sites. Last night at Mont St. Michelle, the island town and church was
glorius. Only a few people hanging around. The narrow cobble stone
streets and alleys were ours to explore. Thus morning we got up early,
cleaned our mobile home for inspection and were on the road back to
St. Michelle by 8:15. 4€ for parking, then across the draw bridge and
up to the Abbey for a quick self guided tour.
Rick has become our best friend on our trip. We ask his advise on
everything, and so far he has not let us down. Best time to avoid the
crowds? Ask Rick. Where to get tickets? Ask Rick. What about gun
emplacements at Utah beach? Ask Rick. Need a free tour of St.
Michelle? Ask Rick. Rick said to get to the abbey before 10 to avoid
the crowds, that Versailles was closed on Monday, that the WWII museum
at Caen was the best, and he was right. Although Sally and I disliked
his PBS travel shows, his books are excellent and he now our constant
travelling companion. We say "Thanks Rick" to Rick Steves and his
travelguides at least a couple times each day.
We read Rick's guided tour as walked through the abbey, then meandered
down through town to our car. It was now 10:30 and the crowds were
beginning to arrive enmass. Our vacant street walk up to the abbey was
now a pack street shuffle back down.
We had to be back in Paris by 6:00PM to return our rented Nissan
before Avis closed. They did not offer night drop services. The mobile
home proprietor ppredicted a 5 hour drive, so we set 11 as the lay
hour we could leave St. Michelle. We left the parking lot at 10:45
setting out through the French countryside and quickly turning on Hwy
86 for Caen, Rhoen and then Paris.
We struggled before we left the states on how to prenounce Caen. con?
Can? Kay-ann? At our hotel in Paris our fun man at the front desk told
us it was pronounced Cone, although you don't say the "n" sound. "ko".
With a kind of gutteral o sound at the end.
The same with Rhoen. O had always heard it as row-en. Nope Ro, with
that same gutteral o from the back of the throat.
Anyway, we sped up the highway at 130km/hr. We hit the first toll
booth. Which lane? How do you pay? The lane we pulled into had no
person and no place to put money. Luckily, no one was behind us, so we
backed out and tried another Booth. It had a credit card slot so we
stuffed our VISA card in. It grabbed it out our hands and swallowed
it. Collectively we gasped! Yet, instantly it spit it out and the
gate before us opened. We grabbed the card and zoomed on our way,
leaving behind 3€20. This happened two more times before we left the
freeway and dropped to a lesser highway.
As I explained in an earlier blog, leaving a pinpoint location such as
an Avis rental car kios in SW Paris and aiming for the 75 mile wide
Normandy coast is not too difficult although getting out of Paris was
tricky. But when we had to perform the opposite, hitting that pinpoint
in crazy Paris-well let's just say we ran one stop light (that we know
of), had to stop ms ask pedeatrians (1)do you speak English, and (2)
where are we and (3) where is the Avis location. We were no
More than half a mile from it, but it took us 20 minutes of circling
and searching to find it.
Once we were rid of the car we hopped on the metro for the St. Paul
area to get Rick Steve's book on Switzerland. We were successful. We
sought out a cafe and had dinner.
Our plan was to spend the night at the train station, sleeping on the
floor, so when we arrived there about 9PM and found they close the
station a 1:30AM and kick everyone out, we were forced to get a hotel
room for the night a couple of metro stops away back on the St. Paul
area. We did, and settled in for the night by connecting to their
WiFi and phoning Andy and Jeff via Skype.
Tomorrow morning we are up at 5:30 to catch our 7:58 train for Zermatt.
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