This week’s Blogger Round-Up begins with Wendy Hollands from Le Franco Phoney who has some very interesting information for the female element, as my father used to say, but you have to read to the end of post to discover what it is. Next, a blog that I haven’t featured before called Le Chic en Rose by another Rosemary, with some very useful information on travelling by train in Switzerland during the winter. To finish off, Mary Kay from Out and About in Paris, with her usual savvy, foundan unusual venue during the European Heritage days in September – the world’s oldest basketball court! Enjoy!
You just don’t see this in the city
by Wendy Hollands from Le Franco Phoney, an Australian who writes about all things French in La Clusaz, Annecy and Haute Savoie as seen by an outsider
Some things are a bit different here in the countryside of France. For instance, how many cities offer a calf as a prize? Here in La Clusaz, it’s a regular thing. You might remember the raffle last year, and now, if you guess the right weight of this calf, she’s yours. She’s worth €200, and if more than one person guesses the weight, the winners share the prize. I’m not quite sure how you share a calf. I guess you take a share of the money instead. Or, as a French friend suggested, meat tray time!
Hang on, hang on. Don’t get too worried just yet. For a start, this is a dairy cow, so she will enjoy eating grass for many more years yet. Also, she was on offer at the Foire de la Croix in La Clusaz last weekend, which is basically a giant cow exchange. Think stock exchange, with moos and poos. Read more
Railway Adventures: Bernina Express Switzerland
by Rosemary from Le Chic en Rose, initially from Yorkshire, now living in Perth in Western Australia who writes of the many things that inspire her including travel, fashion, history, learning languages and spending time with her family
I first went to Switzerland as an 18 year old backpacker with a couple of friends when we could just about afford to get by on bread and cheese from the local Migros. It is certainly not the cheapest destination by any stretch of the imagination! If you are planning on visiting then the Swiss Pass is a must. If you get the timing right you can often get good deals at low season (such as April between the winter skiing and summer hiking seasons). The pass gives you unlimited rail (and bus) travel for 4, 8, 15, 22 days or one month, “free” travel on the boat services on the lakes and admission to 470 Swiss museums. Read more
The World’s Oldest Basketball Court is in Paris
by Mary Kay from Out and About in Paris, an American by birth, Swiss by marriage, resident of Paris with a Navigo Pass for the metro that she feels compelled to use
If you would have asked me the whereabouts of the world’s oldest basketball court, I would have never guessed that it’s in Paris. Not only does the YMCA court on rue de Trevis hold the distinction of being the world’s oldest, it’s also where the first basketball game in Europe was played.
The court is an exact replica of the one in Springfield, Massachusetts where the game was played for the very first time. On January 20, 1892, Canadian doctor James Naismith introduced basketball, a game intended to keep the students of the International YMCA Training School active during the winter months. Read more
Am I jinxed? Is it because I love my iPhone too much? Is this a subtle message from the Cosmos? Beware, this could talk a long time to tell. You might need a glass of wine.
The Renovated Pigeon House photographed before I dropped the iPhone
One beautiful twilight evening in May, as we were strolling around our neighbourhood in Blois, I wanted to take a photo of a renovated pigeon house but the gate was spoiling the view so I slipped my black iPhone 4S behind the bars. And it dropped. Just like that. And smashed. On the gravel below.
Jean Michel had to climb the gate because no one was home. Not a point in my favour.
Since it is insured against breakage I phoned the insurance company, SRP. I was informed that during the repairs (which could take a couple of weeks), I could have an iPhone on loan as it was part of my insurance.
The replacement iPhone
The replacement iPhone, provided by Orange, was scheduled to arrive next day by Chronopost. Efficient, huh? Well, it didn’t every reach me. It took several days of phoning various people to be told I had to go to the police station to report it as being stolen. The Chronopost website said it had been delivered and signed for. Reporting the theft was not an easy task as I had to argue with the police officer who said I needed the IMEI (International Mobile Equipment Identity) to lodge a complaint.
I didn’t have the IMEI because it wasn’t my Iphone. A more intelligent police officer (that wasn’t hard!) then agreed to register the complaint without the IMEI. I phoned Orange in front of the police officer but I was told it would take two weeks to have the number sent to me by post.
The insurance company
In the meantime, I had to send two documents to the insurance company three times – by email, by uploading them to their website and by snail mail – before they finally registered my request to have the broken glass cover repaired.
But time was running out. The case of the stolen iPhone had not been solved so I couldn’t have a second substitute iPhone while the broken one was being repaired and we were going away on holidays. So I bought a new IPhone, this time a 5 because Jean Michel said he’d take the 4S when it was repaired.
