Adjustments

Now that I’m back I still have to write posts, which is going to be annoying. I thought I was done, but I guess I have to continue writing.

I wish there was some sports ball to talk about. Well, a Canadian combo guard (a guard that can play point and shooting guard) in basketball committed to Alabama, and he’s a 5 star according to 247 Sports, and he’s the 7th best combo guard in the nation, 27th best player in the nation for 2020.

Other than that news, being able to go outside is nice, and playing basketball is fun. Today hopefully I will get my Xbox up and running.

We traveled back home using Iberia and American airlines. They lost a big bag with the Xbox and a smaller bag with my video games. They also lost my basketball shoes. Luckily they gave us our bags back yesterday. My mom made me write a list of all the things that they lost, so I put down that they lost some Nike Air Precision III in black and university red (whatever that means) that cost $70. They returned my real basketball shoes, but those Nike Air Precision III look really nice.

I’m also excited because we have fast internet again, YAY. The last time I checked it was at 97 Mbs while the internet in Spain was max, 10 Mbs. It almost exponentially grew. The reason why I’m talking about the internet is to set up a story about my Xbox (duh). In Spain, the Xbox started crashing, and wouldn’t turn on because the internet was so bad, so we went to get it fixed. It didn’t get fixed, but the people trying to fix it lost the American power chord and gave us a European one. We have the Xbox now, but can’t plug it in, so as I’m writing this my parents are trying to get someone to go pick up a chord for 7 bucks. We can’t go into public because the government has quarantined us for 14 days from arrival, 11 more to go. So that’s the story on the Xbox.

Do you feel the power?

It’s nice to be home because I have all my stuff back, more room, and just being home is really nice. I hope you enjoyed this post, and on that terrible bombshell, GOODNIGHT!

Stay tuned

Hey folks, we are home safe and groggy, though all of our bags are not– including the XBox (Henry just can’t catch a break) and most of Chris’s clothes (whoops).

Anyhow, in the next week or so we’ll post some final thoughts on our recent adventures to give ourselves, and anyone else who wants it, a sense of an ending.

Thanks so much for all the good wishes. They helped get us home. Now we’ll see if they protected us from the virus.

Two days in Normandy

Last Thursday we left Paris for Normandy by slow train. This was just as well since the weather in Paris had turned from what we enjoyed, partial sun and moderately cool temperatures, to what we had expected for this time of year, cold and rain.

The rain, apparently, has been a prominent influence in Normandy this year. As we rolled through the French countryside, the fields were sodden and often flooded. There were lakes where there should not have been. We could tell by the trees standing in the water.

Our base of operations in Normandy was Bayeux, in the former British sector for those of you keeping score at home, one of only two major towns in Normandy that escaped bombing by both sides during the war, so it still has its medieval charm and its cathedral.

Bayeux getting medieval
Notre-Dame de Bayeux (above and right)

The cathedral, Notre-Dame de Bayeux, is as big as its charred sister in Paris, has similar flying buttresses to support the roof, and the lower portions of its two main towers and its crypt have been standing since the 11th century. Just to put that in perspective, when you are walking in those portions of the cathedral you are walking where people who knew and talked to William the Conqueror, he of 1066 fame, once walked and talked. The interior also has some playful features like the different decorative motifs on each of the arches in the main sanctuary, one of which is a collection of devil heads– a prudent reminder for the faithful at their prayers, I suppose.

Tapestry detail: building the armada

Also in Bayeux is the Bayeux Tapestry. I will be the first to admit that I thought a museum dedicated to a tapestry would be a serious snooze-fest, but I was wrong, wrong, wrong. First, there’s the fact that the thing is 70 meters long by about 50 cm tall, and it is all rolled out for your enjoyment in a darkened room with an explanatory narration that follows you as you follow the tapestry. The story on the tapestry is the immediate backstory leading up to the Battle of Hastings and William’s eventual coronation. Not to be a spoiler, but Harold II doesn’t come out looking too good. Well, that, and he dies. The whole thing was a propaganda piece made not long after William’s success for his largely illiterate subjects.

