Saint Malo by foot and a return to Paris - 6-8 November 2019

We are once again faced with returning a rental car at a train station. Armed with an email from EuropCar I felt well prepared to head to the right spot; this was clearly a folly on my part! This time around, we found the rental office at Gare St. Malo straight off - but no indication of where to put the car. So we circled the station only two times and found a parking spot near the office. As soon as we walked up to the door, we found a sign instructing us to park in the train station parking lot and return the keys to the office. Back to the car, another rounding of the train station, and the car was parked and returned. Main lesson from this trip seems to be call the rental car agency directly to find out where the car return is actually located; don't trust the website.

We decided to walk back to the heart of the walled city. The seawall separating the city from the beach is massive and it was interesting to see that they've driven massive pylons along and in front of this wall, presumably to break-up the waves as they crash in from the ocean. I can only imagine what this area must look like in the heart of the winter when a huge storm rolls in. It must be amazing to witness.

We headed to Le Bistro Autour du Beurre for lunch. Basically, this is the restaurant associated with Andre Bordier, who is the master of butter. He supplies butters to some of the best tables in the world and all of the dishes here showcase his work. I had a lamb dish that featured sheep from the Mont Saint Michel area that graze on the salt marshes. This lamb is the best that I've had outside of Hokaido. Simply a fantastic lunch!

Mushroom mille feuille

Mont St. Michel Lamb

After lunch we opted to waddle around the ramparts that wrap the city and take in the ocean views. Because of the storms in the area, the winds have been pretty constant so we were treated to many sailboats practicing in the bay. St. Malo was a stronghold for privateers and as such, was heavily fortified against attack. It was interesting to read about the pirates based out of this city and to learn their fates.

Tonight, we pack and prepare to head to Paris in the morning.

7 November

Fortunately the train strike ended shortly after our car trip from Paris so our tickets for this leg of the journey have been preserved. I'm reminded at how enjoyable train travel is and how much I regret our having to drive from Paris to Bordeaux at the beginning of the trip. I seem to have picked up a cold somewhere in our rainy travels, but since we've been to Paris previously and our only set agenda is dinner tonight, it's not a bad time to be sick.

We checked into our hotel, Le Burgandy, and decided to take advantage of the spa. A soak in the pool and several trips to the hammam helped with my cold tremendously. We headed back to the room and cleaned up for our dinner at Arpege. For whatever reason, we've struggled to get enough vegetables on this trip, so dinner at a premiere vegetarian focused Michelin starred restaurant is just the ticket. Kris opted for the full vegetarian menu and I went for the semi-veggie menu. The food was absolutely beautiful and a wonderful experience overall. Ironically, at the end of the meal, we were presented with picnic knives - something that would have come in handy earlier in the trip.

A vegetarian 'tartare' made from beets

A carpaccio of scallops and radishes

Happily sated and full of veggies, we wandered back to our hotel through the rainy Parisian streets. Tomorrow is our last full day in France although we're currently without plans.

8 November

I am once again fully sick in Paris. Today promises to be a quiet day, but we don't want to miss out on seeing some of the city. We opted to walk (slowly...) down to Notre Dame to see the devastation in person. I had seen pictures of the aftermath, but wasn't really prepared for the emotional impact of seeing it in person. The pictures don't really do it justice. While it's hopeful to see the stone towers still standing.

We grabbed lunch from one of the gyro shops in the Latin quarter and grab space on one of the steps on the river. I was feeling fully crummy by this point so we dragged ourselves back to the hotel (With a Monoprix stop for water and juice.) We ensconced ourselves in the room where we watched movies and slept for the remainder of the afternoon. Perhaps not the usual itinerary for Paris, but it worked for us.

We opted for drinks in the hotel and had the concierge book us into a nearby brasserie. The hotel bar was excellent. They had a drink wheel reminiscent of the one at Ray's to help you choose (although their offerings were a bit classier than those at Ray's. No Sex on the Beach or Buttery Nipples here!) I love a good bar snack and they offered truffled cashews, spicy almonds, and kalamata olives. Not too shabby!

We headed to Flottes, admittedly expecting it to be pretty average. While it wasn't the standout meal of the trip (That would have been rough, all things considered...) it was perfectly serviceable. Kris had a braised lamb shank that was really tasty and my cod hit the spot. The only bummer was that they were out of the Cuban Havana Club rum that Kris wanted to try since we can't get it in the States.

