Winter Vacation - Part 2

Day 5, 6, 7 – Interlaken, Switzerland

We had to leave Salzburg bright and early (story of the trip) in order to start our 8 hour train ride (that included 3 transfers). In order to make the time pass, we thought it would be a good idea to split four bottles of wine between the four of us. Well, that made for an interesting ride, and it did, indeed, make the time pass… but we were EXHAUSTED by the time we got to Interlaken. We went straight to the ATM to get Swiss Franc notes out (you think Euros look like Monopoly money? Just wait until you see Swiss Francs), and then went to the grocery store to buy dinner. When we got to the hostel, we were highly impressed. This was probably one of, if not THE, best hostel I have ever stayed at. They had free breakfast, sheets, and towels; free coins that we could use for their washers & dryers (soap included) and hot drinks; a movie room with leather couches and over 50 movies to choose from & English TV!; a fully equipped kitchen with everything you need and a huge dining room to eat with stereo, foosball and ping pong table; among many other things. Amazing. Perfect place to stay for our “relaxing” part of the trip.

 

We left the hostel and walked to Outdoor Interlaken, where Helen and I bought our “Beginner Ski Package” from, and where Margaret and Stephen would be renting their equipment from, to get fitted for all of our stuff. Well, when we got there, we became very upset because we found out (even though we had called to confirm the day before) that we were the only 2 signed up on Wednesday for the package, and they needed at least 4. Well, we were going to ski NO MATTER WHAT. That was the whole reason we came to Switzerland, and we weren’t going to walk away with nothing. So, after talking to the manager, he said if we both split the price of a third person, we would be able to ski tomorrow for the whole day, with our own ski instructor. I grudgingly accepted the offer the next morning, but not until I complained a little more. Ughhhh.

Wednesday morning we got up early and rented our equipment. Margaret and Stephen went to the big kid mountain on a train, while Helen and I were personally escorted by our ski instructor in a van to the top of a mountain, to a town called Axalp. The slope we were on translates to “Kiddie Paradise.” YESS! And there were definitely little kids there, and toddlers as well, skiing and sledding like pros. I was determined to be a badass and get this skiing thing down fast so I could make it to the big kid hill by the end of the day. Well, I definitely did. We first learned how to put on the skis (very important to know), how to brake (also very important), and then how to turn. I got everything down pretty fast, and then it was just a matter of going up the lift again and again to re-run the drills. We took a break for lunch, where we ate at a very small, family owned restaurant a 5 minute walk away from the slope, which was very delicious. After we refueled, we walked back to the slope and the sun had come out. Snow was melting everywhere, and it was actually HOT on the mountain. I started skiing with just a long sleeve shirt on. Definitely the best weather on this trip by far, which was very odd as I thought it would be the coldest. After a couple more drills, we moved to the “big kid hill”… as in, the steep one where you can actually go fast… WOOHOOOO! My ski instructor kept commenting on how I must like to go really fast, because I wasn’t scared at all to go further and further up the slope. Definitely true. I ended the day by following my instructor down the slope and then him following me. He was teaching me how to use the poles to turn, which resulted in my first and only wipeout of the day. It was awesome. I was laughing so hard I couldn’t get up. I did one more run, which turned out really good, and my instructor said they have a saying in skiing that goes something like “Never do the last run”. You always end on a good note, so we stopped and headed back to Interlaken. I’m officially obsessed with skiing now. Why does it have to be so expensive? L

We all relaxed Wednesday night… cooked dinner at the hostel and then watched Atonement in the movie room. Helen and Stephen left early Thursday morning, but Margaret and I slept in until probably like 11 or 12. We definitely needed the sleep. We then spent the whole day just relaxing. We picked up some postcards, ate lunch at some run down burger joint called Mr. Grill, went to the grocery store to get some food for dinner, and did some much needed laundry. I have come to find that having clean, DRY socks is a great thing to have, and I will never take that for granted again. I think I have finally mastered the ski tights, jeans, two pairs of thick socks, and boots outfit. Now if only the boots would stay dry. Anyways, while making dinner, we met a guy from Kentucky and a guy from Switzerland who joined us for dinner. We then watched The Talented Mr. Ripley in the movie room, and the Swiss guy brought us wine from his home country.. and peanuts hahaha….. hilarious.

