goodbye france, hello germany, and another quick taste of switzerland

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what a long few days. sitting on a train right now between geneva and bern in switzerland, its around 1800 wednesday. but i’ll get to that in a few mins. get ready, this is a long one.

so yesterday was an amazing day! my room at the majestic hotel in nimes was pretty dark, and i slept in until close to 1030. couldn’t believe my eyes when i looked at the time, most days i’m up before 8 so i don’t even bother setting an alarm. i figured i’d be up half early to get a start on the day so i could visit the roman arena in nimes before heading off to carcassonne for the rest of the day since carcassonne was about 2 hrs away by train each way. anyways had to skip the arena, which is a mini colosseum a la romes. at least i got a chance to walk around the outside lol. anyways got on the train and enjoyed a breakfast of a ham and cheese sandwich and a petit pain au chocolat. three american girls sit across from me and seem pretty sure they’re on the wrong train. we have a little chat and i assure them they’re going the right way (either that or we’d all be lost together). turns out one is from alaska near the yukon border. i told her i had a friend living in whitehorse and she said “oh i’m sorry for your friend!”. hahah! Guess she doesn’t like whitehorse jenn - maybe you like it better? 2 hrs later i see the turrets of carcassonne rising in the distance. it was as beautiful as i had imagined! i just wish they had some medieval flags attached to the tops of the turrets, it seemed a little bare without them, and i had pictured them there.

anyways get off the train and get a map from a lovely woman at the tourist info booth outside the train station and take a nice walk through the “newer” part of the city, which was only 4 or 5 hundred years old from what i gather. bought a couple of bananas from a fruit market to snack on on the way. anyways cross over the quaint little “old city” footbridge to see the walls of the old city towering above. thankfully it wasn’t too warm out so the walk up the hill wasn’t a killer. speaking of not too warm, i went out to buy shorts the day before because i’ve been too hot most days and of course once 12 o’clock comes the sky clouds over, the wind picks up, and i’m, dare i say, kinda cold in my shorts and t-shirt. got me lots of looks from people bundled up in their parkas too lol it was still 15 degrees at least so to me thats summer!

anyways got inside the walls of the old city and it was fantastic. super tourist haven but there were windy streets, cute stalls and shops... i’m not sure how old the city really is, but most of this old town was in place in the 1200’s. it was a refuge of the cathars, a sect of christianity trying to escape persecution from the catholics. but you know us catholics, anyone not like us what do we do? launch a crusade of course! there were lots of cathars in the area but the church slowly hunted everyone down and killed them, or forced them to repent. which lead me to the medieval torture museum. it had on display lots of gadgets used to torture witches and heretics (anyone who said bad about the church and didn’t follow its doctrine) and anyone else they decided they didn’t like. some just caused lots of pain (chair of nails, three holed board one for head and one for each hand) while some were clearly death machines (guillotine, chamber full of spikes that was slowly closed around the body ). somber kinda place but super interesting. everything had a description in french, english, spanish, italian and german. after that took a walk around the ramparts (i think thats the right term?) in the space between the outer and inner walls. just amazing that its still standing after all this time (altho lots of repair work on the go so it seemed). after that i was starting to get a bit sore footed so i went into st nazareth church. what a beauty. just when i’m thinking how amazing is this, a 5 man vocal group starts singing some religious music. in the church it was echoing and they were awesome. what a moment. took a video which i hope does it some justice.

anyhow it was getting a bit late and i was getting cold so i head back through town to the train station, stopping for a nice chicken and cheese panini along the way. oh right and a butter croissant. heaven! all washed down with a coca light (diet coke). then back on the train for the 2 hr ride back to nimes.

