Friday, June 19th At the beginning of this journey I wondered how we would handle the longer than normal vacation. Now that we are almost half way done I am surprised at some of the things I have discovered. It seems that 2 weeks is the right amount of time to unwind and finally relax. Being gone for 2 weeks is like getting a deep tissue massage instead of a back rub. You begin to remember what life was like before constant access to email, the internet, the news, fighting traffic and paying bills. As corny as it sounds, it is [View Full Entry]

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Thursday, June 18th About an hour To the north of Grenoble, just past the Chambery, is a small city near the Swiss border called Annecy. It's only 30 minutes from Geneva, and it sits on the edge of a mountain lake with very clear water. Annecy is like a little Venice or Amsterdam, complete with its own set of canals, a medieval prison, and a castle on the hill overlooking the town. Pedestrian bridges are sprinkled throughout the quaint streets and flowers sprout from the windows of the buildings and the sides of the bridges. As soon as we arrived we [View Full Entry]

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Wednesday, June 17th The morning started out pretty funny. Tiffany decided to take a walk around Brignoud with one of the girls since we weren't going into Grenoble until later that day. A few minutes later she came back and I asked her what was wrong, why did she come back so early ? Tiffany said she was worried she might get a ticket for disturbing the peace. I was confused naturally. She laughed and said that one of the guys in town had whistled at her and waved, apparently appreciating the new shorts she had purchased the day before. Embarrassed [View Full Entry]

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Tuesday, June 16 By the time we woke up Tuesday morning, Pierre and Christine were already in the garden working. Over breakfast we decided to tackle Charmant Som, which is one of the peaks in the Chartreuse, and the historical Abbey of Chartreuse. The heat was getting pretty bad this week, so before we left for the mountains we stopped off at the local sports store and bought shorts for Tiffany and the girls. I first discovered Charmant Som when Pierre took me there several years ago. A very steep hiking trail takes you to the top, where a cross marks [View Full Entry]

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Monday, June 15 Monday was our first day in the Rhone-Alps region of France. Grenoble is in a valley practically surrounded by high mountains with snow at their peak even in June. Pierre technically lives in the suburbs of Grenoble in a little town called Brignoud. From Brignoud it's easy to access the many hiking trails in the summer and ski resorts in the winter. When you step out of Pierre's house, your eyes are immediately drawn to the immense mountains at your doorstep. With so many mountains it's no wonder that Grenoble hosted the winter olympics in 1968. If you [View Full Entry]

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Sunday, June 14 We woke up very early on Sunday to take the TGV train to see my friend Pierre who lives near the French Alps in Grenoble. After saying sad goodbyes to our hosts Jean and Annick we took the local train into Paris to the Gare de Lyon. Tiffany somehow managed to get caught in the doors of the Metro train as they closed and screamed. Fortunately she was ok, but the next thought was "How embarassing!". The locals on the train took it all in stride, ignoring her like they ignore all other strange occurences on the train. [View Full Entry]

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Saturday, June 13 On Saturday we went to the Chateau of Versailles with Pierre's parents and with Anne's family. The plan was not to see the Versailles in the usual manner via the palace at the front entrance (very touristy) but to come in through the back entrance and see the huge English garden filled with fountains, and walk around the Marie Antoinette's Estate also known as the Queen's Hamlet. We found out later in the day after talking some tourists from King of Prussia (Yo, Philly !!) that it was an hour long wait to get the tickets and then [View Full Entry]

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Friday, June 12th After only a few days of traveling I could already smell rebellion in the air with the wife and kids so tired the day before. So we decided to sleep in late on Friday and have a more leisurely day with some site seeing in Paris followed by dinner with the family of Anne. The girls ended up sleeping almost 12 hours which was unbelieveable. We left for the train station in Cormeilles about 11:00 in the morning and made our way to the first destination of the day, the Arc D'Triomphe. A quick history lesson - Napolean [View Full Entry]

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Thursday, June 11th On Thursday, Pierre's sister Anne accompanied us into Paris for a day of site seeing. We took the Bateaux Mouche which is a nice leasiurely way to see the primary sights of Paris in one sitting. The Bateaux Mouche is basically a big tour boat with open air seating on the top to get the best view. The weather was still mixed so it was freezing cold and windy on the top deck of the boat. To make up for the cold morning we decided to have lunch at the Creperie de Cluny in the Latin quarter. This [View Full Entry]

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Where Have We Been ? Sorry it's been a few days since I posted to the blog, today was my first opportunity to use the internet. I bet you thought I forgot about you guys already :-) We arrived in Paris Tuesday afternoon after what seemed like an eternity on planes, trains and automobiles. In a nutshell we flew through Charlotte, Atlanta and Dublin to get to Paris (hey, the ticket was cheap !!). When we arrived in Paris, we still had to take several trains during the Parisian rush hour before finally arriving at Cormeilles-En-Parisis, the home of our friends [View Full Entry]

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