoe was somewhat thwarted (though she was willing to attempt to read the French, which made the process even longer).  As it was, Zoe would have happily spent the rest of the day but other activities, and lunch, were calling.

The power of leverage

Then we had to walk again, up the avenue to the Arc de Triomphe.  Throughout the walk we were looking for a creperie for a casual lunch, but such places are thin on the ground on the Champs Elysees.  By the time we’d climbed the Arc, admired the views of the 12 avenues radiating outward, and made our way back down, people were definitely getting seriously hungry.  We decided to go onward to the Eiffel Tower on foot and hoped to find a creperie on the way — but were foiled once again.  Eventually, after going out of our way and doing much fruitless walking, we settled for an Italian restaurant that was well-liked for its food but charged us a small fortune for drinks, which weren’t even alcoholic.  (The kids remember it very fondly, though, since the

Remains of tiramisu

waiter gave us a complimentary piece of tiramisu for dessert.  Nadia went so far as to enter the phone number on her phone, as though she plans to order takeout in the future.  I personally didn’t feel that the tiramisu was worth the almost $60 that we paid for four bottles of water (most restaurants give you tap water for free) and four Cokes.)

Anyway, we were fortified with pizza and pasta and gold-plated water and Coke and tiramisu for our trip up the Eiffel Tower.

Sunset on the Batobus at 9:45pm

Given the line and the climb, we barely made it down in time for the last Batobus of the day at 9:30.  (Zoe had to skip her run this time.)  That was another reason we climbed so fast — after our experience attempting to take the Metro home from the Eiffel Tower on World Cup day, we were highly motivated to make that boat.

Too exhausted and not hungry

View of us buying crepes from our apartment window

enough to contemplate dinner, we made do with sweet crepes (we finally got our crepes!) from the creperie across the street from our apartment.  Jet lag has not totally left us and we’re still staying up too late, but the system has to work eventually.  8:30 alarm for Day 4!

Icelandic airport

We’ve successfully made it to France, courtesy of WOW Airlines.  I think they got their name from what people say when they find out how much it costs to bring a bag.  Consequently, we are traveling pretty light.  With careful measuring we determined that the girls’ school backpacks, if not overstuffed, could qualify as a “personal item,” so that’s their luggage.  Bob and I shared one suitcase to check ($80 each way) and we managed to avoid the carry-on category entirely ($60 each way).

WOW Airlines entails a stopover in Iceland.  Leaving Boston at 7pm and flying to Iceland, there was barely a night, with the pink light of the sunset almost immediately followed by the orange glow of sunrise.  The Iceland airport was pretty cool, although our enthusiasm dimmed once we’d spent $20 on two smoothies.  We had to go outside to get on our plane to France, and it was COLD.  (Now we are in France, and it it HOT.)

The scene at a nearby cafe

Anyway, WOW Airlines delivered us uneventfully to Paris, where we eventually managed to locate the train and find our way to the apartment we rented on airbnb.  I should mention here that it was now about 2pm on Sunday — three hours before the start of the World Cup championship, with France playing Croatia.  The street where we were staying was lined with bars and cafes and was closed off to traffic.  The mood was already quite…celebratory.

Climbing wall along the Seine

Everyone was exhausted from a night on the plane with little sleep, but our usual strategy for beating jet lag is to force ourselves to stay up until at least 7 or 8pm.  So once we’d gotten settled on our lovely apartment, we marshalled the troops and set off on foot.  (As I write this, it is noon on Monday and everyone but me is still asleep, so I think the plan failed.)

Paris Plages

We had read that the city was erecting a huge screen at the Eiffel Tower to show the game.  We figured we’d walk in that direction (3 miles according to the map) and check out the scene for a while, doing a little exploring on the way.  We headed for the Seine and enjoyed the beautiful architecture, “Paris Plages” setup (a faux beachfront set up along the river), and various huge street parties getting ready for the game.

Well, I guess we took a circuitious route or misread the map, because it was quite a long walk.  By the time we

reached the area around the tower, there were huge streams of people moving away from it.  Eventually, after wandering around that area for a while, we discovered the police had barricaded it off and we were stuck on the wrong side.

The energy in the city was amazing though.  Periodically we’d hear a roar

Some much-needed cooling mist

go up all around us as we walked along, and we’d know that France had scored.  French flags and people painted red, white, and blue were everywhere.  (Bob found a little flag on the ground so we were able to wave it around and join the party.)  Near the Eiffel tower someone who lived on the ground floor had opened their window near the TV set, and a throng of fans was gathered in the street outside, peering through the window to watch.

Here’s where we’d made a major miscalculation.  We’d said all along that we’d take the metro back home.  But when we finally made it to the nearest

Uselessly consulting our map again

station, the area was behind the police blockade.  The next nearest station was closed for construction, along with a couple beyond that on the same line.  (Luckily we found a sign on the ground indicating this.)  Eventually we discovered that the entire metro seemed to have been shut down.  So that long, long walk in the hot sun had to be repeated.  No one was very happy about this.  Eventually the game ended and the streets were full of celebration, which at least added some festivity to our death march.

Back home we had to fight our way through crowds of revelers to reach the door of our apartment, but thankfully the soundproofing is excellent.  I’m not sure if anyone is going to be willing to walk anywhere tomorrow, though.

Ice cream bribe to keep walking