so back in nimes i just go for a little walk around but its getting late and i still had no plans for the next day so i go to the train station to see about getting out of there. well foiled by my railpass. think i mentioned before how the french restrict teh number of seats for railpass users on the fast trains. so i have to get out of there stringing together local trains. i ask the chick at the counter how long to get to frankfurt doing that and she says at least one day! at least! so knowing that its easter weekend coming i want to get there sooner rather than later so i’m near there when my pass expires sunday. so i go back to the hotel and try to book a room somewhere and of course the internet is not working. can’t even look up the train schedules. so i go back to the train station and check what times i can leave nimes at least, and figure 708 sounds good (befoer that would be 530!!!) to get an early start. had a french phone card so i manage to call home and talk to dad for a few mins (house is, touch wood, SOLD!), and then rodney since his birthday is today! happy big 3-0 buddy! and after all this now that i think about it, i totally forgot to have supper last night, and didn’t realize it until now when trying to think about what i ate to put in the blog. weird. not that i couldn’t miss a meal or two there, plenty of backup on board!

so i got up this morning at 530 so i’d have time to shower, pack, look up trains and book a room before getting to the station. alarm goes off, i get up, book a hotel in baden-baden germany since it says i can get there by 7pm if i leave at 708am. long day of trains but a 2 hr stopover in lyon i figure i can go out and have a look around for a bit.

this is when the fun really started. got to the train station 655. look at the board and no mention of a train at 708. i go look at the schedule on the wall and its there. i go to the window and they tell me something (either a strike or work on the tracks), its changed to a bus. that leaves at 700. and its currently 702. i run out to see an empty slot where the bus had been. strike one!

so i wait till 808 for the next train to avignon. get on, get to avignon no sweat. instead of a 10 minute connection i should have had from the 708 train, now i have to wait 45. usually no big deal but on a 12 hour day of trains it can come unravelled pretty fast! anyways get on the train from avignon to lyon and wonder about my connection to geneva. get to lyon and looks good, train to geneva at 1436 seems to be on time. actually seems 4 mins early as it says 1432. use the last of my phone card to call mom, who i haven’t spoken to since i left 2 weeks ago, and hang out in the station since i only had an hour and a half now, plus i needed lunch and the phone call so no look around town. bought a ham and cheese on a baguette sandwich (4th in 3 days lol) which was again, cheap and delicious, with a petit pain au chocolat and a coke zero.

as 1432 approaches, there’s no track listed on the sign for the geneva train. it just says “car sortie porte something” which means nothing to an amateur frenchie like me. so i go to the info booth and they say oh yes there’s work on the tracks today so its a bus instead. they tell me how to get on the bus.

go outside to the bus area which is chaos. people everywhere. buses everywhere. some backed in, some front on, with papers in the windows of where they’re going. i see the one that says geneva, throw my bag in the hold and get on. confirm with the driver “pour geneve?” he says “non” and i point to the sign, he laughs and points to the right and says “violet!”. i see the purple bus. i get my bag back from the hold. i run to this bus. its paper also says geneve. i ask the driver, who confirms, i put my bag under, hop on and have a row of two to myself right under an A/C vent. things are finally coming up Jason!

traffic in Lyon is crazy but after 25 mins we’re on the highway, and the sign says 135km to geneva. sounds good, connection in geneva is at 1715 which seems doable. we make one stop along the way but still seems like i’ll make it. so much hopeful optimism. or maybe naievete? we get to the swiss border, which now that they’ve joined the Schengen agreement (making most of europe one immigration zone - no real passport checks between them) should be a breeze. of course our bus gets pulled over. customs comes on to check out passports, seems to go quickly and i’m confident i’ll still make the connection, but starting to get a bit worried. the customs officers speak so so english. they speak to an african man who speaks less than so so english and no french. they decide to go through his bags. bus driver shouts “cinque minutes! toilets la, smoke la, et ici en cinque minutes”. in other words, have a quick smoke or pee and get back here in 5 mins! so i get off since i’m a nosey parker to see what they’re doing with that dudes bags. and of course, what does he have in there? sealed packages of spices! well thats what it looks like to me, but what does it look like to customs? DROGUES! so they take the dude into the customs house, and the driver says something about 5 more minutes. now i know my connection is shot. which sucks because i have a room paid for in baden baden and don’t know if i can make it. the french machines told me the last IC (fast train) from basel to baden-baden is at 2012 or something, and if i miss the 1715 in geneva, i wont get to basel until at least 2030. thankfully i had written down a few local train times this morning when i was checking on the internet and the french machines seemed to only have the fast intercity trains on them for germany. so i am hopeful yet i might make it there! otherwise i’m gonna have to find somewhere to sleep along the way, and find some way of calling ahead to say i won’t make it tonite but would definitely like to check in first thing in the morning when i arrive, so please don’t cancel my room!!

