On the road again traveling across the Swiss Alps to Paris

The air was chilly as we boarded the bus for our trip through the Swiss Alps to our next destination, Paris, France.

I do not remember much about this portion of our trip.  The medication I was given made me very tired and all I wanted to do was sleep.  Randy made arrangements with Mary to let me have two seats on the bus so I could sleep; and sleep I did.

Consequently, I do not remember much about the day’s travels.  I asked Randy what he saw as we traveled down the road.

“When we first started out there were beautiful mountains, then as we passed into France there were many picturesque farms and a smattering of monasteries and castles along our way,” Randy responded.

Randy mentioned that we had intermittent rain during most of the morning.  We stopped at a very nice rest station that had an expansive food court.  We ordered one Panini sandwich to share and bottled water.

Eventually, we arrived on the outskirts of Paris and our guide gave us a history of the city as well as pointing out various monuments along the way.

Like so many of the cities we have visited over these last days, the streets were very narrow and the buildings had beautiful grille work balconies.

As we got further into the city we saw a tangle of traffic that made Randy cringe.  I suppose the narrow streets and heavy traffic is why there are so many small cars and motor scooters in and around the city.

We were both amazed that motor scooters and motorcycles were parked on the sidewalks in part of the city.

We eventually made our way to our hotel.   The streets were too narrow for our bus so we disembarked and walked to the hotel.  Most of the elevators we used so far were so small you could only get one person and two large suitcases in them.  I found myself in most hotels walking up to our room.

Well, at this hotel we could actually get two people and two large suitcases in the elevator.  We both looked at each other and said in unison, “Life is good”.  Very funny!

Our experiences with European hotels so far had been mixed.  Some were spacious with modern bathrooms and several were older, smaller and had bathrooms that were little more than very small closets.

I put the key in the door, pushed it open and there was the bed!  We had to turn the suitcases sideways to get them in the room.  The space between the end of the bed and the wall was so narrow we had to carry our luggage to the other side of the room.  And, oh my, the bathroom was so, so small.

View from our balcony

But, Randy was happy there was a small balcony (or what Randy thought was a balcony) outside our bedroom window.  Frankly, I do not believe it was meant to be space you should stand on.  But, Randy, being who he is, had to check it out.

As soon as we got settled in the room, Randy went out to see if he could find me some clear soup.  Randy found some soup that needed to be microwaved, but after checking with the hotel, they said they did not have a microwave.  So we were out of luck.

He eventually made his way back to the hotel.  He was unsuccessful finding soup but had a funny story to tell.

“I was walking down the street just a few steps from our hotel when I was approached by two ladies of the evening.  Actually, considering the area around the hotel I was not surprised,” he commented.

When he came into the hotel, he learned that we were staying in the wrong hotel.  Our guide had the address for one hotel but the phone number for another.  The travel agency had booked both hotels for our group; evidently we were in the wrong one.  So, Mary told us that we would be moving in the morning to the correct hotel.  Trust me when I tell you this announcement did not sit well with several of our fellow travels.

It had been a long day, we were both tired, too tired to worry about dinner so, we settled in for the night.

Tomorrow we are back on the bus for a guided tour of the Paris highlights.

Enjoy,

Mary