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July 31, 2015
IT'S FRIDAY, MY FAVORITE DAY!!
We're having a great time on our trip, but it's not without some challenges. One of those is that I have to use our ancient laptop in a hotel room to write this journal. As I said, it's a challenge, but at least I'm able to post!
We wrapped up our stay in Paris this week, but first we headed for the beaches of Normandy for a tour before we left for London.
But to back up a little, on Saturday - after walking our legs off since arriving - we decided to take advantage of the "Big Bus" hop on, hop off tour around the city. It was included in the "Paris Pass" we had purchased, so we went for it. We had already seen a lot of the sites by foot but it was fun to see everything from the top of a double-decker bus from a different view. Besides, we still hadn't seen the magnificent facade of Notre-Dame with gargoyles and the Mary in Rose window. But after looking at the crowds surrounding the cathedral, we decided the bus view was fine. Our bus also took us by the Army Museum where Napoleon's Tomb is and the avenue des Champs-Elysees where the Arc de Triomphe is located. Again, staying on the bus as the area was very crowded with tourists. We got some great pictures and saw a lot of Paris that we hadn't seen. That evening, we splurged and had a wonderful dinner in a restaurant located by the Opera House near our hotel. Dave had Hake and I had Veal which was "mouth-watering" good. We also ordered wine with the meal. After all, if we're having dinner in a nice Parisian restaurant, that's what we do - right? The wine was especially delicious, it was from South Africa and we were told that the vineyards were located on the hills next to the ocean which gave the wine a refreshing salt-water taste.
Sunday afternoon we took a tour to Giverny to visit Monet's Garden. I just couldn't leave France without a visit there. Although it was pouring down raining, that didn't dampen my spirits. The Lilly ponds and flower gardens would inspire anyone to paint there, it was beautiful. Our guide was a young man who had very good English and after our tour through the gardens and Monet's house, he drove around the countryside showing us the local villages and a castle. It was a delightful afternoon, in spite of the weather. Unfortunately, I came down with a cold - probably a combination of the rain and just being tired. I persevered however. After all, I couldn't let something like a sore throat and cough stop me in France!
We arrived back in Paris to watch the final stage of the Tour de France. The bicyclists made several trips through Paris, around all the major attractions, so many of the streets were blocked off. That made it a nightmare for traffic, but we made it safe and sound back to our hotel with only a slight delay. We got back from Giverny too late to watch the race, even though it was just down the street from us. So, we just turned on the TV in the hotel. They even had Jets fly by with the red, white and blue French colors at the end and they flew right over our hotel.
Well, it finally happened. We decided to take a taxi to the Paris Flea Market which was quite a distance to walk. The taxi driver took us for a "ride" and we were totally lost. Note to ourselves: be concerned when we give the cabbie the address and he looks totally confused. Unlike many of the drivers in Paris, this one apparently spoke no English. We did ask if he knew the way and he said something like, "OK, OK, no problem". Along the way, Dave mentioned to me - loud enough for the driver to hear - that we were heading south instead of north and the guy immediately did an about face and delivered us to our street. But - not where we wanted to go. The street had a name similar to our destination, but we later figured that it was a couple of miles away. The "ride" cost us 16 Euros to get there and only 7 Euros to get back in a different taxi. Hummmm! We were frustrated by our experience so we stopped at a Starbucks for some real coffee on our way back to our hotel. We never did find the market.
While we were in Paris, we noticed the pedestrian lights are a very soft red and green and it is hard to distinguish the difference especially when the sun is bright. Monet would love the pastels, but they were really hard to see. The locals ignore the lights anyway so it really doesn't matter. It really amazes me how smoothly everything flows with cars, bicycles, motorbikes and people all going different directions. I would never try to drive in Paris and the taxi drivers do earn their keep.
On Tuesday our adventure stepped up a notch. That morning, after checking out of our hotel, we took a taxi to the train station in Paris, and of course everything was in French. After asking several persons where to catch our train for Caen, we found the right platform and with a sigh of relief - boarded the right train. After giving ourselves high-fives, we were sure glad we allowed plenty of time to get oriented because trains in Europe leave and arrive on time and wait for nobody. After a two-hour train ride we arrived in Caen - only to discover our hotel was another 45 minutes away! We thought our hotel was in Caen because that's where the tour the travel agent booked for us began. We weren't very happy with our travel agency right about that time. The only thing we knew to do was to get a taxi to deliver us to our hotel. That turned out to be a very hefty sum! Knowing we had to turn around the next morning and meet our D-day tour of at the train station back in Caen, we figured we were going to spend all our Euros on taxis and we were going to be broke in no time!
We arrived at our beautiful Chateau La Cheneviere near the town of Bayeux - that's it on the left. It is a beautiful place with gardens and even a swimming pool and tennis courts. We feel we are living the life of luxury. After telling our concierge about our long taxi ride to the Chateau, she was very helpful and she made train reservations at Bayeux to Caen for a fraction of the taxi price, plus we got senior discounts! So from our hotel in Port en Bassin, we ended up with a much shorter taxi ride to the Bayeau train station which connected at Caen for our tour. It was a faster way to go and our wallets are much happier.
After a peaceful night's rest at the Chateau, we had a taxi (one of only two in town) take us for a short drive to the Bayeux train station where it dropped us off in Caen where we met up with our D-Day Landings and the Battle of Normandy Tour. We started out at the Memorial Museum where we got to see how WWII started in Europe and the rise of Hitler's Germany and saw a movie on the troops landing on the beaches in Normandy. It was very emotional. You can see in the photo of Omaha Beach how exposed the soldiers were on the beach because of the tall bluffs. After a tour of the museum, we were treated to a wonderful lunch before we headed for Utah and Omaha Beaches. We ended our tour at the American Memorial Cemetery where those that had died in Normandy are buried. Since the tour ended real close to where our hotel was, the driver dropped us off so we didn't have to go back to Caen and catch the train to Bayeux. The whole tour was about 10 hours and we were tired when we got back to our room so we ordered some vegetable (squash) soup from room service. It was delicious and felt so good on my sore throat! Since I had a cold, I took a hot shower and headed to bed early.
The next morning we left the beautiful Chateau and took a train back to Paris. We then had to take a taxi to another train station to catch a connection to London. Good-bye France, hello England! Our train ride took about two hours going through the Chunnel along the way. We were met at the train station by our driver who took us to our hotel in London. Thank goodness we were met by someone at the St. Pancras station, as it the largest train station in Europe and I could see us getting lost and spending the rest of our vacation in that station!
We think we have solved one of the problems we were having with the computer, the tablet and Dave's phone. We weren't able to get a full charge on any of them - the computer kept dying in the middle of posting the journal (grrrrr) - and finally discovered that the voltage converter we purchased for the trip wasn't working right. We were offered a second converter at the chateau and that one works just fine! So when we checked out, Dave told them that he would buy it from them and they said OK! So now we're able to post the journal, use the other devices and charge Dave's razor (maybe the most important!) with no problem.