In addition to the viewing of the tapestry itself, there is a short film giving more information about its construction and history and a small museum that includes a number of interesting panels, displays, and even dioramas (which, by the way, are much better than what the Jesuits at Azpeitia could come up with). I was just really impressed with the presentation and design of the museum as well as the artifact itself. A pleasant surprise all ’round.

Rene shows us the view from the Higgins boats

The main reason, however, that we went to Normandy was to see the landing areas, both beaches and drop zones, for the D-Day invasion. We had hired a guide, a Dutch WWII enthusiast named Rene, for an all-day tour on Friday to drive us around to different sights and give us historical insights as we went. The invasion zone is spread across 60 miles and still consists mostly of one-lane roads, so it was very helpful to have someone who knew the lay of the land.

Can you see the stained-glass paratroopers?
Pont du Hoc: there was a really big German cannon right there

It was a raw, rainy, blustery day, perfect for Normandy on leap day. Rene picked us up around 9:15, and we went first to St. Mare Eglise to see the Airborne Museum and the town itself, including a tour of its small church made famous by a hanging Red Buttons in the movie The Longest Day. We had lunch there as well, crepes and croque monsieurs in a bistro on the square before heading to Utah beach, Pont du Hoc, and then Omaha beach, all in the American sector.

Of the three, Pont du Hoc was the most arresting. It was a German gun emplacement for four WWI era 150 mm cannon that could fire on both Utah and Omaha. This is where the US Rangers had to climb up straight up 100 ft cliffs using grappling hooks and ladders under German fire (also shown in The Longest Day). There are still shell holes as large as cars on top of the cliff and a fully intact German observation bunker that can be explored. The burnt roof beams inside the bunker from the US flamethrowers used to clear it are still visible. That surprised me given that 75 years have passed; I can’t imagine they’ll hang on for much longer.

Omaha beach is terrifying and mind bending for what happened there, but there’s not much left to see. A few small, stark bunkers cling to the dunes, but time is having its way with them.

The American cemetery at Colleville-Sur-Mer, our last stop, is exactly the opposite experience. Time seems to have stopped there. The grounds are immaculate, and even on this drizzly day it was beautiful and full of life because most of the landscaping is done with evergreens. The grass may have looked even brighter green against the grey backdrop of the sky. The cemetery is a grid of white marble crosses and stars of David with two main walkways in the shape of a cross and two large memorials, one a semicircle of columns and the other a small circular chapel. The whole affair is perched on a cliff overlooking the ocean at the northeastern end of Omaha beach.

Colleville-Sur-Mer

We only had an hour there because we arrived around 4 PM and they close at 5 PM in the winter. We strolled the grounds while Rene pointed out the markers of some soldiers with notable stories, a set of twins, a father and son, a group of African American nurses, and lamented the fact that we couldn’t walk on the grass to get a better view because last summer’s hordes had destroyed the lawns. Even so, strangely, I found myself not wanting to leave. It was so beautiful and so peaceful that I’m not afraid to be cliched about it. I guess that’s what a cemetery is supposed to be, but most of the ones I have visited have failed in those respects. This one works. It’s like the archetype of the cemetery, the sublime example. It’s the kind of cemetery that makes you think, “I could spend eternity here,” even when you know in your rational mind that that isn’t what happens in anyone’s belief system. Nobody thinks your body just lies in the ground admiring the view once you are buried, but, all the same, it might be okay in this place.

On our last day in Normandy, we visited the beach at Arromanches-les-Bains, which was on Gold beach in the British sector. There is a 360° movie theater on top of the cliffs next to the town that puts on a stirring 19-minute film of documentary footage on nine screens. We shared the experience with only three other wayward tourists, and it was stirring. How can one not get a little choked up when Sir Winston starts growling, “We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets . . . we shall never surrender” in booming surround sound.

