Last Blog Entry

We will head to the airport in the morning to make our way back home so this will be our last post. We walked from this spot where the group is looking over the Seine with the Eiffel Tower in the distance and walked along the river to the tower. There were lots of smiles and laughs on this second last day of our journey. Although someone said " we left our true Pyrz sounds " in Paris with some good screaming on the underground on the way back. It has been a bit of a weird day for us after 3 months on the road. We have done lots of stuff over this time, obviously too much for this blog. Hopefully the blog will do what we wanted and help us to keep a map of where we were and a bit of what we were doing to help keep all of our pictures in order when we get back to recall some stories. Once in a lifetime is a pretty overused line most of the times, but it is hard to imagine the 9 of us doing something of this duration like this all together again. We have gone thousands of kilometers and gone on : planes, trains, automobiles, walked, ran, crawled, strollered, boated, road the trolley, tram, bike,ferry, bus, tube, piggyback and a few other modes of transportation. We met lots of different people, from the person who wouldn't accept a Canadian passport in England as identification to the people in the church in Poland that gave us handouts of money to the good Samaritan on the underground in Italy that offered his knife to Rob to cut his backpack off that was caught in the doors as the rest of the family had gotten off of the train. We broke lots of the travel rules on this time away and it couldn't have worked out any better. 9 people don't live out of a 9 passenger van for 3 months without learning a few things. For those of you that have read this along the way thanks for the company we have enjoyed it. It is a good feeling we all had tonight to be heading back home now with all of the memories of these last 3 months.

Paris

When we arrived in Paris it was funny how many people we ran into that said " you didn't drive into Paris did you?" No matter how hard we seemed to have tried to miss traffic we ended up driving in to where we are staying Friday afternoon at 5:00pm. At least we know how rush hour feels. The apartment where we are staying is not to far from the Louvre. When we got here it was funny, we had to meet someone with a key but we were really in the wrong building, we were waiting in the office building of the design office of Louis Vuitton. Security people politely told the 9 Canadian hobo's that we had to leave. Lots of things that we read said if you go to Paris n December expect rain and that part has been true. Jackie and Rob went and walked around some of the Christmas markets around Saint Germain area and tested the Chaud vin. We hope to continue walking around,we have already given our vehicle back so we are on foot again . We visited the Louvre and paid our respects to Mona, this may be the first museum Natalie hasn't slept through. Our place here is very small, if you take a picture you will normally catch at least 3 or 4 people on the screen. This first picture is outside our front door on Rivoli which runs parallel with the river.

Our 13th Country?

As we make our way back up to Paris we made a stop at technically not another country but it probably has a bigger budget than Luxembourg. It started out as mostly a joke earlier in our trip but in the true spirit of following the signs that interested the group at the time we made a stop at Disneyland, France. I guess we really did have enough left for 1 more castle. Rob has been taking lots of pictures of the cast picking up garbage and the inner workings of Disney and all of us have pretty much done what we like here as it is not busy at all. We stayed in the town of Lagny sur Marne which really is a great place. It is so interesting to see a place that has made it on its own for hundreds of years and then become so close to something like Disney just 15 years ago and see how it has adapted to the change. People watching is a great pastime, like watching a local walk into a cafe at 7:00am have a glass of beer and then go next door to the butcher and pick up a rabbit still in its skin. Oh well I guess it is the weekend.

Home stretch and back to France

Heading back north and across the Pyrenees to make our way back up into France, we certainly have crossed our share of mountains and passes through our trip. Lots of cyclists on the roads more than anywhere else we have been yet. No doubt the Tour de France influence. We even got near to Col du Tourmalet one of the most famous passes in the race. We only had 2 of our team members throw up during this ride! We made our planned stop in Lourdes. Not quite sure how to even try and write about Lourdes, an unbelievable feeling being there. The peacefulness felt there is almost unexplainable. In the Basilica of the Immaculate Conception there is a very small chapel "St. Gabriel's" where an English mass is held each day that we were able to get to. The Basilica is built right above and on the Grotto rocks. The priest there who was from South Africa gave some really good tips of how to see and understand Lourdes better. We are so glad we came to Lourdes.

Spain

Our time in Spain has been quite different from most parts of our trip so far. The place where we stayed was called L'Hospitalet de I'Infant, right in the heart if the Costo Daurada. It is a real Miami Beach here. Most things are very new here as is the Villa that we are staying in. No complaining though, we are accepting the warm temperatures with no problem. It is very windy here but when the sun comes up it reaches at least 15 C each day. We made some day trips into Barcelona where we went to the Aquarium on the sea. Some fantastic shark photos! For the most part our week has been relaxing in the warm sun. One morning Livy went for a run with Rob and she came back with Oranges for breakfast that they picked on the way

Montfort

It is fun to watch everyone in town carry their baskets. It almost looks like everyone even has the same kind. Just before 7 am the street gets active with the older folks making their way to the Boulangerie for their bread. When we carried ours we almost immediately fit in, it seemed like even more people talk to you. We missed some good people pictures for sure. One picture that we should have got was when the fishmonger comes into town, or when the butcher who comes in once per week sets up to sell his “chevalin” horsemeat. It was surprising how much he sold. Peter really wanted to play soccer at the outdoor field but the rain didn’t let up. Our last night in Montfort got us up close and personal with the local electrician and burned a few candles out waiting. We ended up blowing the main fuse on the panel coming into the building. The main 40 amp fuse just couldn’t take it.

South of France

We drove along the the sea to make our way to France staying along the way on the Italian Riviera. Where we ended up getting to is a place called Montfort-sur-Argens, Provence, France. The place where we are staying was built in 1799, is called a typical Provencal burgher home from the area. Some of the reading says there are about 700 inhabitants in Montfort, maybe years ago there could have been a few thousand. It is very quaint, the person who owns this now is from Sweden and refers to Montfort as a unspoiled village and area that provides a hint of life in “old” Provence. It has been hard getting a lot going here this week as some crazy wind patterns seem to have latched on to the area bringing rain almost all of the time.Our thermometer has been Peter's feet, he decided to buy some shoes and put his flip flops in his bag. We won't be surprised if they come out again in Spain. Maybe that is ok too, to keep us in this place. We did drive out of the area towards Toulon and spent the day by the sea. Blog entries are getting fewer and shorter mostly because we don't seem to run into internet much where we have been. We do have lots of pictures though. The kitchen table is good for us a "monk table" that seats 12 so it is perfect for us. Natalie can be seen here working as the French gourmet chef. Hopefully we will be able to get out a little bit more. There is vineyard after vineyard when Rob and Livy were out cycling you could smell wine everywhere ( probably was just the empty vines from the past harvest ).