The hot pink iPhone
When I ordered the iPhone 5 over the phone, I hadn’t done my homework properly and got talked into a hot pink 5C whose camera isn’t as good as the 5S but which is considerably cheaper. When it arrived at the Orange shop in Blois (I was not taking any more chances with the post), I went bananas. When I saw it, I knew that I did not want a hot pink iPHone and the only cases I could buy were Micky Mouse and company. A second point against me, maybe even three or four.
I sent it back by Colissimo, paying extra to have it totally insured in case this one disappeared too, then I phoned Orange to order another one once the return had been cleared (this alone required quite a bit of insistence).
The gold iPhone
The next bit is embarrassing and cost me at least ten points. Feeling fragile and jaded by now, I lost it when I ordered the next one and chose a gold 5S. How stupid can you get? If you want to attract an iPhone thief, buy a gold phone. Almost as soon as I got off the phone, I regretted my purchase. It took me an hour to decide to phone back. I was told that there was no problem – the order had not been sent so I could have a black one instead. Relief.
However, I had been told a lie because I received an SMS saying that my gold iPhone order was being processed. No amount of patience or yelling at Orange made any difference. The only way to have a black one was to refuse the gold one when it arrived at the depot, wait for the return to be cleared (2 weeks), order a black one then wait for it to be delivered. We were about to go on our German cycling holiday by then. I was losing more points by the minute.
My Kenzo cover except that the sides of my iPhone are white.
In the end, I decided I would take the gold one which, incidentally turned out to be a sort of burnished colour that doesn’t look even remotely gold, and order the chic-looking black Kenzo case with roses on it that I had been coveting for some time.
The smashed iPhone is sent for repairs
When I was in the car (as a passenger) on the way to Germany, I received a phone call from Orange concerning the gold/black iPhone mess. We don’t want you to have a phone you don’t want, said the lady (???). I explained that I had decided to make do with the gold one and was more interested in having SRP looking after the broken one now (I had still not been told where to sent it). She said she’d make sure I received the instructions for having it repaired as soon as possible.
On 21st July, immediately after we got back from our holiday, I sent off the broken iPhone to the address I had received by email. I would just like to add that there is no way of talking to SRP because you consistenly get a message saying to ring back later.
About a week later, I received a no-reply email from SRP telling me to wipe all my data off the iPhone and giving instructions to do so remotely, which I did.
No news of the smashed iPhone
I did not hear back from them during the month of August but since most places shut down completely anyway, I didn’t think that it was worth pursuing. I scheduled the follow-up for 3rd September since I thought the staff would need a couple of days to tell their co-workers about their summer holidays before they would deal with call.
Then, out of the blue, on 2nd September, about 6 pm, I received a phone call from a man who told me that he had bought an iPhone with a broken case via leboncoin.com for 150 euro but couldn’t use it because it was blocked. A message gave him my number to ring (this is due to Apple’s tracking system).
The smashed iPhone turns up in someone else’s hands
I was completely taken aback. How could someone else have my iPhone, which was supposed to be being repaired by the insurance company? I explained my story and said I’d ring him back after I’d spoken to the insurance company but that I certainly wouldn’t want to pay him 150 euro for my own phone. He reassured me that he would simply give it back to me.
Next day, after many phone calls, I finally managed to declare that my iPhone had been stolen some time between when I sent it by Colissimo and the man’s phone call. I checked the Colissimo website and saw that the last time it had been seen was at the distribution centre in Val d’Oise which meant that SRP had never received it.
I phoned Colissimo and was told that it would take a maximum of 21 days to complete their inquiry and get back to me. That’s when I discovered that I had omitted to ask for extra insurance and would be reimbursed a total of 4 euros if, indeed, they were responsible for the disappearance of my iPhone. I am no longer covered by SPB for that iPhone because the insurance was transferred to my new iPhone as soon as I activated it.
Back to the police station
So I decided to go and report the theft to the police immediately. The odious police officer from the time before recognised me and my lot fell to the least intelligent police woman on duty who took a full hour to lodge my complaint because she found the story so complicated. She was not aided by the fact that she held multiple conversations with any colleague who came in sight and there were a lot of them because there was a complete change of staff while I was there.
The police station from the outside – I didn’t know how they’d react to a photo inside!
Before I read and signed the complaint despite the multiple spelling errors, I phoned the man with iPhone back but I was only able to leave a voice message.