Henry and me with a Sherman at Arromanches; Henry’s the tall one
A piece of the Mulberry near shore; the white caps on the horizon mark the man-made breakwater

The other impressive item at Arromanches is the remains of the “Mulberry harbor,” a breakwater and harbor that the British and Americans made from whole cloth with scuttled ships and hunks of concrete the length of a football field towed from the UK and sunk off shore. I had read about these many times, but I had never realized the enormity of the task or the size of the harbor itself. When I first saw a portion of the breakwater from the land, I thought it was a tug towing a series of barges on long cables, but then it just kept getting longer and longer. The breakwater was 1.5 miles long. There were four steel and concrete piers within it for cargo ships to unload onto, and these could support the weight of Sherman tanks. This was a massive engineering marvel in the turbulent seas of the English Channel. There was another Mulberry in the American sector, but a storm destroyed it two weeks after it was built. Seventy-five years later, the harbor at Arromanches is also a ruin, but not so much that you can’t see how impressive it was.

So, yeah, Normandy was cool.

Paris museum overview

(As is often the case, if you click on the title above, you’ll see a new image in the banner.)

Louvre: ancient stuff and lots of it; huge, enormous, massive, overwhelming. We took the 90-minute dash of a tour in English and glad we did. It would have taken us days to find Venus de Milo, Winged Victory, and Mona Lisa. We would have needed a basket of breadcrumbs and maybe a compass. Instead, we had a lovely, slightly disheveled woman who reminded me of Professor Trelawney from Harry Potter. She seemed to have an unending well of patience as she guided a group of 20 through the madhouse of the Louvre trying to explain why these classic works of art were indeed classic and even giving us a brief history of portraiture from Eastern Orthodox iconography to the Renaissance so we could put the Mona Lisa in context when we finally waded through the hoards to see it. We roamed around a little after the tour on our own, but mostly we were just bewildered. And if that is what the Louvre is like in February, I can’t even imagine summer.

As already mentioned, we also stopped in to view the gigantic Water Lilies at Musee de l’Orangerie. Again, so glad to have come in the off-season. They must limit entrance times or something in the summer. I don’t know how you’d actually see anything otherwise. We were only sharing with a few dozen others.

On our last full day in Paris, we visited the Musee d’Orsay and the Pompidou Center. On the off chance that anyone wants to take my advice on museum visits in Paris, I’d say if you only have the time to visit one, go with the d’Orsay. The impressionist and post-impressionist collection is incredible. Around every corner, there’s a painting you’ll recognize, and the ones you don’t recognize are just as beautiful. I still can’t fully comprehend how they make the reflections of the light on water look like that. I stared at some of them until my eyes hurt trying to get a hint. Then there are the multiple Van Gogh self portraits over time which are heartbreaking when seen in close succession. That man was in some serious mental pain. Aside from these paintings, there is also an impressive collection of sculpture, some truly massive realist paintings from Gustave Courbet, and a set of art nouveau rooms which must have been J.R.R. Tolkien’s inspiration for the Elven refuge of Rivendell. In addition to all this, the building itself, a train station built in 1900, is just fun to be in. Finally, go early in the morning and in the off season for best results, though your mileage may vary.

The Pompidou Center is one of those buildings that looks like it has been turned inside out. There’s one in London too, but I don’t remember the name of it at the moment. Some of the art on the inside seems to match this theme as well since the Pompidou’s collection focuses on modern and contemporary art. Think Georges Braque, Picasso, Sonia Delaunay, Paul Klee, Moholy-Nagy, Mark Rothko, and that ilk. Then there’s Warhol and Claes Oldenburg and related pop artists. From there, the Pompidou Center’s fourth floor launches into some seriously conceptual art of the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Good on them for trying to be on the cutting edge, but I must admit I think I fell off that edge more than once. It’s the kind of art (mostly sculptural) that makes you go, “Huh?”– which is probably the point. It turns out that I prefer my art to make me go “Wow!” instead of “Huh?” but there are more things in Heaven and Earth than are dreamt of in my philosophies. When you get bored with the “Huh?” art, you can leave the galleries and scurry through the human Habitrail that hangs off one facade of the building. Turns out, they really are as fun as they look in the hamster-sized version.