Oh yeah… we also walked from the hostel to the train station and back again… twice…. because we were trying to find an open reservation for our train to Paris the next day. Not many trains in Europe require reservations, but the high-speed French ones do. Well, I didn’t take into account that it was the holiday season (of course) so I didn’t think of making the reservation a couple days prior. Well, all the trains were booked. Yes, ALL of them… .in every city in Switzerland, including night trains. We decided our best option (pretty much our only option) was to take 3 different regional trains (where you don’t need reservations) throughout the day. Our total travel time would be over 8 hours, and we wouldn’t get to Paris until after 5pm, but that’s the best we could do… so we took it.

Day 8, 9, 10, 11 – Paris, France

Champs-Élysées

Christmas Eve. We made our first connection to Basel, then, just a couple minutes before our second connection to Mulhouse-Ville, we see a big sign come up on the platform that says “Ausfall.” Crap Chrissy, what does the mean again? OH YEAH… cancelled, or broken down… oh wait, crap! Not good! This is gonna be bad. We’re gonna miss our third connection to Paris. We RUN to the travel center, have to wait for about 10 minutes, and finally a really nice guy gives us an option for another train that puts us on the same train to Paris once we get to Mulhouse-Ville. WHEW! That was a close one.

We got to Paris in one piece and went to our hostel. It was probably the worst hostel I have ever stayed in… a complete 180 from the one in Interlaken. The only good thing was location and friendly staff. We stayed right in the middle of the Latin Quarter, which is the student district of Paris and where lots of inexpensive (for Paris) restaurants, shops, and bars are. We walked up a really small winding wooden staircase what seemed like forever, until we found out our room was on the top floor, which resembled a small attic with 8 beds in it. The bathrooms were two floors below us, with the most unsanitary shower (the door was even broken) and toilets I have seen in a hostel. The breakfast they provided us was a croissant, a hard piece of bread, and cereal, but the cereal only came with hot milk. Yikes. We used their kitchen to cook some food, and we noticed that they had placed water in the soap bottle to make it appear like it was soap, and had been cleaning the dishes with two sponges that were growing mold… seriously. Also, no free wi-fi, and even once you paid for internet, it was a horrible connection. Thanks for not allowing me to Skype my family on Christmas, Young & Happy Hostel.

Notre Dame

Okay, enough with that rant. We left the hostel and went straight to the grocery store to pick up some inexpensive food to cook (we definitely bought 3 packs of ramen noodles each… 85 cents each in France… that’s over QUADRUPLE the price compared to the US!) then picked up a bottle of wine and headed to the Eiffel Tower to see the light show at night. It was nice since there weren’t many people around (it was Christmas Eve after all) but also pretty cold. We then went to the Notre Dame to see the children’s choir sing Christmas carols. We got there just in time… loads of people from all directions started forming a huge line to get in and we were right in front. We got an alright spot (it was already pretty full from the mass right before) and were able to enjoy the performance. It seems like no matter what, no matter where or when, but that Americans seem to subconsciously flock together. Out of the entire church and hundreds of people, everyone that surrounded us was American. Crazy.

The next morning, Christmas morning, we woke up early and ate our crappy hostel breakfast (a huge change from Mom’s Christmas breakfast) and headed back to the Eiffel Tower to actually go up it this time. There were a lot of people, but we actually didn’t have to wait that long. They only had the first floor of the tower open so that may be why. Unfortunately, neither of us could really enjoy the view that much because we were FREEZING. I mean….. FREEEEEEZING. The only other time I have ever been that cold was when I had to leave the tour in Berlin. It wasn’t snowing or raining, and the sun was shining…. But the wind, man…. The wind was intense. We camped out in the souvenir shop to regain feeling of our fingers and toes, and caught a glance of some kids ice skating in the tower (awesome).  We decided we had to go back to the hostel because there was no way we could stay outside any longer. We ate some ramen for lunch and then I tried to Skype with the family for Christmas (but was unsuccessful as previously stated).

