Author’s Note:
If you follow this blog regularly you know that it’s been about two weeks since my last post, and I normally try to post every 2-4 days. We arrived in Annecy on a Sunday, I started writing on a Monday, got sick on Tuesday, and discovered shortly afterwards that our internet connection was positively glacial.
It took me about 4-5 days to recover from the stronger-than-a-cold-not-quite-as-bad-as-a-flu whatever the hell it was I had. Once I did, I made a few failed attempts at uploading pics to the blog using the wifi of some local watering holes.
To cut it short, this post was originally written two days after we arrived in Annecy, and I wasn’t able to upload pics for it, so here we are in Aix-en-Provence two weeks later with a blazing fast internet connection and happy as clams.
Not that we weren’t happy in Annecy. Well, you’ll read about it soon enough.
– Nathan
Today is the first day I’ve missed home. Not our stuff. Not our friends and family (we started missing them the minute we headed to JFK and have missed them achingly ever since), but an actual place to call home.
We spent most of yesterday at Lake Annecy’s Imperial Beach letting the boy blow off a couple of days’ worth of steam, and when we returned to our flat I wasn’t feeling too well. I chalked it up to too much sun and too little rest the previous day, but today I woke up feeling sick.
So I’m missing our comfy bed and familiar surroundings. Fortunately for me my wife is a rock star, so she woke me with fruit salad and some eggs, then she took the boy out to the market to deal with tonight’s dinner. She always takes good care of me when I’m sick. Thank you, babe!
The Cathedral in the Sky
Saturday we drove from our gite in St. Aubin to Mont Saint Michel, the famous island abbey off the coast of Normandy. Juliann’s navigation skills were put to the test because we kept having cell signal and GPS issues with our phones. There ain’t many bars to be had out in the farmlands of Normandy.
Plus my 3-year-old Droid Razr is a piece of crap. I was too cheap to replace it before we left the States and now I’m regretting it. When J reads this paragraph I can see her raised eyebrows and smug grin: I told you so.
She’s right. What can I say.
Anyway, back to our drive. We were nearing the coast and she told me to take the next left. I did. She was looking down at her phone, focused.
“Can you tell whether we’re heading in the right direction?” I asked.
She shook her head, “Nope, not yet. I’ll let you know.”
I looked to the right and my jaw dropped. “Never mind,” I replied.
In the distance, in between the trees and over the seemingly endless rows of corn, was the silhouette of Mont Saint Michel. It had to be at least 10 miles away and still looked massive. It shimmered in the heat of the day.
Juliann looked up.
“Holy…” she breathed.
She and Braeden spent the next 15 minutes or so pointing and exclaiming as we drew closer.
We parked in the lots on the mainland side of the causeway that connects to the island, we queued up at the well-run and very clean shuttle bus stand, and soon we were stepping out onto the end of the causeway, gaping at one of the most remarkable sights we’ve ever had the pleasure of seeing. Braeden, of course, was more interested in the receding tide and the wet sands below, so as we walked towards the island we answered his questions about where the water was going, what tides were, etc.
We entered the gates and were absolutely blown away. The place looked like the real-life version of Diagon Alley: a tiny little cobblestone street (if it could be called a street, it was only ~10-15 feet across) with ancient stone buildings crouched over it, impossibly high stone walls and parapets crossing everywhere like a maze.
Our heads were on swivels as we were swept along by the crowd, corkscrewing upward as the street grew steeper and narrower. There were many things to see but we pressed past them, as we had decided earlier to climb to the top first in order to get the more strenuous part of the day out of the way early.
After about 15 minutes we arrived in front of the abbey and another set of timeworn stone steps. We bought tickets for the audio guide, had a quick snack, and continued the climb to the entrance.
The audio guide turned out to be a great choice. The rooms in the abbey were beautiful, but the commentary and background added so much information we would have never known. Not to mention that the boy thought it was the coolest thing ever to have his own little “radio” to listen to. It kept him engaged and happy, and he had a million questions.
After the tour we gave Braeden a few minutes to run around one of the gardens at the exit while we stared at the incredible views afforded by the abbey’s perch.
Then we descended back down the medieval street and stopped in one of the restaurants for lunch with a view. It wasn’t the world’s most relaxing lunch because by now the boy was tired and hungry, but we enjoyed it nonetheless and I got to sample one of Normandy’s famous “Mere Poulard”-style omelettes, which was incredible. It was the lightest, fluffiest omelette I’ve ever had and it tasted like some kind of delicious egg-bread mixture. So good.
After lunch we lingered for a while atop the parapets, Braeden and Juliann filled out a couple of postcards, then we headed back to the car. The ride back to our gite was beautiful and delightfully uneventful, and we had dinner out in the small town of Ducey, where there was a festival going on. They boy went on a couple of rides, including a spin on the bumper cars that had him screaming with laughter, and we checked out some local music.