There are a bazillion more art museums in Paris, but these are the ones we visited in between strolling the streets of the city and taking in the art that is Paris itself.

P.S. to a previous P.S. I am now officially going on record to say that Paris no longer deserves its reputation as a place where snooty French people refuse to speak English to American yokels. I know three phrases in French, and one of them is “I’m sorry; I don’t know how to speak French,” and the people we interacted with in Paris were lovely and helpful and sometimes even self-deprecating about their inability to speak English. If you are not a an ugly American, you will have Paris in the palm of your hand. Just be nice and self-deprecating yourself about your inability to speak French, and you’ll get kindness back in spades.

In Paris

I am writing this in Paris. I am actually in Paris. It’s amazing! We’ve done a lot of walking these past few days, which is a little tiring, but after all the best way to see Paris. Turns out, it’s pretty awesome to just get to experience the city. It honestly is the City of Lights, as we experienced last night.

We’ve been eating a ton of super amazing food including sweet AND savory crepes, profiteroles, steak and fries, etc, etc. Thanks to my mom we’ve had a restaurant reservation every day, which makes it extremely more pleasant to find food. I say this because we have had a lot of bad experiences with trying to find someplace to eat in new places in the past.

When ordering delicious pastries for breakfast, you may have to use your French, meaning not me. But, I have sort of fallen more in love with this language, and I think for my 14th year, I’ll spend some more time learning it to then be able to spend a year abroad in Paris! My future is spread out before me, but honestly I just love this place.

For example, we visited the Eiffel Tower and saw the whole city spread out, and then we walked to the Arc de Triomphe, oh and had macarons again. I am not a fan of floral macarons. For future reference, I will not be getting the orange blossom macarons again.

We also went to the Louvre and saw the three very famous sisters, the Mona Lisa, the Winged Victory of Samothrace, and the Venus de Milo. They were definitely very majestic. That museum is huge, but in that way, pretty cool.

We also saw the famed Water Lily paintings in the Musee de la Orangerie, which were huge and really beautiful. The funny thing about that experience is that they were the only works in the museum at the moment.

It’s been a little surprising at how much English I hear in the streets, whether it be British or American. But, then I remember or am told that it is actually a huge global metropolis, so obviously you’re going to have many languages. Speaking of which, most of the French people we’ve spoken to, or pretty much all, have amazing English with a thin accent, which is impressive.

So far, and we have one day left, my favorite part about Paris has been the atmosphere and simply knowing I am in Paris because it’s so cool. It’s just a completely different world with the wrought-iron balconies hanging off of tall stone buildings over fancy retail stores or souvenir shops. There’s also the Siene splitting off the island of Ile de la Cite and providing many bridges to break up the streets. Not to mention Montramarte with its hills and magical looking buildings. I concur it’s been a very good experience! I love you, Paris!

Cars in Paris

As you all know, we are in Paris, France, and I have been taking pictures of cars that catch my eye. I took a lot of pictures because there are people here that have nice cars. I chose six cars to write about out of the many that I have taken pictures of.

Citroën 2cv in Montmartre

This model of car is very famous. It was first designed after World War 2. In a BBC show called, The People’s Car, James May (The Top Gear and Grand Tour presenter) talks in depth about it. It has an interesting design and is pretty small. I really like it in this shade of blue.

1970s Lamborghini Espada in the streets of Paris

I first saw this car in the roundabout of the Arc de Triomphe, but I couldn’t get a picture of it as it sped by. I was annoyed that I couldn’t get a photo. When we were walking back to the AirBnB in the neighborhood of Saint Germain de Pres I saw it and I was surprised. I snapped a few photos, and my dad asked,”What kind of car is it?” As I looked I realized it was a Lambo. You can’t see the side view in this picture, but it has a beautiful design, and its engine noise is music to my ears.

