Blogs from Annecy, Rhône-Alpes, France, Europe - page 2

This entry by Tom. Another day, another nice Kyriad hotel breakfast and temperatures hotter than the surface of the sun. On the news last night we found out that all this hot weather is blowing in from north Africa--so, the Sahara Desert. I had planned to ride over the Col du Grand Colombier today in part to make the descent through the Lacets du Grand Colombier and shoot some video of that. Learned about this stretch of road from watching the TdF a year or two ago and it looked pretty cool. But after two days in a row of 6+ hours on the bike in 30°C+ temps, I re-vectored and departed Bellegarde-sur-Valserine with Caroline on a short-cut route that bypassed the cols of the Jura and instead crossed the Génissiat dam on the Rhone river ... read more

Tag 88 – Mit Alix durch Annecy Am vorigen Abend war ich um Viertel nach acht am Bahnhof angekommen, wo Alix mich erwartet hatte. Sie fragte, ob wir den Bus nehmen oder zu Fuß gehen wollten. Da ich so gleich noch etwas von Annecy sah und wir sowieso noch hätten warten müssen, entschied ich mich fürs Gehen, obwohl es regnete. Als wir eine halbe Stunde später im Studentenwohnheim ankamen, waren wir recht durchnässt, und auch meine Reisetasche hatte ein bisschen Feuchtigkeit durchgelassen, aber dank meines Ordnungssystems in Plastiktüten war das zum Glück ja nicht so schlimm. Ihr Zimmer war zwar nicht sehr groß, aber es war genug Platz für eine Isomatte für mich und es war total gemütlich eingerichtet. Sie hatte sich eine Pinnwand mit Postkarten und Fotos von Drejø gemacht und sogar den Ausschnitt einer ... read more

Well we finally found some wifi to enter a blog. We left on Wednesday night at 22:00 and got to dover at about 02:00 on Thursday morning. The ferry left at 04:00, and after negotiating a very confusing (for me) route to the boat we boarded a very empty ferry, and we were off. Not before driving over our dustpan brush, which Fiona was pleased about as she now doesn't have to sweep out the van every evening. We landed at dunquerk at 07:00 and were making our way to Belgium, for fiona's fags, when we met our first unusual travellers. We were pulled into a layby to check our directions (a usual event for us) when there was a tap on the window. It was 2 first time would be baccy smugglers from Oldham, who ... read more

If you thought whitewater rafting was beyond your means, think again. Just a short flight away from northern Europe you can get the thrill of shooting the rapids for a fraction of the price of heading over to the Zambezi, Nile or Colorado rivers. A two hour drive from the major towns of Annecy, Grenoble, Chambery or even Geneva is the Tarentaise Valley formed by the River Isère. It offers more than 23 km of whitewater or “eau vive”, as it is called in French. A two and a half, to three hour downstream trip is less than €60.00. The difficulty varies from a class II to IV and the scenery is dramatic. If that’s not enough, and you want a bit more of a white-knuckle ride, try the Doron de Bozel. A tributary of the ... read more

France has one of the best social security systems, if not the best, in the world. Both blue and white collars workers get paid 6 weeks vacation time every year. So, in July and August most of the French people take their annual summer holidays and travel around the country. Since I wanted to avoid the summer rush I took a mini vacation in May, to Annecy a town in the Rhone-Alpes region, often referred to as "the Venice of France." As Annecy is only 130 kilometers (80 miles) away from Bourg-en-Bresse (the city where I lived in France) it took us less than 2 hours to cover that distance. We had an early summer that particular year in 2003. As a matter of fact, that year turned out to be the hottest summer in France ... read more