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Published: July 19th 2012
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This is the day that wont ever F****** end.
It was the best of days and it was the worst of days.
I should mention that this is the second time that I am typing this blog. I typed it earlier and then when I hit submit, the stupid internet funked up and I lost everything......argh...It is after 1 am and after the day I am about to tell you we had I do not need this. This blog will seemed a little rushed as I really am not in the mood to type this for the second time but here goes...again.
I had spent many weeks planning this trip before we left to make sure that we could see and do as much as possible when we were here. This is meant to be a one in a lifetime trip for Syd and I and I wanted it to be as good as it could be. Each day of the trip I prepared maps, notes and things to do. For todays sheet I left a note for myself to get up early as it was going to be a packed day.......
We woke up at 10 and that was how our day began.
We ate breakfast and travelled from Lyon to our first naturally beautiful destination of Gorge de d'Ardèche. The gorge is in a very mountanous region of France and words cannot describe how beautiful it was. We drove to the top of the mountain and viewed the gorge from the top, then we drove to the bottom of the gorge and viewed it from the valley. There is a beautiful river that flows through the valley with lots of sandy beaches to attract sun worshipers and kayakers. Today was the perfect day to do both as it was 37 degrees. In the valeey there are a number of tourist towns that line the river and it is a very busy place full of life and people. It really is a wonderful place to spend a day or two if you have the time.
I should mention the drive through these mountains. We of course were driving on roads, but these "roads" are roads only in the dictionary sense. Yes cars drive on them and yes they have road signs, but they really are not roads.
They are narrow strips of pavement hanging off the sides of cliffs that are barely wide enough for one car let alone providing enough space for two way traffic. Meeting a car coming the other direction is risking your life every time. To put this in perspective, it took us about 8 hours of driving to cover about 225km of mountain driving. However, I would not have changed any of it at all. Syd and I had a blast screaming and freaking out at every hairpin turn, and there were many of them. The views aer pectacular and it is a day we will not forget. I believe these are the kind of roads you would find in Cambodia, or Panama..... not France.
Our next destination was about 100 km into the mountains further to the Gorge de Tarn. This gorge is undescribable and pictures will not do it justice. It is a massive gorge with a number of towns at the top of the gorge and many in the valley. We visited the valley town of Saint Enemie, and wow was it amazing. Much of the town is built right into the mountain, with stores carved out of
the rock which makes them look more like caves than businesses. There of course is a beautiful river that has carve out the valley with lots of people enjoying it.
We had dinner in the town. I had curry chicken, with a goat cheese and honey quiche and a hazelnut cake for dessert. Syd had a locally caught perch, a salad which she did not enjoy and a creme brulee. Of course we could not eat until after 7PM when they start serving dinner, we had to rush as we wanted out of the mountains before dark.....that did not happen.
The drive from Gorge de Tarn to Montpellier is about 125km. We left town at 8PM and did not arrive in Montpellier until 11, and that is when the fun started.
Montepellier We used the GPS to find our hotel and really did not have any problems at all finding it. However, the hotel is on a very busy narrow street with no parking. This is a common occurrence and the GPS is very good at locating parkades. However, in this case the closest parkade was nearly 1km away and was through a lot
of windy roads. We parked the car and spent the next half hour looking for our hotel with no luck. Imagine Sydney and I wondering around with all of our luggage at 1130 PM in Montpellier, France looking for our hotel. We finally gave up and decided to get a different hotel. We stopped in at a chain hotel and we were told they had not more rooms left. They directed us to a hotel 5 minutes away who had rooms. We were not willing to walk again and get lost again so we had them call us a cab. We waited 30 minutes for the cab, but I had the thought that he could find our original hotel.... he could not. We had him drop us off at the recommended hotel which was literally 1 and a half blocks from the first hotel. So in 30 minutes of waiting for a cab and 20 minutes of driving around I ended up a 45 second walk from where we started. I am now paying for a hotel I did not show up for (75 Euros), paid 20 Euros for a cab that took us no where, and now paying (105
Euros) for a hotel room that sucks so bad. The toilet and shower are in the middle of the room with no walls dividing it. I can see the toilet anywhere in the room as well as the shower, which has a glass surround. This is a perfect setup for a dad and his 12 year old daughter.
Oh well, the day is finally over and all in all it was one of the better days of the trip. This has been a trip of a life time so far and there is still so much more to go. However, Montpellier will not be a place we will visit. We are going to sleep in tomorrow, and the assuming I can find where I parked my car, I will be driving as far away from this place as possible. I am sure Montpellier is a wonderful place, We are just never going to know about 😊
We look forward to more adventures tomorrow.
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