The new iPhone owner calls back
He rang me back later and I tried to get the story right. He explained that he works in IT and had the cover replaced by a friend but it cost him 110 euro (not that he was asking for any money, he said, that was his own problem and would teach him not to buy over the internet). He said, though, that he could have the broken cover put back on (you’d wonder how that would be possible considering the fact that the front was completely smashed).
I told him I’d ring him again after talking to Jean Michel to work out when we could go and collect it and he said he could organise things directly with JM. He even gave me his name.
The sad demise of the smashed iPhone
But Jean Michel does not want us to pursue the matter. He says he doesn’t want an iPhone that has been messed around with. Which I can understand. So I think I’ll just have to write it off as a complete loss. But I still love my iPhone 5S!
P.S. Just discovered that 220 euros have been deducted from my account for the stolen replacement iPhone. Now I have to look after that as well!
After the August exodus comes La Rentrée, that untranslatable nationwide “back-to”: back-to-school, back-to-work, back-to-wearing-shoes-every-day, back-to-setting-the-alarm, back-to-the-metro, and all the other disagreeable things about everyday life.
1st September in the Palais Royal – a few stragglers who are not part of La Rentrée
For those who have stayed in Paris it means queuing at the market, leaving the car in the garage and being packed like sardines in the metro.
For families with children it means the added expense of buying school supplies and paying for extracurricular activities. There may be no uniforms except in select private schools but kids still shoot up 5 cm during the holidays and their feet are always growing.
I remember the first time Jean Michel experienced his own rentrée des classes (back-to-school) when his 16-year old twin sons come to live with us full-time. Mine were 21 and 24 by then so were looking after themselves.
Tension kept mounting as he saw how much time, energy and money were involved. I told him to be patient until the October break after which everything would go back to a normal pace. And it did!
We are having our last rentrée in Paris. No more children to worry about – my son Leonardo is living and working in Berlin maybe on his way to San Francisco, my daughter Black Cat is in New York, having finally got her dream job, and the twins are 25. The future doctor is married and has applied to be an intern in psychiatry in Brest on the western tip of Brittany, and the greenie, having completed a degree in geography, is living in a community near Nantes on the eastern tip of Brittany.
Jean Michel has only 17 more working days until retirement although the move is scheduled for the end of October. After a very slow month workwise, I have just received a rush job for tomorrow (of course) so I shall stop this post right here and wish you une bonne rentrée!
We’ve just had a lovely visit from of my former ESIT students now living in Maryland, with her husband and little Ada, which is my mother’s name. The weather is not brilliant so we decide to forego a visit to the Villette version of Paris Plage as planned and walk towards the Marais.
Lovely façades in rue Saint Honoré
As we walk down rue Saint Honoré, which we must have done a hundred times already, we notice two façades we’ve never seen before even though we’ve eaten several times at the Bistrot du 1er.
Café Oz in rue Saint Denis
A short while later, I spy Café Oz off to the right in rue Saint Denis. The last time I saw Café Oz it was on the other side of the river – now there are three of them! www.cafe-oz.com.
Window box in rue Saint Denis
We are intrigued by all the window boxes of geraniums. How do they do it in the middle of Paris when I only have very mediocre success in Blois? We are also amazed at just how many people there are! August is supposed to be empty. On rue Vieille du Temple, we come to a quiet little cul-de-sac with a village feel to it and an Australian Ugg shop on the corner. Now I know where to buy my winter slippers.
La Chaise au Plafond (the chair on the ceiling!) in rue du Trésor off rue Vieille du Temple opposite Ugg
In the Marais, immediately recognizable from all the Yiddish signs everywhere and the throngs of people, we stroll into the Jardin des Rosiers and out the other side through the Maison de l’Europe de Paris which has a giant Easter egg, painted by Croatian naive artists in the courtyard.
Giant Easter Egg at the Maison de l’Europe in rue des Francs Bourgeois
We can also see a large brick chimney that we later find used to be a factory for extracting gold, silver and platininum from jeweller’s dust. The Marais of course was once full of Jewish jewellery shops.
Spontini in an old bakery on rue des Francs Bourgeois
It’s amusing to see that Spontini is now in a former bakery that once sold special bread for diabetics. I like the fact that they’ve kept the old signs.
Harpist in the arcade leading onto the Hôtel de Sully on Place des Vosges
When we reach Place des Vosges, all the cafés are full so we walk along the arcade to Hôtel de Sully, enticed by the haunting melody of a harpist.