A Range Rover next to the Cafe Deux Magots

This car isn’t very pretty. It looks pretty cool with its matte black paint job and tinted windows. I saw a driver come out of it and pick up some rich guy. It was waiting for the guy next to the Cafe Deux Magots which we went by because it’s where some famous philosophers ate and talked about philosophical things.

Lamborghini Aventador roadster and Ferrari California off of the Champs-Elysees

These are two beautiful cars that I really like. They both are for rent for a drive, as you can see by the dents. The gold one is a Lamborghini Aventador roadster, and it is one of my favorite cars. The red one is a Ferrari California and is also very cool. The only people that can probably afford these were the people who had their kids walking down the street with Gucci track suits and Balenciaga shoes. Although, they are very cool.

Old Fiat 500 taking pictures with the Eiffel Tower

This car is pretty funny looking. I would put it in the same group as a Mini Cooper. It’s a small, cute-looking car that is very weak. The funniest thing was that it just pulled up next to the Eiffel Tower. I think the color fits it well and made it pop out from the gray bleak morning.

Original Mini Cooper close to the Eiffel Tower

I have put a lot of old cars on this list because I know my audience. This Mini Cooper is tiny. There is a picture of me next it, and it is at my waist. I was suprised when I saw it because everyone knows what car this is. I myself don’t think it looks that cool. I like big muscle cars or super cars, but I respect your opinion for liking it.

I have a lot more pictures of cars from this trip and the trip I went on in Germany. When my sister and mom take a million pictures of flowers or “artistic” pictures I take pictures of cars I think are cool. I look around the streets when I go out walking for cool cars. I might show off some more of my camera roll car collection in future posts.

Paris whirlwind

Okay, I’m just going to admit right off the top that I’m tired and toward the bottom of a bottle of $7 Bordeaux, but if we are going to provide even the briefest insight into our Paris adventures while we are here, this is probably how it’s going to have to be.

Any of you who read the New York Times are probably familiar with the “36 hours in . . . ” series in the travel section, and those articles have always made me metaphorically dizzy when I read them, as well as making me think, “You could never do that with kids.” Turns out, doing something similar with two fourteen-year-olds (Happy birthday, Frankie and Henry!) does in fact make me dizzy.

We rolled into Paris yesterday afternoon around 4 PM on the high-speed TGV train from Hendaye, on the French border with Spain. We didn’t get much above 200 km/hr between Hendaye and Bordeaux, but when that thing scratched off out of Bordeaux and started screaming along at speeds up to 320 km/hr, it was, shall we say, noticeable. Such a civilized way to travel.

We walked from the train station to our AirBnB in the Saint Germain de Pres neighborhood on the left bank of the Seine. It’s a cute little fourth-floor walk-up in a classic Paris building on a classic Paris side street. After a momentary rest, we headed for the Seine and Pont Neuf, which involved some wandering around Saint Germain de Pres first. Then we walked up the right bank to Le Trumilou, a classic French bistro where my amazing spouse had made reservations. All I have to say about that is I would gladly condemn my close friends and family to the guillotine if you promised me I could have that cassoulet at least once a week.

And there were even views of the remains of Notre Dame across the river. Given that, we had to roam back over to the Ile de la Cite and walk around the outside of the burnt husk of the church. They are hard at work on the restoration and have a large-format exhibit on the temporary walls surrounding the site that explains the fire itself and the restoration process. I guess that’s just an excuse to come back and see the restored version in a few years.

In the morning, we started with multiple baked goods and a walk to the Eiffel Tower. Again, thanks to my incredible spouse and the fact that it is February, we breezed from the first security checkpoint (yes, there are more than one) to the first elevator up the tower in about four minutes. To the I-don’t-like-to-be-around-tourists curmudgeons out there, I have only this to say: 1) go in February, 2) go with my wife, 3) suck it up because the Eiffel Tower is cool. The only uncool thing: it turns out that on windy days, it sways up to four inches, and today was very windy. The movement was definitely noticeable and a little disconcerting. So, to take the edge off, we bought a bunch of macaroons on the second floor as we came down. Weirdest macaroon flavor so far: jasmine– like the flower, not the Disney princess.