We head home tomorrow. Being sick makes it a little less sad to leave (I'm looking forward to my own bed,) but this has been a fabulous trip. Bordeaux was a lot of fun, but Brittany was an unexpected and delightful surprise. I'm really glad we decided to explore this somewhat overlooked region. Until next trip...

Settling into Bordeaux - 27 October 19

Our first day in Bordeaux and we spent much of it sleeping. After rolling back to the hotel at 8:30pm (full disclosure, it would have been 8, but Bordeaux Marathon Relay cut us off from our hotel until we found an alternate route. I felt even more jet lagged at the site of hundreds people, decked out in lights running the streets at well past dark. Looks like a HUGE race though and really well organized so for anyone looking for an international race for their bucket list, you could do worse!) we tumbled into bed and slept the sleep of the worn. 11+ hours later (Legit. My Fitbit told me so.) we were up and ready to face...Well, what was left of the day.

We were supposed to spend the morning exploring the city then pick up the rental car (remember the train? Yeah, this was supposed to be the only rental on this trip) and make a leisurely drive to our base camp hotel in Saint Emilion. Instead, we had to hurry up and pack and I realized I had mistakenly set the rental pick-up to 10am so I had to hustle back to Gare Saint Jean to wrestle with yet another rental agency and then figure out where to stash the car for the day since adjusting the pick-up time would have more than doubled the cost of the rental. Fortunately, I was familiar with the train station layout, having circled it so many times yesterday, so the pickup was uneventful. I managed to navigate the 5 blocks to the hotel w/o incident and even learned that due to it being Sunday, on-street parking in front of the hotel was free. Huzzah!

By the time I had parked, Kris had been kicked out of the hotel room, so we hucked our bags to the car and prepared to explore the city on foot. We first headed towards the city gate that we had seen the night before. We then headed towards Chocher Saint-Michele (the spire is pictured below) where we found ourselves in the midst of a huge flea market.

Following my gut and the crowds, we ended up at the city marche. In the tradition of European markets, this puts even the West Side market to shame. Amazing fruits, veggies, meats, seafoods, and cheeses, I could have spent all day here. And in fact, we have a morning planned here later in the week - Specifically to dine on one of the seafood platters from a stall in the heart of the market. We settled for some window shopping and 2 of the best caneles I've had ever. Which led us to decide that we would say yes to every canele we saw in Bordeaux. I mean, it would be rude not to sample the local tradition, no?

Realizing that the day was slipping away from us, we hopped on a tram (Dear Cincinnati, if you want the streetcar to be successful, it needs to go more than 1 mile. And connect things. XOXO, EMS) and headed to the Cite du Vin. It turns out there's a fantastic food hall next to the museum, so we stopped for a light lunch of sardines and gravlax. Thus sated we headed to what I was worried was going to be a complete bust - a museum devoted to the history and making of wine in Bordeaux.

Turns out this place is amazing. They have used technology in a fabulous way to create interactive exhibits in 9 languages that don't feel overwhelming or confusing. We learned about everything from varietals to pests to soil types to pairings. And the whole experience is capped off with a glass of wine on their 8th floor observation deck. Really a great experience!

We ended up cutting our visit a bit shorter than I would have liked, because it was it was getting dark and we had an hour drive to the hotel. We walked along the river for a bit, then hopped a tram back to the train station. We saw a little shop selling caneles, so we picked up a couple for later. We found the car where we left it, unmolested no less. We threaded our way through Bordeaux and headed in to the pitch black vineyards. We fairly collapsed at the desk of the hotel and politely listened to the introduction from the receptionist. Kris did a phenomenal job booking us into an actual castle! Our room in the Hotel Grand Barrail (https://grand-barrail.com/en/) is in the tower of the castle! We found two caneles waiting for us in the room (are you sensing a theme?) which were good although not quite as good as the ones from the Marche. 

Tomorrow, we head into Saint Emilion to start the wine tasting! 

Cancelled train, a rental car adventure, and caneles - 25 Oct 19

We decided to return to France for our first vacation of 2019. Instead of Paris though, we decided to get out into the countryside a bit. Week 1 will be wine tasting in Bordeaux and week two will be spent in Brittany. It should be a good break for a year with a lot of change.