Grand Foyer at Opera

Christmas night, we walked down the famous Champs-Élysées (kind of like the Rodeo Drive of Paris, but way bigger), where Paris’ Christmas market was. We tried the French version of Glühwein (Germany’s is definitely better), and we got a Belgian waffle that I had been craving since I was in Brussels (definitely wasn’t the same at all). We walked down the whole street, and got a view of the Arc de Triomphe. Then we made our way to the Opera Garnier to try to score some last minute tickets for that night’s show. Success!! Since we were students, they gave us 140 Euro tickets ….. for only 25 Euro! We sat in the freaking third row, on the ground floor, obviously with a view of the entire stage. This was definitely a change from my last opera attempts, with tickets in standing room and only half the stage visible. We saw “The Barter’s Bride,” but it was performed in Czech with subtitles in French, so we just kind of made up our own storyline. I found out later that I was pretty off in my conclusions, but that’s okay… I had fun. Oh, and the Opera Garnier is one of the most beautiful buildings in all of Paris, which is saying a lot. The interior was absolutely extraordinary, and we enjoyed ourselves just walking around.

Sunday morning we decided to take the Sandemann’s Free Paris tour (if you ever go to a major city in Europe, TAKE THEIR TOURS! They just work off tips, so their guides are funny, informative, and GOOD). We walked around Paris for an entire 3 ½ hours, with a short stop for lunch at this amazing little café, where we enjoyed some delicious baguettes and dessert. On the tour, we learned a ton about the history of Paris and the stories behind a lot of the buildings. That definitely helped in bringing the city to life since looking at a bunch of big, beautiful buildings without knowing how or why they’re there doesn’t really help to appreciate them. In true Paris nature, they had a pedestrian bridge covered in thousands of locks. The locks are brought to the bridge by couples from all over the world to represent their love, and then they're supposed to throw the key to the lock in the river below. Oh, Paris. Cities around Europe have copied this idea, but it started in Paris, of course, the city of love. 

Montmarte District - Moulin Rouge!

Sacre Coeur

After the tour we went back to the hostel to get ready for the night, then met up with the Sandemann tour guide again to go on another one of their tours (yes, they were that good). This time, we took a tour of the Montmarte district of Paris, where mostly artists live or have lived. We saw Picasso’s old apartment, as well as Van Gogh’s, but most importantly, learned about the history of the area and stories about the artists which really brought the district to life. We also went inside the Sacre Coeur (sacred heart) church, made famous to Americans in the movie Amélie. Montmarte is the only part in Paris that is actually hilly, so it had great views of the city below. It is also where they used to take peopleback in the day to hang… eeek. After the tour, we tried a much anticipated crepe, but not a sweet one, one with cheese and meat. SO. GOOD. Then we met up for the Sandemann Pub Crawl (I know, I know.. getting a little obsessive with Sandemann’s now) in the same area. We met some cool Brazilian guys that we hung out with for the night, but the pubs were not that great. I know I said I would never do a pub crawl again, but it was a Sunday night so we thought they might have a better idea on what to do in Paris… WRONG. Ah well. This was also the first night I have had in Europe where I actually got a little scared in a city. Margaret and I got separated at some point, and I won’t go into too many details, but I was alone in the city for awhile with no map and no Metros running with no cab in sight. I ended up getting a ride back to my hostel from some maintenance workers… whew.

