Internet people

I must say after a couple weeks of travel, I have really gained respect for people who can create content I actually want to read or watch on blogs, youtube etc. We are both finding it so hard to find the time to actually sit down and write something out, either email or blog or facebook. And, when you do find the time, if you actualy want to upload pictures or format things nicely on a crappy internet connection, it takes like 30 minutes to properly write out a few paragraphs of what we did! The nice thing though, is that ranting aimlessly (like this) gets down a lot of text very quickly...


Some things I have learned I wish I knew before I came:

1. In France, the train car you are in barely matters, and the seat you are in doesnt matter at all. People just sit in your seat, or sit in any seat they want, and then go "Oh, it doesnt matter its all the same" when you show them your tickets. Now when we get on, we just go near where our seats are and take the best ones.

2. French regional trains are germ infested disease ridden cattle car hot boxes. Instead of TGV to Paris and then down to Lyon from Bordeaux (2.5 ish hours, wait, then 4 ish hours) we took a direct train 'first class' straight accross (7 hours). HUGE MISTAKE. Jess and I both lost years off our lives, and caught at least 4 serious diseases. Everyone was coughing, it smelled like urine and poo, everyone is so close together, and its 34 degrees in there. Plus there is no drink or food car. Do not do this, be warned!

3. Do not expect peoples directions to be correct. Saying something is on Grande Rue de la Croix-Rousse, apparently means "some where in that neighbourhood of 25 blocks)". We spent over an hour walking around yestserday for a laundromat, only to walk back to the hotel and ask the lady again where it was and she revised her previously very specific directions to "this street or this one or this one, between here and here". Idiot!

All in all though everything is going great still. Everything has been a lot of discovering and figuring stuff out, but transit is just so good, and signage is clear through any language barrier. Today in Lyon its our last full day so we are giong to take the tram up above old Lyon and visit the cathedrals, and then have dinner at the #1 rated trip advisor restaurant... I'm super pumped for both! French food has been really good, and we have been keeping really busy seeing the sights. Parc de la tete d'or was very nice good, but ill let Jess share her excitement over that. If you google it, i think it should be fairly obvious what we spend at least 20 minutes staring at.

Hope everyone is well... Train tomorrow to Nice/Monaco for 3 days then Venice, if I can buck up and pay the hotel rates (holy crap!)

Owen