The last couple of weeks in October were quite busy. I was attending my French class every morning and looking after the little girls twice a week - plus I was trying to get ready for my trip with my mom, taking care of last minute reservations, travel iteneraries, etc. However, there were a few highlights from those weeks that I would like to write about because they are worth mentioning and I am sure will always be fond memories for me.
Dave wrote his first module exam on October 18th...after weeks of preparing and a weekend of intense studying he was finally done with module 1 and was rewarded with a whole day off! So while he stayed in bed Tuesday morning for a MUCH deserved sleep in, I left for a full day of French - class in the morning and a tour around the city in the afternoon. That day was a definite role reversal day for us as I had to get up early and left him in a warm bed sleeping!
When I came home late that afternoon I opened the door to find Dave cooking dinner for me, flowers and candles on the table, and wine ready to be poured! He had spent a large part of his day off planning and preparing for the evening - as a thank you to me for cooking, cleaning, and giving him support as he does his Masters. I was so touched, but more than anything I was thrilled for us to have a whole evening together where he did not need to hurry off to study or prepare for a group project meeting! It was wonderful to just spend time together without any distractions.
The next week a few of us significant others to the ISU students went for a picnic one afternoon. Mark, Zahira and I met downtown and were going to go for a bike ride to a park for our picnic. However, bicycle complications prevented the bike ride part of the plan. However, the day was sunny and beautiful and we decided to just enjoy the afternoon together - eating! We found a sunny spot on the banks of the river along the canal and laid out our feast. Zahira made a spanish omelette (sooooo amazingly good), Mark brought all the French necessities - a baguette, brie, camembert and WINE (plus tasty sandwiches) and I brought pain au chocolate and crackers for the cheeses! Wow - do these two know how to picnic, it was the most amazing lunch, sitting on the river banks eating and drinking and soaking up the sun! I had a fabulous time!
My mom arrived in Strasbourg on October 28th at 1:30 pm. It was so good to see her! She had been able to sleep a few hours on the plane so she was awake and alert enough for us to talk and walk around Strasbourg's town centre for the afternoon! She loved Strasbourg right away and really enjoyed seeing all the beautiful buildings.
The next night my mom and I went to a baby shower. Two women from our church, Whitney and Eloise, are expecting at the end of November/early December, so some women from the church put on a surprise baby shower for them! Baby showers are not a tradition in France as they are at home, however, both Whitney and Eloise moved to Strasbourg from the US and were delighted that they and their babies were honoured with a shower! It was such a fun night, watching them come in and look shocked at all of us as we yelled "suprise", looking at all the cute baby gifts and hearing all the advice and stories from the other moms in the room. Plus, the food was incredible. It was a really special night and I am so looking forward to meeting these two new little babies who will be joining us soon!
The next morning mom and I set out for our trip. As I wrote earlier, the weeks leading up to the trip were busy. For me, but even more so for Dave. Thus, we did not get to spend a lot of time together before I left and while I was excited for the trip I was also sad to be leaving Dave for two weeks. We had never been apart longer than 10 days and 2 weeks seemed like such a long time....I know its sappy, but that is how I felt! So it was with mixed emotions that I kissed Dave goodbye and set out for the train station. I knew he would be busy, like usual, while I was gone, but I was worried about not being there to look after him, even though he had been independant and looking after himself just fine for years before I ever came along!
Mom and I spent the whole day traveling to Venice, Italy from Strasbourg. We first took a train into Germany to a little town called Karlsruhe. We waited there for 3 hours until a bus picked us up to take us to the Frankfurt Hahn airport. The bus was late (which gave us quite a scare b/c it was our only means of making it to our flight on time) and while on route encountered an accident on the highway. So as our bus slowed down we looked and saw traffic backed up and pretty much at a standstill. So what does our bus driver do? He decides to squeeze the bus onto the shoulder between the guardrails and traffic and speed up to make his connection deadline! There were some tense moments but he managed to get us thru the traffic jam and on our way - yikes!
When we arrived at the airport we had to wait a few hours before we boarded, so we had a nice dinner together and talked. It is these little things that I miss most about home - being able to sit and chat with my mom, my sister, my friends. Sit by my dad as we both read and eat! So while there was a lot of waiting time that traveling day, it was also great to just be able to talk with my mom and catch up!
When it finally came time to board I was surprised to find that our tickets had no seat numbers listed - rather the plane was filled by way of rush seating!!!!! We flew Ryanair and apparently this is standard procedure for them. I had never encountered anything like it - there was quite a crowd waiting at the gate who wanted to get their seats - but thankfully everyone got on in a somewhat orderly manner and there was no mass mob behaviour!
