Author: Tim

Saturday, February 8 and Sunday, February 9 – transit from Paris to Madison

I’m writing this at 2:40am on Monday in Madison, so, sadly, I have not avoided jet lag on the return trip!

The journey from my Paris hotel to the airport was just as I like it – taxi avoidance! I had a 5 minute walk to the Metro station, followed by a short ride to Gare du Nord, where I picked up the express train to Charles de Gaulle. Total time: 1 hour. Total cost: €10.

And as we entered the airport, with the train running above ground and parallel to the auto lanes, I noticed a massive traffic jam. So, Travel Tip: take the train to Charles de Gaulle!

Unfortunately, my return wasn’t glitch-free. I was scheduled to arrive in Chicago around 4pm, and I was to follow that with a bus ride to Madison, arriving around 8pm on Saturday. Well, my departure from Paris was delayed just enough to result in me missing the Chicago connection in Toronto (and I mean just – probably by 10 minutes!). I was able to get a later flight, but that got me to O’Hare around 10pm, so I just got a hotel at the airport for the night. Oh well. I took the bus the following morning, with an arrival in Madison around noon.

Odds and Ends…

Budget: Even with the extra night in Chicago, I ended up coming in well under my default budget of $200/day. Of course, using miles for the flights didn’t hurt!

Steps: Paris is a great walking city, but it is rather spread out. Here are my daily step counts while there:

• Monday: 22k
• Tuesday: 23k
• Wednesday: 27k
• Thursday: 30k
• Friday: 26k

I was ready for that relaxing business class experience!

(I only used the Metro three times during my stay: from the train to the hotel on arrival; to the flea market on Monday; and from the hotel to the airport train on departure)

I finished the trip with 546k steps, averaging 16k per day.

Final Thoughts: I had a wonderful time!. And I like Kari’s suggestion of calling the whole trip my 60th birthday celebration! (rather than focusing on the actual birthday, which was, shall we say, less than extraordinary!)

Thanks to everyone for following along! And for all of your comments too; I enjoy hearing from you while I’m on the road. I’ll be back in a couple weeks as I make a return visit to South America! But until then, I’m off to New York City for Ali & Matt’s wedding!!

Thursday, February 6 – Paris

I led off the day with a trip to Retromobile. The place was packed with people. Let me just say that the classic car hobby is alive and well! No wonder I can’t afford a Mini!! And this was a Thursday; I’d hate to see what it’s going to be like on the weekend.

My next stop was a visit to the Catacombs of Paris (thanks for the suggestion Ed!). These are underground ossuaries which hold the remains of more than six million people in a small part of a tunnel network built to consolidate Paris’ ancient stone quarries. This ossuary was created as part of an effort to eliminate the city’s overflowing cemeteries. Preparation work began after a series of gruesome cemetery basement wall collapses in 1774. Beginning in 1786, nightly processions of covered wagons transferred remains from most of Paris’ cemeteries to a mine shaft opened into the ossuary. It remained largely forgotten until it became a novelty-place for concerts and other private events in the early 19th century; after further renovations it was opened to public visitation in 1874.

I did a LOT of walking today (more on that to follow). Here a few pictures from my roaming…

Steps Update: I set a trip personal best today by accumulating 30,057 steps. And that put me over half a million steps for the trip! I’m averaging close to 16k steps per day, which is well in front of my South America pace. That trip was more than twice as long though!

Auction Results: Here are the prices achieved for the cars I highlighted in my Tuesday journal entry:

• Mercedes Benz Gullwing: $1.2 million
• BMW 507: $2.2 million
• Porsche 904: $2.1 million
• Jaguar D-Type: Did Not Sell. The estimate was $6.5-7.0 million. However, the high bid did not meet the reserve, which was likely the low value on the estimate.

Friday, February 7 – Paris

My last day in Paris, and the last day of my trip. It’s gone by so fast, but I’ve had a great time!

It’s a beautiful day in Paris, so I think I’ll just roam around and take in the sights. But first, there’s one stop I have to make…

Okay, I need to walk this off!

Observation: I mentioned previously that Vaduz is pristinely clean. Well, Paris is a dump. There is trash, cigarette butts and litter everywhere (Not helped by the fact that they still use paper tickets for the Metro. Really?); copious amounts of graffitti; and dog droppings on the sidewalk. But hey, it’s Paris, so they can get away with it!