We left for France today. We decided to take extra precautions before we left this time, so we shut the water off to the house. Since this was the first time we've tried this, I of course had a 'Aw crud' moment halfway to the airport when I realized that I hadn't also shut off the gas to water heater. So, back to the house we went. Fortunately, we had planned on getting the to the airport fairly early so the unexpected detour didn't create a panic.

Check in at CVG was smooth and enjoyed an uneventful flight to Atlanta. Once we arrived, we headed to concourse E for a leisurely lunch at One Flew South in concourse E. We then picked our way to concourse F and prepared to board for Paris. While standing in line, I decided to check my email and found, much to my dismay, a notification from SNCF France letting me know that they'd cancelled our train tickets for CDG to Bordeaux. A little quick Googling uncovered that the maintenance workers were on strike.

So, cue standing in line to board a trans-continental flight, knowing that we're supposed to be in Bordeaux the next evening and having no way to actually get there. I pull out my Sapphire card and call the Chase travel concierge, hoping they could help. My first clue that this was going to go poorly was when my 'travel specialist' asked several times what a bore-ducks was and then where it was. He found a single flight with 2 tickets available, but at 900 euro each, that seemed like the last case offer. We had boarded the plane and were sitting in our seats when I was exclaimed 'So, you're telling me there are absolutely NO cars available to rent in ALL of Paris tomorrow?'

Fortunately, Kris pulled out his phone at this stage and started searching. With in 2 minutes he found a car for a one-way rental and reserved it shortly before they closed the boarding doors. So now all we had to worry about was whether or not the rental agency would honor the pre-paid reservation. Just what you want to think about during an 8 hour flight!

When we land in Paris, we decided to skip the arrivals lounge for a shower and change of clothes and head straight for the rental counter. After collecting our wine bag (now featuring a brand new 2" cut on the front pocket,) we headed to the Budget counter. The counter agent couldn't have been nicer; not only did he have our car, but he also offered us a life saving cafe.

We loaded our bags into our grey Peugeot 200S, and after a scant few hours of sleep on the plane, headed off in the pre-dawn dark for our 5.5 hour drive to Bordeaux. I had a bit of trouble figuring out how to get out of CDG. We ended up circling the rental lot twice before we figured out the correct turns (And this is with GPS.) Once on the highway though, it was smooth sailing.

We stopped at a rest area about 3.5 hours in for a snack and a quick nap and still managed to arrive in Bordeaux proper earlier than we would have had we taken the train. The downside was that finding the car drop off was 10x harder than getting out of CDG. I'm pretty sure I drove us around the Saint Jean train station 6 times (again with the help of GPS) before Kris spotted a sign no bigger than a sheet of A4 that pointed to the car return. We ended up on a gutted stone warehouse 2 blocks from the train station with a less than amused lot agent. Apparently he did not find comments about how difficult the lot was to find and that the GPS directed one to the wrong spot 'helpful.' Ah well.

Kris brilliantly booked a hotel mere blocks from the train station. So once we handed over the keys and collected our belongings, we stumbled to our hotel and collapsed for an hour of quiet relaxation. Realizing if we went to bed at 5pm, we'd be really screwed up time-wise, we decided to walk into downtown. It turns out that Bordeaux is the birthplace of one of my favorite confections - caneles. We stopped by Auguste K and picked up an assortment of flavors to try later.

We headed down the back streets to a square ringed in restaurants. A couple looked okay, but I spied a bistro down a side road that looked promising. We arrived at Le Michele a little early for dinner. So in the French style, we grabbed a table and a glass of wine each and collected ourselves. The people watching was excellent and despite our fatigue, time flew. We split a lovely onion soup; Kris had an entrecote and I had a duck confit. All three were excellent!

While it wasn't the first day in France that we had anticipated, everything ended up just fine. Hopefully tonight, we'll both sleep well so we can quickly get on local time. Tomorrow, we pick up another car and head for Saint Emilion.

Italy Day 7 – Goodbye Rome, hello Tuscany!

Today we say our goodbyes to Rome. While dinner and the late-night tour were fantastic, it made getting out the door this morning rough. We needed to be at the airport by 10 pick up the car so we could make it to Grosseto at a reasonable time to meet my friend’s family at the apartment we’re staying in. We cleaned up the AirBnB and ourselves, shoved everything back into suitcases as best we could and headed to the bus stop.

