Sunday, August 4, 2013
I
packed up all of my stuff again this morning and made my way on the #4 tram to
the train station, where I (thankfully) didn’t have any problems finding the
shuttle bus to take me to the airport where I would pick up my car. It was a longer bus ride than I anticipated,
but I dutifully read my book and tried not to stress!
There
were no problems picking up the car or even finding it in the lot! AND I even got it started and out of the lot
without stalling! That was pretty
exciting! Of course, there was no one
behind me to put pressure on me, so that helped! Then, I needed to go through 2 stop signs,
where I stalled both times! I pulled
over to get the GPS all organized, which took some coaxing, but thankfully I
got it to work because I do not think I would have made it here without the
GPS!!
I
followed it out of the city with no problems at all! Then I had to go through a toll-booth. This was pretty much my worst nightmare
confirmed! It was awful. I hadn’t figured out how to roll down the
windows, so I couldn’t get the ticket I needed to move forward a bit so I could
get out of my car to get the ticket to lift up the bar that crossed over in
front of me. However, by the time this
all happened I had about 10 people behind me and I had already stalled about 4
times!! Then, I managed to pull up a
bit, get out and get my ticket and get back in the car. By this point everyone was honking their
horns at me and I was on the verge of tears.
Thankfully, after about the 15th try (and I am hardly
exaggerating here) I managed to drive out of the stupid toll booth! Uggg…
Thankfully
the rest of my drive went ahead without too many other problems at all. I had a couple of other stalls at random
intersections, but by the last toll booth I even managed to drive away without
stalling at all! It was pretty epic!
The
views were to die for! I climbed up
through the Swiss alps and through the West corner of Switzerland to get to
France. I would definitely do the drive
again – and plan to stop along the way to visit all the little places I passed
through today. Lots of really quaint and
picturesque villages and towns.
I
arrived at the house around 3pm and I left the car for M. S.
to park because I didn’t want to drive it anymore! M and Mme S. retired in a house they
built back in 1990 in Sondersdorf in Alsace.
It is further South than Strasbourg, and close to the Swiss/German
border. It is pretty much my perfect
house with slanted ceilings in the upstairs level with the windows on the side
of the roof. As well there is a “Heidi”
stove – made out of tiles and woodburning, so you can cook with it as well as
sit on it as a warm chair. It is
awesome.
It was
so great to see everyone today! I haven’t
seen the S. family in quite a few years, because I typically follow Sophie
around and don’t always get the chance to see the parents as well! Today was perfect to see them, Dani and
Sophie as well as little Laure. Today
she is 8 weeks old! She is pretty cute –
except for when she cries!!
We had
an awesome dinner to celebrate and it was so nice to be here! (And btw I speak French so much better than
Italian! Lol.) -Allison
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