We arrived in Venice at about 10pm. We then took a shuttle bus into the city and got off at the Mestre train station, which was the nearest landmark to our hotel on the bus route. While there we were determining the best way to get to our hotel when a taxi driver came up to us to see where we were going. We told him the name of our hotel and he told us the fare: 12 euros. Now I knew the hotel was close by and had not yet decided on the best way to get there so I said no thanks....and the taxi driver walked away saying "you shouldn't come to Italy if you don't speak Italian"! After determining that a taxi would probably be the best way to get to the hotel, as it was dark and we were both so tired, we found another driver to ask him to take us there. He pleasantly told us that we did not need a taxi as it was a 10 minute walk and he showed us the way - so we arrived safely, walking out the opposite end of the train station through a residential area, to our hotel! So we had two extreme experiences with Venice taxi drivers that night!
We were shown to our lovely, clean, quiet room - had hot showers and went to bed after a very full day!
Now, some may be wondering why it took us so long and why we took such an odd route to get to Venice. The reason is that I found a really cheap flight from Frankfurt Hahn airport to Venice - thus we needed to get to the Frankfurt Hahn airport! However, Frankfurt Hahn is not Frankfurt....it is much further out of the way and more isolated that Frankfurt so getting there required us to first take a train and then a bus! It turned out that our train and bus rides were more expensive than our flights! But still, all in all we both got to Venice for under $100 Canadian. The rest of the trip we took trains, as we had a rail pass, which made for shorter travel days and less stress!
The next morning we woke up to clouds and rain - however, we put on our rain coats, took our umbrellas and set out to explore Venice. The good thing was that it was actually quite warm out despite the rain. We needed our raincoats with sweaters underneath, but we were not cold (like I had been in Prague in similar rainy conditions).
We arrived on the island of Venice after a ten minute train ride costing 1 euro (we stayed on the mainland where hotels were A LOT cheaper). We went to the tourist office in the train station - we were wondering about doing a tour of the old Jewish quarter and some other tours of the island - so we had some questions and were looking for information. However when we got to the counter the woman on the other side was sitting down looking at her computer....so we waited for her to look up before starting to talk. She continued to look at her computer and said yes? We asked her a few questions and were told "no" to each one - and not at any point did she look us in the face! We left after 2 minutes realizing that the tourist office was not going to provide much information or assistance - or friendliness!
So we left the train station and I pulled out my map of Venice thinking we would look at it and make our way to Piazza San Marco. However after 5 minutes in Venice I realized that a map was not going to help us! It is a city filled with mazes - so many little alleyways, bridges, canals, corners, etc that you never know where you are! The only way we found anything was by following the very helpful signs with arrows!
The first day we decided to just wander through the streets of Venice and discard the map - we went shopping and explored the alleyways and canals. It was very fun and very facinating. I had never seen anything like it - no road, just little alleys, canals, boats and bridges...and lots of water! At one point we found ourselves on top of the Rialto bridge - we had wondered up there - but did not know it was the Rialto bridge until the next day when we saw it from the water and realized we had been on it!
In the evening when darkness fell and all the lights came on Venice was so beautiful. It was charming and interesting in the day, but at night, lit up against the water it was breathtaking. Mom and I took a canal bus back to the train stop and the ride took us along the grand canal all lit up - it was gorgeous! At first our bus was PACKED with people to the point that I did not really feel safe floating in such an overcrowded vessel, but I got used to it and mom and I squeezed our way next to the captain's area at the front of the boat and had a wonderful view of the city as we passed by.
The next day we did more wondering and explored new parts of the island that we did not get to the first day.
We went to a grocery store for lunch and got fresh buns, brie and salami and ate along one of the canals. The grocery store was very busy and the lines for the cashiers extended to the back wall of the store...it was a funny experience waiting in line though, listening to the Italian women and men chat and get impatient waiting in the lines. At one point one of the ladies walked up to the cashier and began questioning her about why she had to wait so long (from what I gathered from the conversation) - she was not pleased to have to wait and I do not blame her because it was a little bit ridiculous!
We bought some "treasures" in Venice to take home with us - I bought a T-shirt and mom bought some jewellery that was made on the island and a new leather purse. And of course we had to indulge in some of the local goodies - licorice, gelato, and cookies. I had to take pictures of the food as they were no only tasty, but so colourful and fun to look at!
At the end of our last night in Venice we found a little bar near the train station and settled in for drinks and a simple dinner of paninis! Mom had a beer, I had a coke and we shared a bag of potato chips to eat with our sandwiches - it was one of my favorite places we had dinner! It was a tiny hole in the wall bar, with money bills from all over the world posted on the walls and there was just one younger man working there by himself doing the bartending, the "cooking/grilling" of the paninis, the dishwashing and handling the money! Mom and I were very impressed with his one man operation.
The next day we set out for the Cinque Terra - a series of 5 towns on the north Italian coast. On our way there we stopped in Pisa to see the tower - these experiences will be the subject of my next post, hopefully to be up in the next couple of days!
Love Heather & (this time) Cathy!
Haha! I love the red and white jacket pic! Brings back a whole lot of Trek memories! :P
ReplyDeleteYes - that is the same jacket! It has been through a lot with me!
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