Village Saint Paul
Our route takes us past several courtyards. We wander in and discover Village Saint Paul, which we’ve never seen before, but most of the boutiques are closed.
Part of Philippe Auguste’s wall around Paris
We see a large half-ruined wall which turns out to be part of the city walls built by Philippe Auguste at the end of the 12th century to protect Paris while he was off at the Crusades. We have vestiges near us as well, but they are not nearly as imposing as these.
Chez Mademoiselle with its coordinated 2CV!
Further along the street, after the famous Lycée Charlemagne in Rue Charlemagne, there is a little café called Chez Mademoiselle with a grey Citroën 2CV parked in front and painted to match the front of the café. How’s that for coordination?
Tapas at Trésor in rue Trésor
After going past two of the oldest houses in Paris on rue François Morin, we find our way back to the Ugg shop and its cul-de-sac because we saw that Trésor is serving tapas. There is even a table for us on the edge of the inside room looking out on the terrace. It seems to be a well-guarded secret from tourists because everyone around me is speaking French.
Nicki de Saint Phalle’s fountains near the Georges Pompidou centre
Our path home takes us past the Pompidou Centre and Nicki de Saint Phalle’s fountains that my kids used to love when they were little. A much better promenade than last week!
UGG Australia, 26 Rue Vieille du Temple, 75004 Paris
Trésor, rue Trésor, 75004 Paris
Chez Mademoiselle, 16 rue Charlemagne, 75004 Paris
I have three very disparate subjects for this week’s blogger round-up. Andrea from Rearview Mirror takes us to Lithuania, one of the Baltic States, where she visits Kaunas Castle and experiences her first Baltic sunset. Fellow cyclist, Maggie LaCoste from Experience France by Bike, introduces us to a very efficient website called Biroto for planning bike rides in Europe while Sara from Simply Sara Travel poses the question of our “must-sees” in Paris and comes up with palm trees. Enjoy!
Kaunas Castle and My First Baltic Sunset
by Andrea from Rear View Mirror (formerly Destination Europe), a fellow Australian who, after 6 years of living in France, has given up her Paris apartment to live a nomadic life slowing travelling around Europe, experiencing each destination like a local.
After a slow but scenic drive through the flat Polish countryside we slipped through the abandoned border crossing and I was finally in the Baltic States. I’ve always been curious about this part of Europe. With so few travellers making their way this far east, I wanted to see what everyone was missing out on, if anything. While my road trip was officially starting in thegorgeous capital of Estonia, the drive from Warsaw required a quick stopover in Kaunas, Lithuania’s second largest city. Read more
German Website Biroto – A Great Planning Tool for Cycling in Europe
by Maggie LaCoste from Experience France by Bike, an American who loves biking anywhere in Europe, but especially France, which has the perfect combination of safe bike routes, great food, great weather and history.
The last day of craziness is upon me as I get ready to leave for my bicycling trip to Normandy and Brittany. But before I leave, I wanted to pass along this information about a great bicycle trip planning tool that I discovered recently. I received a note from Ans Leenders from the Netherlands who was having problems trying to download GPS information for an upcoming trip along the Via Rhona. For whatever reason, he was having technical difficulty accessing the GPS files from the Via Rhona website. In the course of trying to find another place to access the GPS data, Ans discovered Biroto and luckily he passed the website on to me. And I am now passing it on to you! Read more
Bring out the bucket list
by Sara from Simply Sara Travel, a girl from New Jersey who traded in her bagels for baguettes and moved to Paris. The aim of her blog is to inspire readers to travel, embrace a new culture, and open their minds to new perspectives.
Paris is a very transient city when you live here as an expat. People constantly come and go, and while it’s a joy to live here and constantly welcome new friends, I’ve also had to become accustomed to saying goodbye.
A close friend of mine just left Paris, and while I could write a month’s worth of posts on how much I will miss her, let’s focus on the positive: The bucket list. While “bucket list” means to most people “a list of things to do before you die,” for any American expat in Paris it has a less tragic meaning: “The list of sights to see, food to eat, and cities to visit before returning to the United States.”
That’s right, I love the bucket list. It’s a way to reflect on what places I love in Paris, discover new things or restaurants that have made it onto other’s lists, and if I’m lucky, I get the opportunity to join a friend in checking off items on their own list before they leave. Read more
We’re back in Paris. I feel like a côte de boeuf so I go to the butcher’s on rue Montorgueil. Usually there are three open, today there is only one. In fact, only about one shop in five in Paris is open. There are even restaurants that are closed.
