This is going to be a tough day. I never was good at staying up late, even as a kid. But, it was worth it last night to see the Bastille Day fireworks.
We were up at 4:30 am this morning, sneaking around the flat getting ready to go. I ran the ridiculous bike boxes down to the courtyard, then made another trip with the panniers. By 5:15 we were ready to go. I had a string holding the two bike boxes to my pack. With panniers attached to the bikes and the bike boxes dangling from my pack, we rode the 1.5 miles to the train station in the early morning dawn light. Other than giggles from the early risers we passed on the street, all went very well. Sally ran in to find which hall our train left from (Hall 1) and we soon staked out a territory around a cluster of chairs to disassemble and box the bikes for the train ride, as the French require. We were boxed and ready to go by 6:30 am, with casters inserted into the bottom of the boxes so I could roll them both easily to our platform and train. Our train left at 7:23 am. We had a few moments to sit. They don't announce the platform the train is at until about 20 minutes before departure. We kept an eye on the big board. As foretold, our platform appeared on schedule and we hustled our bags and boxes down to our assigned car.
There was no place to put the bike boxes. At the end of each compartment there is a luggage rack, but it is too small to accommodate our boxes. Sally scoped out other options while I held the boxes in the passageway between the two cars. The report back was no place big enough. We decided the only thing to do was leave them in the passageway between the two cars. I wedged them so they did not block access to the water closet or either doorway and sat down next to them to keep them from falling over. Our train ride was 3 hours. This was going to be a long babysitting job. I was pleased when the doors closed, exactly on time and we started rolling down the tracks. After about 15 minutes, and no authorities stopping by, I took out a piece of line and lashed the boxes to the handrail and walked up to my assigned seat next to Sally for the duration.
At 160 miles per hour the scenery flies by! We dozed and blogged as we whisked across the beautiful French countryside. On one trip to the water closet a Swiss customs agent was eyeing the boxes. I explained our trip to him and his partner. They thought it sounded fun and left the passageway.
We unloaded at Basel, Switzerland and inquired which platform for our connection to Lucerne. We had to ride an escalator up, cross three tracks and then down another to platform four. 30 minutes later and we on our next train. This one had a space for our bikes, boxes or not.
We stepped off the train, after an hour, in Lucerne and saw Roger and Marlis waiting for us. They had scoped out bike storage options at the station. One Swiss Frank a day! We reassembled the bikes in a side alcove and as we did station workers came by and offered to dispose of our boxes. Soon we were wheeling our bikes to the storage facility. What a facility! Racks and racks for bikes in a huge area. After our bikes were settled into their racks, we loaded our bags into their car.
We walked to a lakeside cafe and talked for an hour over Cokes and coffee, then spent the next four hours touring downtown Lucerne on foot, walking the ancient wall that used to surround the city and seeing the river and town.
About 5:30 pm we headed for their home in the outskirts of town. It is a beautiful, modern home. Full basement, second floor and nicely arranged living area on the first floor. Roger has a band in which he plays lead guitar. He has turned one room in the basement into a acoustically excellent recording studio. While on a tour of the house we stopped here. He brought up some tracks his group had previously recorded. They are amazing. Roger is excellent on lead guitar and their female vocalist is unreal. He played along with the tracks on his guitar. We got about three songs in before Marlis came down to tell us dinner was ready.
Their daughter started a resort in Thailand seven years ago, at age 23. They have made a few trips to visit and got interested in Thai cooking. Tonight they served Thai soup, that they made, with white rice, wine, water with gas (love that name!), bread and cheese and ice cream and fruit for desert. It was wonderful.
I was enjoying the company and conversation but by 10:30 pm the cobwebs in my head were thick and heavy. We pitched the tent in their yard, crawled in, and we're soon fast asleep.
Roger and Marlis are amazing. We had such a good time today!
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