A Joyeux Noel et Bonne Annee!
Trip Start
Sep 27, 2007
1
4
8
Trip End
Ongoing
Paris, Strasbourg and Grenoble,
France
Wednesday, January 2, 2008
Spent three nights with michelle sergeant, her sister, and two other kiwis from london.
That first night, i showed off my iceskating skills on the rink in front of hotel de ville. Christmas eve involved being the greatest paris tour guide ever (basically dragging the others right around the highlights of paris all day...past le louvre, up the champs elysees, went up the arc de triomphe - which i hadn't done before, back to st michel - found a great falafel place there, then over to montmartre for champagne in the sunset on the steps of the sacre coeur). That night checked out the Notre Dame as it glowed with lights for the christmas mass service, and then made a quick run up to and around the pantheon.
Started christmas day with real champagne (yay!), and a shit load of chocolate, kicked off a traditional 4 course lunch at Restaurant Chartier with Kir Royals, then scaled the Tour Eiffel by foot!
Boxing day i headed by TGV to Strasbourg (homeless people snuck onto the train and took the seats behind me!...they were superexcited about going to strasbourg i think), and arrived in a town with white stuff all over the pavement...turns out it was snow...lucky the canadian assistant helped me clarify that one!
Next day, Stu, Erinne and me checked out the capital city of christmas (strasbourg!), and it turns out im not cut out for a maximum of zero degrees...seven layers of clothing, two pairs of gloves...still bloody freezing, ended up drinking mulled wine at 11am to try warming up..unsuccessful unfortunately. but the city was totally christmasy, snow covered roofs on houses, pain d'epices, marches de noel...way cool. the next day we went for a tour of the kronenbour beer factory. then the day after we by mistake (my crap navigating) passed by the european parliament as we narrowly missed driving into germany, on our way to grenoble!
Drove thru the Jura mountains, shaved past but not into Geneva, on the N83, officially the best drive ive done ever, and arrived in Grenoble late that night, only to find our hotel was less than central...rather in a nearby town called Vorreppe.
On the 30th, we checked out Grenoble, went up the longest cable car in the world to the fort de la Bastille, then thru a grotto, and thru a hole in a fence and up thru the alpine forest to to top of the mountain! Last day of 2007, we drove up to the Chamrousse ski field, and i snowboarded my little heart out, falling face first into the snow multiple times!
Had fondue that evening, and hit the bars and clubs of Grenoble to welcome in 2008. Woke up on the first in time to pack our bags and make the big journey home to bed..
Christmas Morning