Shut-up shop in rue Colonel Driant
Now it’s Sunday and we’re at the market near Sainte Eustache. There are only about one-third of the usual stalls and even those have limited produce.
Sunday market half-deserted
Most of my clients have shut up shop as well which means I have some free time to see the odd friend who is still in Paris in August!
Free parking space in front of our apartment building
There are spare parking spaces in our street, which is most unusual. Usually, they are bumper-to-bumper. No wonder parking is free.
So where is everybody?
With everything else close, I notice this old butcher’s stall. It seems to be empty now. You can see the meat safe at the back.
The families with beach or country houses are on the coast or in the countryside. If the mother doesn’t work, the father often commutes at weekends. It’s peak time for French holiday makers on the Atlantic and Mediterranean and the airports are over-stretched. Some companies close for the whole of August while others shut down for the week surrounding the 15th August which is a public holiday in France.
Tour Saint Jacques seen from Ile de la Cité
There is a saying that the weather deteriorates after the 15th August weekend, but this year, it got in early! Looks like the end of August might be finer and warmer.
Paris Plage from Quai de la Mégisserie
It’s Sunday afternoon and Jean Michel suggests we go to Paris Plage because we’ve left our bikes in Blois. It’s about 20°C and overcast. We hope it won’t rain.
The panels and broken fence on Pont des Arts
I want to see the love lock situation on Pont des Arts. Currently, nearly 10,000 people have signed the No Love Locks lobby’s petition to have them banned but I can’t see the solution, much as I hate them now, though I initially thought they were fun.
Bouqinistes on Quai de la Mégisserie just before Pont des Arts
It’s easy to find the footbridge – just follow the crowd! The bridge, which used to be one of my favourite places in Paris, is looking sad and ugly, with graffiti-covered panels to replace the sections that have broken off completely and other sections which are moving in that direction.
The Louvre at the Beach
We go down onto the Voies sur Berge below and see a new initiative – the Louvre at the Beach with reproductions of paintings in the Louvre relating to bathing.
Fermob’s red Eiffel Tower
Further along we come to a red Eiffel Tower. When we get up closer, we see that it is made of bistro chairs! The tower, created by Fermob, which has been making chairs since the end of the 19th century, celebrates the Dame de Fer’s 125th anniversary. The 324 folding chairs symbolise the Eiffel Tower’s 324 metres erected for the Universal Exhibition of 1889. It’s a wonder there are no love locks on it yet …
Up close, you can see some of the 324 bistro chairs!
On the whole, there is not much action, but more sand than in previous years. We only see one sculpture.
Sand sculpture at Paris Plage
Right down the end, where there is no more sand, we find a couple of vacant deck chairs so take a selfie before going home via Notre Dame on the other side of the Seine.
Selfie in Paris Plage deck chairs
Maybe next Sunday we’ll visit the other Paris Plage venue near La Villette. We overheard someone saying it was much livelier – though that wouldn’t be hard!
It has taken over 2 1/2 years to renovate the Comédie Française theatre and find a new location for the temporary structure replacing it next to the Buren columns, called the Théâtre Ephémère. Initially, Libya made an offer but it didn’t work out. It is now going to Geneva for the Opéra des Nations, a strange choice in my opinion because the building doesn’t have much to recommend it! But at least it should be taken down by the time we move and I’ll be able to have one last photo of the Buren columns with the Palais Royal Gardens in the background!
You can see the Théâtre Ephémère on the left of the columnsThe sign at the entrance to the dismounting areaThe Comédie Française is on the right
We don’t often find ourselves in Paris on a sunny Sunday in August without our bikes, so after a leisurely lunch on the balcony, testing a new vinho verde, we went for a walk along Berges de Seine from the Orsay Museum to the Floating Gardens. I have to say we were a little disappointed compared with last year, perhaps because there was nothing new. But the sky was amazing.
Lunch on our balconyThe Tuileries GardensBoats on the SeineThe Alexandre III Bridge
I didn’t have much time to read other blogs when cycling in Germany, but now I’m home, I’m catching up! I’m starting with a very interesting post by Anda from Travel Notes and Beyond about what she has learned from travelling the world. It certainly got me thinking. Next comes some excellent advice from Maggie at Experience France by Bike about the best SIM card to use in France. And to finish off, a fun post by Mary Kay from Out and About in Paris who tested the self-guided Twiztour cars in Paris. Would you be game? Enjoy!
Ten Things I Learned from Traveling the World
by Anda from Travel Notes & Beyond, the Opinionated Travelogue of a Photo Maniac, is a Romanian-born citizen of Southern California who has never missed the opportunity to travel.