Monday morning we went to a small café for breakfast (we were done with hard bread and hot milk) and enjoyed a tasty croissant, eggs, orange juice and coffee. Then we went to the Louvre. We found out about a sort of “secret” entry into the Louvre (thanks tour guide), that not many people know about and instead wait for hours on end outside to enter through the glass pyramid. All you have to do is take the Metro to the Louvre stop and enter directly through there. It was still a madhouse once you got there (we had to wait a while to buy tickets) but nothing like the line we saw once we got into the Louvre and looked outside. We decided to spend most of our time in sculptures, Napoleon’s apartments, and of course, a quick stop at the Mona Lisa. I think my favorite part, though, was just the building itself. I can’t even begin to imagine how people back in the day built such a massive, ornate, complex mansion, and actually lived in it as well.

Homemade vanilla

Afterwards we walked right across the river to the Orsay, excited to see some really cool Impressionist art from Monet, etc….. only to be disappointed since we forgot it was closed on Mondays. GURR. This was almost as big of a disappointment as not being able to go to Versailles the day before. We had planned to go to Versailles Sunday, but we heard the palace had barely any of the original furniture, etc. and then they had closed the gardens due to too much ice. Ah well.. I think the gardens would be something I would want to see in the spring, or any other season besides winter for that matter. So with no Orsay to see, we went back to the Montmarte district to drown our sorrows in some “authentic” French food. We found a cute, small restaurant that had a 3 course menu for one set price (kind of the norm in Paris, though). My courses were raw ham (don’t ask me why), turkey scallop a la cordon bleu, and vanilla ice cream. Margaret’s courses were onion soup, beef bourguignon, and vanilla ice cream. They were all alright, but the star was definitely the ice cream. Yummm!

After dinner we made our way back to the hostel to pick up our luggage, and then headed to the train station. Thank goodness we got there early. It was a madhouse, with almost every train a couple hours late or completely cancelled, and people standing around everywhere. Our train finally came up on the screen, and surprisingly, it was the only one on there that was on time. We get on the train, but then find out it has maintenance problems so we had to wait in the train on the platform for over 30 minutes…. which meant we missed our other connections. The train attendant, after checking our Eurail passes, was obviously having a bad day and made a huge deal about us not having reservations for the train. Listen, buddy. We gave him (and now his French counterpart) all the paperwork that told us reservations on German trains were not compulsory, only recommended. Then the French guy explains to us that we have to pay a tariff just because we’re going through France, which makes no sense and we had never heard of that before. Long, useless conversation later, we each had to pay 20 Euro or get off the train at the next stop (which was not smart seeing as a lot of the trains were late or cancelled). We decide to stay on the train since it’s ultimately heading to Frankfurt train station, but then they tell us if we’re going to Mainz we should get off in Mannheim. So, we get stuck in Mannheim at around midnight, since THAT train was late, then finally got to Frankfurt airport, got back to Mainz train station, and then after a taxi ride later, finally back home. 

So, impressions about Paris? I think that the few French words and phrases that Margaret and I looked up in Switzerland before we came helped us a lot. Who knew that knowing the word for please or thank you or chicken could go so far? We luckily had roommates at the hostel that we hung out with from Montreal (the French-speaking part of Canada) to help us with our pronunciations and such, which also helped. However, getting by on English wasn't nearly as easy as it was in any of the other countries I've been in. Trying to speak just a little bit of French first seemed to make the people we talked to friendlier, so I'm glad we did it. Now I just wish I could see Paris in the spring or summer, when its real beauty shows. Overall, though, it was a lot of fun and I'm just glad I got to spend time with good friends once again. 

Margaret went back to the States Wednesday morning (but not until I made her, Khoa and Howard some Cincinnati chili!). I am off to Berlin Thursday for New Year’s Eve. They have the largest outdoor celebration in the world... even bigger than Times Square! I am loving all this traveling but I’ll be ready to settle down in Mainz in February once my internship starts. I hope everyone had a great Christmas and I wish everyone an awesome New Year!!

To check out pictures from my entire trip, look at my Winter Vacation album here in Picassa!