I’ll have some final thoughts on the trip and a narrative of my return to Madison in my final entry. Stay tuned!

Tuesday, February 4 – Paris

Okay, so most of these next three days are probably going to bore you to death. One of the main reasons I traveled to Paris was to attend the classic car show, Retromobile. In conjunction with that, three auctions are also being held here this week. My plan is attend the previews for two of the auctions. (I’m going to the previews, rather than the auctions, because they are free to attend!) I’ll only post a few pictures from the car events.

Today’s preview was held at Place Vauban, which is a semi-circular square located adjacent to Les Invalides. The venue was basically a tent set up in the square, with a clear plastic roof.

I was fortunate in that a few of my all-time favorite cars were in the auction. I’ll only include those pictures here…

I also made a return visit to one of my favorite museums – the Musee d’Orsay. It’s a favorite not only for its content, but also its setting – a former railway station built between 1898 and 1900.

Also, in my walking around today I passed by Notre Dame again, but this time from a different perspective…

Wednesday, February 5 – Paris

Cars and a museum again today!

I attended another auction preview today. But for me, this visit was more about the venue than the cars. (Although there were some great cars up for auction!) The auction is to be held Thursday at the Grand Palais, an exhibition hall and museum complex located on the Champs-Élysées. Construction began in 1897. Here a few pictures from the preview…

I also corrected a major oversight on my part by taking a tour of the Monet Museum (Musée Marmottan Monet). I can’t believe I overlooked this previously!

And I’ll close with some random shots from my roaming around the city these past two days…

Sunday, February 2 – transit from Monte Carlo to Paris

It’s another full day of train travel, and I’m looking forward to it! The itinerary:

• Monte Carlo to Nice: 24m, no 1st class car (oh no! I guess I’ll survive!)
• Nice to Paris: 5h 58m
• Paris Gare de Lyon to Hotel: Paris Metro, one change, 30m

It was a very relaxing day. No drama thankfully! The views weren’t as dramatic as in Switzerland, but we did travel along the coast for a while, and that was beautiful!

Monday, February 3 – Paris

During my time in London I had the good fortune to visit Paris several times. So, my urge on this trip was to maybe take in some things that are off the beaten path, or I might have overlooked. There was one tourist spot I had to visit this morning though…

Thursday, January 30 and Friday, January 31 – Monte Carlo

The shorts are coming out today! I don’t care if I look like a tourist in uber fashionable Monte Carlo! The forecast for the next two days calls for party cloudy skies, with temperatures in the upper 50s.

This post is going to be all about pictures! I’ll lead off with a couple from my hotel…

I mentioned in my previous post that Monte Carlo is set into the side of a mountain, so although the city covers a small area, the steepness makes it difficult to cover on foot. To alleviate that there are several public elevators located throughout the area. And two of those were the ones I could have used last night to walk from the train station to my hotel. The issue was finding the first one…

Okay, enough of this boring stuff, let’s get on with some pictures of beautiful Monte Carlo!

I also took a tour of the Collection of Voitures Anciennes, which is a museum featuring some of the private cars in the collection of the Prince of Monaco. I’ll just bore you with a couple pictures here…

And finally, I was incredibly happy to learn that the start of the Rallye Monte Carlo Historique was taking place here on Friday! The staging took place during the day, and the public was allowed to roam freely amongst the cars! Very Nice! Once again, I’ll only post a limited amount of pictures here, so as to reduce the chance of reader abandonment!

Saturday, February 1 – Monte Carlo Casino

The Monte Carlo Casino offers a few options when it comes to taking a tour and/or gambling:

• Self-guided audio tours are available while the casino is closed, from 10am to 1pm. The cost is €17. The tour includes access to all of the casino rooms, with photography allowed and no dress code.
• Gambling begins at 2pm. The cost to enter is €17, of which €10 is refunded by way of a credit towards gaming, drinks, or meals. There is only access to some of the rooms, photography is not allowed, and the dress code is fairly lax (jeans, collared shirt, sneakers). At 7pm, the dress code becomes more stringent.
• An all-day pass for €17. This combines both items above, with the exception of the €10 credit.

I went with the last option. I’ll describe how it all went in the captions of the pictures below. Note that the exterior pictures of the casino were taken on Thursday and Friday.

