Blogs from France, Europe - page 1623

Breakfast was continental of course, so I set off to do the tourist bit, dreaming of a good old British fry-up. I should have been grateful, as on my budget that meal was to seem like a relative pig-out. I then headed back to Paris. The city of romance, and I was going to travel there on my own. I suppose that it was no worse than going with two blokes, but it was a sad, lonely traveller who got off the train at the Gar du Nord. Little did I know at the time, but three years later, I would get engaged to my future wife in Paris. When trying to navigate the Paris underground - or New York's for that matter - you realise how elegant the London tube map is. Trying to fathom ... read more

Paris is the most beautiful city in the world, dear reader; a city full of culture and tradition, and blessed with magnificent architecture. This journal tells the intensely personal story of six months spent living in this glorious city, where despite the beauty of the surroundings the personal signs were ominous from the beginning. Leading on from the previous journal, I caught the ferry from Dover to Calais and then boarded a train on to Paris where I checked into a hostel in the heart of the city. I was young and adventurous which is a plus, but impulsive with a tendency not to think things through, which for a traveller is definitely not a plus! I originally applied for a student work visa at the French embassy in Tokyo towards the end of 1987, and ... read more

ENTRY TWO — May 21st 1986 Cat Ass Trophy: The Journey Continues The morning we left Amsterdam was warm and sunny. I remember being excited about traveling through the Dutch countryside — and seeing Marlike again (pronounced Mar-lee-kah). Would she have changed a great deal? Our train ride was uneventful, Miranda spending the entire time with her gaze directed out the window, trying to catch a glimpse of a windmill. I couldn't get a sensible word out of her, so I decided to order an Amstel Lager, read my magazine and enjoy the ultramodern train ride. The American newspapers and magazines were full of news about Jim Baker and Tammy Faye. Their glorious "empire" seemed on the verge of collapse. After a short time (Holland is not a big country), I noticed th... read more

Linda, Carol and I joined with my Canadian colleague, Hank, and his wife, Gerlinda, to visit Normandy. Gerlinda’s father was a German soldier who had died of appendicitis the year before the Normandy invasion on June 6, 1944. She had never visited his grave. 30 March 1985 Saturday. We drove southwest from Brussels to Rouen, France where we stopped for lunch and visited the Rouen Cathedral and the place where Joan D’Arc had been burned at the stake. We then continued on to Honfleur, the picturesque seaport at the mouth of the Seine River. Honfleur was a favorite spot for Impressionist painters Courbet and Monet. We walked around this quaint seaport town that had been a hot spot during the Hundred Years War between England and France. We then drove along the Normandy coast and cut ... read more

When we lived in Glan Munchweiler we took a trip to the French Riviera in conjunction with a weeklong trip that included northern Italy. After moving to Boblingen, we soon learned that we could do a number of longer distance trips over three day weekends by taking overnight trains sleeping in the couchette compartments. After work on Friday evening we would drive either to Kehl, Germany or Strasbourg, France where we would catch the the 7 pm train directly to Antibes, arriving about 8 am the next morning. We would check into the Hotel Royal located right across from the sandy beach on the Cap D'Antibes side of town. We would then spend Saturday, Sunday, and Monday mornings until about 1 pm on the beach. Sometimes we would walk the one kilometer over to the Juan ... read more