so anyways my plan was to go from nimes, up to western germany to trier in the Mosel River valley. they have a bunch of cute towns there and burg eltz a ginormous castle still decorated in lots of original stuff, all in great shape and owned by the same family the past 700 years. unfortunately this plan involves getting a fast train to strasbourg or paris or somewhere, and then another to germany, since trier is near the border (also near luxembourg where i might stop in, to at least say i’ve been to a new country this trip). but thats looking less likely as time goes on eh!

we finally get to geneva, traffic is a nightmare, and we get to the station at 1730. strike two monsieur mackey!!

find my way past the construction, into the station, quick look at the schedules and hop on the first train to bern i see (next direct to basel is 1915, D’oh!) at 1745. so here i am on the train to bern, hopeful there’s a decent connection to basel, and then praying there’s another connection on to germany from there.

lessons from so far today: never use a railpass in france again (also, since i’m over 26 i had to buy a first class pass. regional trains in france are almost all exclusively 2nd class which i don’t mind normally but i’m getting used to having the single seat on one side to myself). never travel easter week again. never try to string together 5 or 6 trains in a row again with a hotel booked on the other end. never assume trains will go when they say they will. never leave for the train station 10 mins before the train is due to leave. never make a 500km side trip from everywhere else i’ve been just to see one thing (carcassonne).

meanwhile it was so worth it as carcassonne was a highlight of my life.

1945 update: got off train from geneva in bern, capital of switzerland. have to pee really bad, but also starving and ate all my remaining food on the last train (granola bar) and have 8 minutes to do both this, and find train to basel. manage to get a chicken schnitzel baguette sandwich and a coke zero as i go from track 8 to track 6. nothing says switzerland like 11.50 francs (close to the same CDN) for a sandwich and a pop. anyways no time for pee, can go on the train even though i hate leaving my bags even just for a minute. the downsides of solo travel. anyways go upstairs just in time for train #5 of the day. so now on the way to basel with fingers crossed for there to be a train to germany when i get there!!


2120 update: on train #6 for the day. so i arrived in basel, and thankfully having been in the station before i knew where to look for the schedule and knew where the helpful information counter was. so off i run, hoping beyond hope there is a train to baden-baden. i check the schedule. i don’t see freiburg after 2012. somewhat crushed, i head to the info desk to see if there is anything i’m not seeing. the very friendly, helpful lady there clickity clicks away at the keyboard and says yes you can go to freiburg at 2107. i say wonderful. i ask can i get to baden-baden which is where my room for the night is. she says next train is 6am. I’m crushed. she prints out the relevant schedule for me and i’m off, thinking guess i’ll go to freiburg since i at least have a guidebook with some hotels/hostels listed in it, and make my way to baden-baden in the morning.

two seconds later i think to myself, i know (or at least want to believe) when i checked the schedules online this morning there was a late slow train to baden-baden from freiburg. grasping at straws i go back to the very friendly, helpful lady, who thankfully is still very friendly and helpful and suggest perhaps a slow train from freiburg to baden-baden that didn’t come up when she searched basel to baden-baden. she kind of gives me the definitely cross-cultural “you must be kidding look”. but true to her swissly efficient nature, thirty seconds of frantic keyboard tapping later, with me straining unsuccessfully to peek at the screen, she gets a surprised look on her face, smiles, and prints off a sheet. YES! there is a 25 minute connection in freiburg on to offenburg, with a five minute connection to baden-baden, arriving at 2346. i want to kiss her. not wanting to get arrested or slapped i restrain myself and offer my profuse danke shuns!