So, how did the gambling go? I arrived at around 2:30, and it was pretty quiet. I wanted to play blackjack, and there was one table open with a €10 minimum. There were two people playing, so I joined in with a €100 bankroll. It was going fairly well, up and down, pretty much staying even. And then a group of three guys joined us. And they were playing stupid. I put up with it for a little while, but then started losing, so walked away. I ended up playing for about 30 minutes and lost €40. It was still pretty empty in the casino, but I stuck around for another half an hour, watching the limited action at the other gaming tables, and then cashed in and left. I did keep a €5 chip as a souvenir though!

Tuesday, January 28 – Vaduz

It’s a rather rainy day, so it seems like a perfect time for rest, travel planning, catching up on loose ends, and work on the journal. I pretty much saw all of Vaduz yesterday, but I did head out for a while today and visited the Postage Stamp Museum. That was pretty interesting! I also went to the grocery store to pick up some food. I’ve still only had the one sit-down meal so far on the trip, which seems kind of sad, I know. I’ve just got to the point where I find it rather boring to have a meal at a restaurant by myself. (Is that another old-age thing? Probably not, I’m just weird!)

I promised you the story about my 1st class train travel. Well, by last Friday I had (finally!) figured out the final steps of the trip. I looked at online train schedules and came up with the routes and times I wanted for the three remaining journeys. So I went to the Luxembourg train station to purchase the tickets. I ended up working with a great agent and she suggested that I consider buying a Eurail Pass. Of course! I can’t believe I didn’t think of that myself! Must be that elderly brain function coming into play again! She went ahead and crunched the numbers, comparing individual purchase versus rail pass, and it wasn’t even close. And this took a fair amount of work on her part, because there’s more to booking the travel than just buying the pass. For many trains a reservation is required; in that case there is a fee on top of the cost of the pass. And as a bonus, it turned out the cost of a 1st class pass wasn’t much greater than that of a 2nd class one. So, there’s the story! And as you’ll see in my later posts, I have some long rides coming up, so I’m happy I went with the upgrade.

I should mention that the pass I bought allowed for four days of travel over a 30 day period. But wait, why am I buying a four day pass when I only have three days of train travel left? Well, that wasn’t an option over the time period I wanted. So you’re probably thinking: “You idiot, if you had thought of the pass earlier you could have used it on the trip from London to Luxembourg!”. I actually asked the agent about that, and she said it was unlikely I could have used the pass for that trip because there are very few Eurail reservations available on the Eurostar trains. She was probably just trying to make me feel better! (FYI, the cost of the 1st Class Eurail Pass was €295.)

A final note about my train tickets: I was able to book all the required reservations, except for one: the journey from Milan to Monte Carlo. The agent said that she was unable to access the system of the train company to make the reservation, and that I should check back with an agent on Sunday when I depart for Liechtenstein. This one reservation will turn into an interesting adventure. More details to follow in tomorrow’s journal entry…

Loose ends…

I should mention that Vaduz was very clean. Unlike a lot other European cities I’ve visited, there was no graffitti to be seen.

Sidenote regarding passport stamps: I’ve only had my passport stamped once on this trip – when I departed St Pancras station on my way to Brussels. At Heathrow they now have something called eGate, which is an electronic entry system via a passport scan. I never met with an immigration agent. It went very fast! After entering Belgium, and for the rest of my journey, I’ve been travelling in the Schengen Area, which comprises 26 European countries that have eliminated all passport and other types of control at their mutual borders. The merchants in Vaduz have tried to monetize this situation, by charging tourists $3 to place a Liechtenstein stamp in their passport. Not!

Wednesday, January 29 – transit from Liechtenstein to Monaco

I’ll lead off by telling you what happened when I checked back at the Luxembourg train station on Sunday regarding my Milan to Monte Carlo reservation. The agent I met with this time stated that the problem was not with the system, rather it was a case where she could not make the reservation, I would have to do so myself online. She gave me the web address of the Italian train company for reference. As luck would have it, my train from Luxembourg City to Mukhouse had wifi. So I went to the website, but was only able to find information on trains running between Milan and Venice. (damn Italians!)