Rush hour buses with luggage and backpacks are not a whole lot of fun. In hindsight, we might have been better off splurging on a taxi here. However, if we had done that, Kris would have missed out on what he’s pretty sure was a pickpocketing attempt. The first (that we caught at any rate) for the Rome portion of the visit. We disgorged from the bus (along with what felt like half of Rome) at the train station and discovered the train we were planning on taking was first delayed, then cancelled all together. Fortunately, the train to the airport runs every 30 minutes, so we just had to find the right platform and hop on the next one.

Picking up the rental car was a pretty standard affair. I am supremely grateful to have gotten it at the airport where I had some time and space to remember how to drive a stick though, and wasn’t immediately thrown into Rome traffic. When the agent assigned the car to me, she handed over the paperwork with a ‘Don’t worry the car is brand new, only 1000km, so there’s no damage on it.’ I signed the waiver, but still did a thorough walk-around before we left. Turns out she was right. Who knew!

We left the airport grounds and got on the highway. In hindsight, I probably should have brushed up on Italian road signs before I got here. As it was, Kris was looking up signs and explaining them to me at 110km/h. But we lived, so there’s that! We had some time between when we picked up the car and when we were to meet my friend’s family to get the keys to her apartment, so we decided to head to Pitigliano, an ancient mountain citadel that was for years just at the edge of the Vatican’s power. This apparently meant that many Jews who had lived in Rome before the Popes started consolidating power fled here. Here we saw the first synagogue of the trip and while there are apparently no more Jews living in Pitigliano, they still hold services there on a regular basis.

Pitigliano is like something out of a postcard or a painting. Kris and I spent most of our time there saying ‘Oh my! Look at that!’ Oooh! Look at that!’ and ‘Wait! I need to take a picture of this!’ Unfortunately, I don’t have Wifi right now, so I’ll post the pictures when I get to Florence. Or, check out Kris’ Facebook page. The architecture was amazing. These ancient houses are perched or cantilevered over the edges of cliffs and are stacked on top of each other like a feverish child’s Lego set. This was a lovely detour and I’m glad we took the time to see it.

We reluctantly left and headed back to the highway to meet our friend’s family. This was when we discovered that the TIM sims that we thought included texting only included about 5 texts. And remember, no voice…So even though we had made arrangements to meet, he was relying on us sending him a text confirming that we were on time. Que much stressful downloading and discarding of apps, swapping out for US sims, frantic phone calls to the States, until finally Kris got Signal working and was able to get in touch (30 minutes later) with our friend’s brother. This was then compounded when the ENTIRE family showed up to meet us! Brother, brother’s wife, brother’s daughter, friend’s/brother’s dad. So now we’ve held up everyone. Great! In the moment, there is no worse feeling than knowing that you are further inconveniencing someone who is doing you a favor at someone else’s behest. (We both still feel cringe-y about this one.)

Anyway, we make our greetings and load our luggage into Dad’s car and then follow them into Grosseto. Dad waves us to a parking spot and lets out brother and family and then proceeds into the walled city center (Only certain people or licensed cars, I’m not sure exactly, can drive inside the walls.) Brother and family then walk us into the city and give us the dime tour, pointing out attractions, restaurants, introducing us to friends they encountered along the way. It reminded me very much of visiting my grandparents in small-town Midwest. Everyone knows everyone and sees all. But in a good way!

We arrive at the apartment and friend’s dad shows Kris how to work the keys to the front door and the apartment. He then proceeds to show us how everything works. Now in a hotel, I’d be super perturbed by now, but staying in someone else’s house? I felt like I should have been taking video to ensure we don’t break, damage, or ruin anything! Oh, and did I mention, friend’s mom left us a huge basket of cookies, and sweet breads, two bottles of wine, a bottle of olive oil, a bottle of vinegar, and cold beer and water in the fridge. Ah-maze-ing!

After ensuring that we were safely ensconced in our new home for the next seven days, the family took their leave after ensuring that we understood we should contact them if anything is needed. Kris and I took some time to settle in and semi-unpack. At this point, we decided that with the super late night last night, the super early morning today, and the 45-minute stress ball of trying to make contact (remember kids, always read the fine print on your Sim contracts…) we were toast for the night. We ate some of the excellent cookies and called it a night. Tomorrow, there will be wine!