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Published: October 30th 2007
Lyon
Bosilique Notre-Dome De FouruiereIn France for five nights and quite possibly put on five kilos thanks to the fab bakeries here! But is also has been the most frustrating time for us.
We first arrived in Chamonix from Geneve, we had enough of the big city's after one day and headed right back up into the Alps on the France side this time. Also here is the largest mountain in Europe so we thought we had better check it out. Chamonix is another small village with 5000 ppl and of course very touristy but it is the off season so we were happy with that, but that also means that not everything is open and there is only one hostel open (not camping from last experience) and I didn't realise how lost we could get in a small town like this! Well we found it and settled in and went back into the village to explore and we happened to come across our first French bakery. Somehow I resisted but Kylie fell for it and got a chocolate eclair and it was chocolate everything! Out side and in was just chocolate, she was in heaven! Also we had our first (of many) French stick,
Lyon
Roman thearter baguette over here and it is dangerous how nice just the bread is!
Got up at 6.30am to go for a hike the following morning and to work off all the bakery food so headed up the mountain as far as I could go before catching the cable car up to 3842m to see views of the Mt Blanc. It was bloody freezing up there at -4deg and that was without the wind chill factor and it was blowing a gail up that high. Anyway the views were still great of the mountain and pleased to have seem that along with several hundred chinese.
So this was the last time we would be seeing the Alps for two more weeks until we get into Italy so we didn't want to leave and because the frustrating time was still to come.
After the hike I did, also I hiked to see the second largest glacier in Europe as well, we packed up and headed to Lyon our fist French city. Our train was 30 minutes late arriving as we are finding out is pretty good and our host was waiting for us and it was late so just went to his
Chamonix
Mt Blanc and me freezing place and chilled out for the night. Lyon is the second largest city in France so heaps of bakeries for us to visit and also many other non-food sights as well. There is a old Roman theatre there and is still in fairly good condition then we went to the Bosilique Notre-Dame De Fouruiere and this is a church that looks more like a castle over looking the city. We also went through the old cuty of course and hit the shops but only for brousing this time. It is a great city and heaps to do and we would have liked to stay longer but we were heading to the Mediterranean Sea.
Now for the frustrsating thing... The French transport people have decided to go on strike and that means everything is closed so getting anywhere is near impossible as we found out. We have heard several things about the French and we are starting to see some of it ourselves. Not the most helpful at times and can be rude as well but hopfully it will all change soon.
We were planning to go to Cannes in the French Mediteranian and a couchsurfer there offered his house
Canne
Mediterranean Sea to us for two nights since he will not be there, a house for ourselves on the Mediterain!!!!! How awesome would that be we thought!!! But that is when the trouble started. We had to get there by 4pm to get the keys and heard there could be a strike so decided to get to the train station by 6.30am in the morning because they said the only time a train could be going there is that time, of course it didn't. Well in the next 6 hours was spent walking aound the train station trying to work out what to do and we had been sent to many different places by the 'helpful' staff and gave hitchiking a go but first time we have not been picked up and adventually when we went back to another train station we were told that we could get to Canne by going to Paris first. So say it is Aus trying to go from Sydney to Melbourne you have to go by train via Cairns. It was fine with us to do that but why didn't they tell us that by now 8 hours earlier and we would have made the 4pm
time to meet out host. Ended up getting there at 11.56pm with no where to stay but found a nice hotel for a couple of nights in Canne.
Of course we only had one day there so it had to rain and blow a gail but it was still warm there in that town and it is for the very rich that place. Still had a great time as there was plenty to do with all the markets and the Rugby World Cup Final was on so headed to a pub in the afternoon (after a couple of bottles of cheap ass backpacker wine) and we both woke up with a nice headache the next morning. The game was good because the pub was full of English so we had to go for South Africa of course and a good night.
Thats it for this one but going to be doing another blog today, hopefully, for the rest of the time we have had in France so far since I am way behind now and tomorrow we head to Paris! And today if it stops raining going to the D Day beaches..
Thats all for this one
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