Boom, done with the Eiffel Tower. Crepes from a street vendor, then on to the Arc de Triomphe. First thoughts on Arc de Triomphe: does everyone else think of Richard Scary books when they think of the Arc de Triomphe? Second thought: I think it was designed by a near-sighted person. It’s much bigger than I thought it would be. And that roundabout is from hell. Who wants to drive on that?!

Boom, done with the Arc de Triomphe. We walked down the Champs-Elysees, which again, I didn’t realize was really “down”. I just assumed it was flat, but the Arc de Triomphe is on a hill. Who knew? Yes, I know, the billions of people who have seen it before me. I guess it makes me happy that that Nazis had to sweat a little as they jack-booted up to it.

Lunch on a side street of the Champs-Elysees at a place called Le Relais de l’Entrecote, which it turns out is a chain, but I DON’T CARE! This place does one thing: steak frites (aka: steak and fries). All you are asked is what you want to drink and how you want your steak cooked (see better Basque option here). And on top of that, our waitperson spoke English happily, and when she brought out the kids’ desserts, there were candles, and the whole restaurant sang “Happy Birthday” to them in French (we may have mentioned it was their birthday). That was lovely.

Boom, steak frites done. On to the Place de la Concorde, the Tuileries gardens, and two rooms of mammoth Water Lilies paintings by Monet at the Musee de la Orangerie.

Boom, impressionism done. Back to the apartment for a rest. Then a quick trip to do some shopping for birthday clothes and a visit to Le Bon Marche (= giant department store with most things we could never afford, but a beautiful Belle Epoque interior) because it is only a block from our AirBnB. Back to the apartment again, and that’s where the bottle of Bordeaux and this post started.

Boom, 36 hours in Paris, with kids, done.

And now for the next 96!

P.S. 99% of the French people we have met have been incredibly friendly despite the fact that our attempts at the French language have been pathetic at best and mostly based on Google translate and the accents we learned from Monty Python skits. We worried the French were going to be scary and snooty. Not true so far. We’ll keep you posted.

Before Paris

We are going to Paris on Saturday, and I am beyond excited!!!! It’s been on my bucket list for a while and one of the things I’ve most been looking forward to this year in Spain. Our plan is to spend five nights in Paris and three nights in Normandy. Pretty much, the magical City of Lights is for me, and the very important war stuff is for Henry. But, I’m determined to enjoy all of it, and I’m sure I will.

Since I have never been to Paris before, all I know is what I’ve read about or heard about. One of the reasons I’m so excited is because I love traveling and new places. But, I’m sure I have a few expectations that I hope will be met. My first one is that Paris is magical. I mean, to be honest, I have to make it magical on my own, especially since it will most likely be rainy and cold the whole time we are there. After all, it is the end of February and the warm weather in Zarautz is very unusual. But, all I think I will need is a yummy pastry and a view of the Eiffel Tower. Another thing, I think the Eiffel Tower will be amazing, like a stop in your tracks majestic iron sculpture. I am very excited to go up all the way to the top! I wonder if you can actually see it from many parts of the city or if people just make it seem that way. 

I’m hoping for the un-tourist experience, meaning exploring the city all the way and not just staying in the tourism district. I’m sure this will become a reality since I have such travel-friendly parents. Speaking of tourists, I´m guessing there will be less of the hoards because it is after all February. But, I don’t know for sure, so we will see. Also, I’m hoping the food will be amazing, which is honestly a definite of course after all I’ve heard. Crepes, macaroons, bread and butter galore! In case it’s not obvious, I like food. 

Finally, I am very excited to just BE in Paris. To experience it. I would say my expectations are pretty low, it’s not like I´m expecting stars and Christmas lights every night, although that would be nice . . . but, I would say that I am going to make the best of it and eat as much food as I possibly can and see as much as I can and just enjoy it as much as I can. 

As I’m sure you’ve noticed, I’m not excited at all.