On To Annecy
The next day we rose, drove our rental car back to Paris, and hopped a train to Annecy, a little town at the base of the French Alps.
It was a long travel day, a little over 12 hours, and most of it was humdrum travel stuff – killing time in train stations, staying amused, taking naps when we could, etc. We weren’t too tired, however, to appreciate the incredible scenery that started appearing outside the windows of the train once we were about an hour outside of Annecy.
The flat farmland gradually rose into hills, and the hills grew into mountains as the train wound its way through deep wooded valleys. We pressed our faces up against the glass and peered upwards, trying to see the tops of the peaks. It felt like something out of a movie.
We arrived in Annecy a little after 9pm and our host, Veronika, picked us up at the station and delivered us to our apartment. It was the first apartment we booked after arriving in Paris, and we quickly figured out we need to book at least a month in advance in order to get the type of place we want.
So when we walked in after a long day of travel I was a bit let down. It was a little railroad-type apartment, with a tiny kitchen and a single bedroom, and it was a bit dark. But we were too tired to worry about it too much, so we thanked Veronika for picking us up, dug out our toothbrushes and got ready for bed.
The next morning we hit the Monoprix around the corner to stock up on groceries (a full-sized fridge!), had some breakfast, and then went out for a brief exploratory tour.
If you follow me on Facebook or Instagram (@nathanblew) then you already know – Annecy is knock-down, drop-dead gorgeous. Seriously.
Imagine a beautiful little old European town with cobblestone streets and canals crisscrossed with bridges draped in flowers. Then imagine that town on a crystal-clear lake. Then imagine that lake plunked down in the French Alps.
Yeah. It’s really like that. Everywhere you look you have to remind yourself, “Self, that’s not a postcard you’re looking at, that’s the real thing.”
We kept our tour short, however, because the morning was getting warm and we had a hot date with the beach. We suited up, packed our bag with water, sunblock, towels, and the camera, and headed for Imperial Beach.
It took us about 20 minutes to walk there, so we may be taking the bus on future beach excursions, but the scenery was beautiful and we didn’t mind. Crews on one section of the shore were dismantling three huge sets of bleachers which had been used the night before at the Fete du Lac d’Annecy, a huge annual party/show/fireworks display.
The bike and pedestrian walkway run along the lake, and the boy was thrilled to be able to walk right next to the water and peer in. The visibility was around 30 feet and we had fun keeping our eyes peeled for fish.
We reached Imperial Beach, waited in a short line to pay our entry fee, and hustled right in. The beach area is a kids’ paradise and includes rides, go karts, a trampoline park, a playground, and a sweet ropes course that looked a bit too big for Braeden but just right for Mom and Dad.
Most importantly there was a splash play area complete with 2 mini slides and several fountains. Gold, baby, gold!
The beach itself was actually a nicely manicured lawn ending in a seawall that dropped right into 3-4 feet of gin-clear water. That’s right, no sand, just grass.
Some background: I love the beach. When I was a kid my family would spend 8 hours or more at the beach several times a week during the summer, and I still enjoy doing so as an adult. But I loathe the sand. For my life I can’t understand people who can just go to the beach and lie down on the sand with no towel. Hell no. I prefer a beach chair to the towel, since the former increases the distance between my ass and those annoying grains of sand. Even better is a litter carried by six of my closest friends, Cleopatra-style, so I don’t have to walk on the sand, period. But my friends usually say, “No way, Nathan, we’re sick of carrying your ass in that stupid thing. Plus it’s f**king heavy. And we look like idiots.”
Drama queens.
So I have to walk on the sand. Poor me.
When we arrived and saw that we could enjoy all the benefits of the beach without the goddamned sand, I nearly started doing cartwheels and kissing babies with joy.
[Aside: Note that this beach situation is the polar opposite of the Paris Plage, which is created for a couple of weeks every year by dumping sand on one bank of the Seine. You get none of the actual benefits of the beach but plenty of horrible sand. Someone wasn’t thinking clearly.]
We picked out a nice spot on the lawn, spread out our stuff, realized with amusement/horror (mine and Juliann’s, respectively) that our AirBnB host had left us a wildly non-family-friendly beach towel, lathered the boy and ourselves up with sunblock, and proceeded to have a lovely day. Braeden is very much a water baby like the rest of his family, and even after 6-8 hours he has to be dragged away. We had a blast and the setting was gorgeous. It was a great introduction to this beautiful little town.
That’s all for now. In the next post we’ll cover our time in Annecy, including some amazing shots of the town.
A bientot!