Boating – For you boat people out there… a few tips… the way the lock gig works is that you dock before you get to the lock, let one person off the boat and they walk to the lock so that they can work your lines while you are in the lock since there is no help from the lock keeper. If you are pulli…
Blog posts : "2011 France"
I like impressionist art better than I thought
Today we had planned to get up early and spend a few hours at the Musee D’Orsey. Alas we overslept till 8:20. Oh well, probably good to get a good night sleep before we start the venture home again. None the less we hustled and got dressed, finished packing, checked out, and were at the Museum at…
The Louvre
Today we got up early and headed to the Louvre before they opened. That allowed us to be first in line, and as a result, we had almost 2 hours with the master painters on the 2nd floor in the peace and quiet before the crowds set in. I like the Dutch and northern European masters better than the …
A slow meander through Paris
We slept in as neither of us is still feeling very well. We got lunch at an outdoor café near the hotel, and then headed off to the Musée d'Orsay, where they house the impressionist art. The line was 1 hour long in the hot sun and neither of us felt like it was worth it, so we bought tickets to…
Why doesn’t someone do something about this?
Clothes are finally dry! When we got to the hotel, we strung them over the towel warmer and turned it on. Ahhh… finally!
After a very yummy breakfast of yogurt, granola, cheese, and meats, Peter (one of the owners of the Inn) took us on a tour of the chapel. Wow. There are artifacts here da…
Want to sleep in a castle?
Clothes still aren’t dry, so we pack them up in a plastic bag and off we go… After successfully navigating our way out of Barcelona, we drove to the tiny country of Andorra. A strange country. Ski slopes in the winter, and duty-free shopping year round. The place is packed to the gills with c…
Pollyanna visits the big city
I went down to the restaurant to retrieve breakfast from the buffet. They gave me a big tray to carry it back to Dave. Neither of us is feeling well, we seem to have caught a cold, and at the moment, Dave seems to be worse off than I am. Fortunately, we had planned to spend most of the day on the…
If you can drive in Barcelona, you can drive anywhere
The breakfast at the Mas Du Soleilla was fabulous – some type of local handmade yogurt with honey. There was a gal from Switzerland there who had traveled all over Europe. She (along with the owners) had all heard of the Auberge du Presbytere where we had stayed the previous night. They confirmed…
It costs how much to ship the wine home?
We walked around the town. It has a lovely church, and the view over the cemetery – Wow. There was a beautiful hat shop where the owner was sitting in the back with her sewing machine making hats. Four restaurants that we wanted to try, alas we leave today. We must come back here again.
Bye bye boat
Had to get up early to pack the boat. We took a taxi back to the train station in Beziers to get the rental car. Dave upgraded to get us AC. €20 total. So worth it in this heat!
Dave drove us back to Le Someil to by the painting I wanted, only to find them closed. So we sat down at the…
We’re from Seattle too!
Awakened early with a lot of racket outside our windows. Dave put in earplugs so he could go back to sleep. When we got up, we realized that a flea market had been setup on the canal alongside the boat. So we wandered around for an hour. Turns out junk is the same the world over.
Away we …
We only take cash!
Stopped for lunch at the same joint where we had the delicious sausage as part of a mixed plate. I tried to order it again solo, but alas got something else this time. Hmmm. Maybe the pork plate means whatever pork they feel like serving that day…
Found a painting I wanted to purchase but…
Watch out for that line!
Today we biked into St. Nazaire d’Aude. Beautiful mediaeval town. Bought 2 bottles of wine and Dave rode back to the boat one-handed, despite his handicapped thumb.
The locks are now in the downward direction as we have turned around back the way we started. The downward direction is easy …
Bumper boats
We have found that they will rent the boats on the canal to anyone, regardless of boating experience. We “knew” this before we left, but the import of it did not become clear till today. There were two old couples on one boat that clearly had no clue what they were doing. We were following them f…
How do you get a ring off?
The odd thing about boating on the canal is that whenever you put something down, it’s there later. We are used to boating where everything not tied down before you venture out of port will have slid to some far corner of the boat by the time you go looking for it. On the canal the boat is so stab…
Longest day of the year. Why would we ever go home?
Dave woke at 4am listening to the birds, the rooster, and the ducks all making quite a racket. With my earplugs I can sleep through a war and am still sound asleep till 10am.
We walked back into town to visit the winery. After some more practice of my French, “Non Blanc, non Rose, Oui Rouge” we …
You are supposed to be practicing French not Spanish!
Off to the train which was literally underneath our hotel. (Hooray for the Internet and the ability to pre-plan, which I do so love!) We had checked it out the night before and found it looked easy. Tracks each has a letter and a bit board told you which train was on which track. Piece-o-cake. …
Did we land in Italy by mistake?
Landed in Iceland. Cleared customs no problem – I was worried about the peanut butter we have packed and other food stuffs, but no customs forms and no questions. Sheesh, even Mexico makes you fill out forms.
We thought our connection was late, Melissa wanted to try and catch the earlier conn…
And we're off
Flight to Iceland was uneventful and smooth, though odd because it never got even slightly dark outside, and as a result we never slept. Dave liked seeing Greenland with the icebergs and glaciers running into the ocean.
19 blog posts