If Day 3 was peaceful, gorgeous, and wonderful, Day 4 stands as a stark contrast. At best, it was a comedy of errors. It all started with us packing up to leave Paris. We managed to get a cab that we could all fit in, but with a cab driver that could speak far less English than he claimed and who wasn't all that concerned that the place he dropped us didn't look like an Avis Rental Car site. In fact, he had dropped us off at 15 Rue Lourmel...when our true destination was 105 Rue Lourmel. We discovered this, standing on the street corner surrounded by all of our luggage, as he peeled off down the street.
I really wish I could have gotten a picture of this. You'll just have to imagine it, because I really wasn't in the condition to get out my camera. Picture the four of us, on a busy Parisian street (but of course one that taxis and buses don't routinely go down), each with a huge wheeled suitcase, backpacks, purses, and camera bags. Picture us weighed down like pack mules as we weave around cars, on and off sidewalks, across crosswalks, past schools and businesses. Picture us dressed for a day of sightseeing, hair and make up done, clothes just so. Picture us dripping with sweat as we make the hour long trek, all the while alternating between laughing hysterically and bickering, melting under the weight of our loads.
Imagine the impression we made on the poor Avis guy, when we finally arrived there, and collapsed on the pavement outside his office, surrounded by our mountain of luggage. Imagine his face when he saw all the luggage we expected to put into a tiny hatchback Citroen.
By a miracle of French engineering, we did manage to get our entire load and all four of us inside the Citroen. Whew, we thought. Our day can only get better. And, for a while, it did. We drove from Paris to Versailles without incident. We parked easily, and we got into the tremendous entrance line. We waited, bought our tickets, then waited in an equally tremendous line for the restrooms, then waited some more for a table so we could eat lunch. (We had more than worked off our breakfast of croissants and diet cokes at this point.) We ate a very nice lunch and regrouped from the morning's adventures.
We realized that we had been at Versailles for almost three hours by then and had yet to see anything beyond the inside of the restaurant and the restrooms. After waiting just once more for the restroom (can I ask why a place that gets so many visitors each year has so few bathrooms?!), we started exploring the palace. The grounds were just beautiful, and well worth the wait.
And the palace itself was not too shabby either!
We did an audiotour inside. Caroline was enthralled!
After a few hours, we decided we should hit the road before dark. We were planning to make the trip from Versailles to our chateau in the Loire Valley in about three short hours. Ha.
Leaving Versailles proved to be far more difficult than we had imagined. We had no GPS (Mamar's iPhone wasn't working), and we hadn't bought a map. We were relying on directions from googlemaps, and we all know how that works out sometimes. We had very specific directions about how to leave the city, and no matter how many attempts we made, we couldn't find any of the right streets! (It didn't help that the French don't believe in street signs. They do put placards on the sides of corner buildings that indicate the street...sometimes. Most of the time, it seems to be left up to guesswork.) In the end, we decided to call Bill. He's often my solution at home when I need directional help. I call from wherever I am, he looks it up on the computer, and he can help me find my destination. I thought the same thing could apply here. Only it's hard for someone to help you when you can't tell them what street you're on. Long story (and LOTS of international cell phone minutes later), we finally found the highway leading towards the Loire Valley. Right at rush hour.
Unfortunately that wasn't the end of being lost. We made up some time on the highway, and after stopping at a gas station for (you guessed it) croissants and diet coke (and some produce lest we develop a vitamin deficiency), we made it to our exit. We navigated the roundabout and thought we were just a few short minutes from nice, warm beds -- and all this before dark! But, alas, we were wrong. Many, many miles through multiple apparent ghost towns and many, many more cell phone minutes used (Bill says those calls are "legendary" at his office...niiiice.), we finally come to a sign that indicates our chateau is just a couple of miles away! As we wind along those last dark, desolate miles, I glanced over and noticed the gas gauge alight. "Um, Mom," I said. "It looks like we might need some gas." Her response? "Oh, that. Yeah, that's been on a while." Panic! I had visions of us on the side of the road, no gas stations for miles, and no people anywhere to rescue us.
Thankfully, none of that happened, and we did make it to our chateau...just 8 hours after leaving Versailles.
1 comment:
Those phone calls were absolute gold. I mean, I wish I could recall what all was said but there was a TON of laughter.
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