If you type “things learned from traveling” into the Google search, you’ll come up with enough reading material for an entire week. Before I sat down to write this post I was curios about other people’s approach to this popular subject. I noticed that in spite of the broad range of opinions, there is one common thread: people who travel don’t remain stuck in their own ideas. They change, they evolve and learn something from their travel experiences. So, with this in mind, here is my rendition of this subject:
1. High expectations may ruin your trip
We all have expectations, lots of expectations. It’s our human nature, whether we are aware of it or not. And when it comes to our vacation we feel entitled to have them. Read more
Using a Sim Data Card to Stay Connected When Bicycling in France
by Maggie LaCoste from Experience France by Bike, an American who loves biking anywhere in Europe, but especially France, which has the perfect combination of safe bike routes, great food, great weather and history.
We’re spoiled by how easy and affordable it is to communicate, text and tweet to family and friends, post to Facebook, get the latest news and restaurant recommendations and get directions when we get lost. Until we go overseas. Unless you have a European phone or SIM card, communication overseas can be difficult and very expensive. A Google search of anything having to do with saving money communicating overseas yields pages and pages of articles and advice. Regardless of how many of these you read, there really isn’t a simple solution. For phone calls, you can use one of several internet apps like Skype. But for me, the problem has always been data. If ever there was a time you needed data it’s traveling overseas. Read more
Whizzing around Paris in Twiztour cars: #EmbraceParis ice-breaker
by Mary Kay from Out and About in Paris, an American by birth, Swiss by marriage, resident of Paris with a Navigo Pass for the metro that she feels compelled to use
Ladies, start your engines! Or, in this case, turn on your electric, ecologically friendly Twiztour car for one of the most thrilling tours of Paris.
Only hours after meeting each other over a lovely afternoon tea at Le Meurice last Sunday afternoon, taxis whisked the #EmbraceParis ladies to the foot of the Eiffel Tower for our first activity — a Twiztour GPS guided tour of some of the most impressive monuments of Paris.
Assuring Brooke, who’s from Australia, that I had complete confidence in her ability to navigate the streets of Paris on the right side of the road, I squeezed into the back seat of the car with the walkee-talkee. True to their names, “Leader of the Pack” and “Jessica Rabbit” set off at a brisk pace. The four other Twiztour cars made their way across pont de Bir-Hakeim, one of my favorite Parisian bridges, behind them. Read more
Back in Paris after a month’s cycling holiday in Germany, we’re having lovely weather so I’ve been catching up with friends especially in my neighbourhood, the first arrondissement, so I have some new photos of Paris.
Bourse du Commerce (commodities market) on rue du Louvre seen from the back opposite Sainte Eustache
You may remember another photo I published of the front of the Bourse du Commerce (commodities market) after renovation. If you go past, just drop in. It’s now the Chamber of Commerce. The dome has a wonderful series of murals and if you stand right in the centre of the room, your voice will be heard everywhere. Note the semi-circular building on the right, which has also been refurbished.
Sainte Eustache
Now that the area in front of Sainte Eustache has been renovated, its beauty is much more apparent.
Sunset over the Palais Royal from our balcony
Only 3 more months before we move to Blois and lose this view forever! On Saturday, to our great delight, we were able to have dinner on the balcony – the sun is usually too strong in the evening.
Some things are a bit different here in the countryside of France. For instance, how many cities offer a calf as a prize? Here in La Clusaz, it’s a regular thing. You might remember the raffle last year, and now, if you guess the right weight of this calf, she’s yours. She’s worth €200, and if more than one person guesses the weight, the winners share the prize. I’m not quite sure how you share a calf. I guess you take a share of the money instead. Or, as a French friend suggested, meat tray time!
I first went to Switzerland as an 18 year old backpacker with a couple of friends when we could just about afford to get by on bread and cheese from the local Migros. It is certainly not the cheapest destination by any stretch of the imagination! If you are planning on visiting then the Swiss Pass is a must. If you get the timing right you can often get good deals at low season (such as April between the winter skiing and summer hiking seasons). The pass gives you unlimited rail (and bus) travel for 4, 8, 15, 22 days or one month, “free” travel on the boat services on the lakes and admission to 470 Swiss museums. Read more
If you would have asked me the whereabouts of the world’s oldest basketball court, I would have never guessed that it’s in Paris. Not only does the YMCA court on rue de Trevis hold the distinction of being the world’s oldest, it’s also where the first basketball game in Europe was played.