so i run gleefully with a huge goofy grin to the sign showing which platforms the trains are on. i don’t see the train she has printed off for freiburg. i double check the schedule on the wall, nope still don’t see it. slightly panicked, i’m back yet again to see the still very friendly, helpful info desk lady, who grins on my approach, with a ‘please tell me i’m an idiot’ look on my face and say i don’t see the train listed anywhere. she says its the City Night Line (overnight) train to berlin/prague, which has a different train # on the schedule. i say but i don’t have a reservation. she says its ok for the stops as far as Mannheim. at this point i trust her more than santa and jesus combined so off i go to platform 9.

the train pulls up, i wander to sector A of the track and there are only the sleeper cars with beds and signs saying prague and berlin. crushed, i practically jump on the guy working the train and frantically cry “frieburg!!” while pointing at the train, which is pretty much the extent of my German. he laughs, and explains in halting english that this engine will move away and 3 more cars will be attached to the train in 5 minutes. again the strong desire to kiss a swiss railways employee is resisted and sure enough the cars come rolling along and get attached to the back of the train.

so here’s hoping for a bit of good luck on an otherwise luckless day!

2200 update: well i got the train as far as freiburg, and jump off to wait for the next one. as i’m walking down the platform to go in to the station, i happen to read the sign which says the train i just got off was going to stop in offenburg after all, which would give me much more than 5 mins connection time. i confirm with the rail guy and he says ‘ow’ which means yes so back on i hop.

0030 update: well i was too paranoid to pull out the ole laptop as it got later and there weren’t many people around since i didn’t want anyone deciding to follow me and steal it. paranoid? yes. prudent? perhaps. anyways i got off in offenburg, and walked around the station to waste some time before the train at 2323. some guy comes up asking if i speak english, and seems to have a question about working the ticket machines. they’re pretty simple to use so i go to help him, but weary of a scam since its late at night and the first thing he says is ‘i’m trying to buy a ticket to budapest’. since budapest is like a thousand km away i know he’s not trying to go there immediately, and if he is there’s something going on... so anyways long story short he shows me 60 euros he has, shows me the price is 160 or something and asks if i have some money to give him to help him get home. yeah, right. so i just walk away and thats that.

locate platform 6, the train pulls up, i get on and 20 minutes later find myself in baden baden. finally. now the fun part, trying to get where i’m staying, with just an address, and a rudimentary hand drawn map in my book. walk out the train station and thank god there are still buses running. get on, manage to figure out where i’m going and boom theres my hotel! just got a shower since i’m a greasy mess after this mental travel day. so the bathroom door opens from the room, and closes on the toilet so two can share the bathroom or something. i didn’t realize this at first and jammed my thumb in the door. my right thumbnail is now purple and throbbing. what a way to end the day.

at least i didn’t come up with that 3rd strike, or there’s no way i would have made it here! here’s to having some kind of luck, altho not sure it was really that good.

going for hotel breakfast in the morning (included!) then to see the sights in baden-baden. there are a couple of bath houses which i’m not really in to, a casino which i might stop in to for a few mins, some good hiking into the black forest (think Brother’s Grimm) and not quite sure what else. might do some laundry too, and need to plan out the next few days since its easter weekend and it seems like things might shut down a fair bit. but thankfully i’m only 2hrs from the airport i fly home from next week, so i think i’m gonna hang tight around here for the rest. want to see nuremburg, rothenburg, trier, burg eltz (castle), maybe luxembourg and then home next wednesday.

wow that was long. bon soir mes amies... oh wait now, i’m in germany...

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