But I did have a little over an hour of connecting time in Mulhouse, so I met with a ticket agent at that station. She told me my best option was to make the reservation during my connection in Milan. That wasn’t good for two reasons though: a) I only had 20 minutes in Milan, and b) I didn’t want to wait to the last minute, in case no seats were available. We finally got to the point where she could make a reservation for me on the train that goes from Milan to Monte Carlo, but only as far as Ventimiglia (located on the Italy-French border). From there I would have to get off the train (even though the next stop after Ventimiglia is Monte Carlo!), and take a separate train to Monte Carlo, which does not require a reservation. Crazy, right! But whatever, let’s book it. This isn’t the end of the story though. More to come when we get there…

Today is a long day of travel. I reverse my steps from Vaduz to Sargans to Zurich (bus/train), and the rest of the day goes like this:

• Zurich to Milan: 3h 40m, 20 minute connecting time
• Milan to Ventimiglia: 3h 44m, 32 minute connecting time
• Ventimiglia to Monte Carlo: 30m

It was a long day, but I find train travel relaxing. I enjoy just watching the scenery go by. The route through Switzerland was particularly beautiful, with lakes and mountains. I tried taking some pictures, but they were worthless (blurry, reflections, light pole in the middle of the shot, etc).

The journey was very smooth and relaxing until I arrived in Ventimiglia (we were 10 minutes late arriving in Milan (damn Italians!), but I still had 10 minutes to make my connection).

So, upon arrival in Ventimiglia I exited the train and headed to the station to check on the track location for my final segment. Well, I look at the departures board, and notice that my train has been cancelled (Cancellato!)! Wait, what!?! And all future trains to Monte Carlo have also been cancelled. (damn Italians!) It’s 7pm, and I’m in a kind of in panic mode trying to figure out what to do next. I quickly remember that the train I was just on is also going to Monte Carlo. So, I head back to that track with little hope that it would still be there, but thankfully it still is! Wow! Thank you! It turns out they have a long stop time in Ventimiglia because it’s at the border and they do a crew change. Again, thank you! I’m back on the train, in my original seat, ready to head to Monte Carlo. Then the (new) conductor (French) comes by to check my ticket. Oh oh. Well, I explain the situation, show him my ticket from Milan to Ventimiglia, along with the Eurail pass, and he lets me carry on the rest of the way (love the French!). And it turns out it’s only a 10 minute ride to Monte Carlo. I’m not sure what I would have done if the train had already departed; probably would have ended up in a taxi. Not sure how expensive that would have been?

Getting from the train station to my hotel was a little bit of a struggle as well. On a map, they are very close. The issue though is the third dimension. Monte Carlo is very hilly, with winding roads. The hotel actually sent me directions, but they were a little unclear, and involved an exit I couldn’t find and a of couple elevators, of which I could only find one! I eventually made it part of the way up the hill, but then had to rely on Google Maps to get me the rest of the way.

Travel Tip: Did you know you can use Google Maps without a data signal (cellular, internet, wifi)? The GPS in your phone will still track you without a signal. The key is downloading the map data while you have a signal (preferable a low cost signal like hotel wifi!). The caveat is that Google Maps will only allow downloads of maps for a limited area. So in my case tonight, I briefly used international roaming to get a cellular signal, download the map of the area around me, and then went back to airplane mode to track my route to hotel.

Thursday, January 23 & Friday, January 24 – Luxembourg City

Apologies for the delay in updating the journal, it’s been a busy few days!

In looking back over the course of my travels, I must say that I have had pretty good luck with the weather. As recently as my trip last winter, I encountered beautiful days at the critical locations (Iguazu Falls, Galapagos, Easter Island). And my multi-day trek on the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu could have been ugly, but turned out great. The one case of bad luck I can recall was my trip to Nepal. I went during the time of year that typically promised the optimum viewing of Mt. Everest. Unfortunately, the week prior to my arrival a typhoon made landfall in India and worked its way north to the Himalayas. The good news is I missed that week, because it rained every day in Nepal! The bad news is that clouds still covered the mountains during the week of my stay. Oh well, I still had a great time, and I ultimately did get a glimpse of Everest – by taking a small plane up above the clouds! That was pretty cool in itself!

Anyway, I digress. The point I’m ultimately getting to is the fact that my entire stay in Luxembourg City (and beyond) was engulfed in clouds and fog. But there is a bright side (pun intended!) – it didn’t rain or snow! And it was still a fun stay; I’m just disappointed I wasn’t able to present the true beauty of the city.

And there was a comedic aspect to the whole thing. I was following the weather using the app on my phone, and here’s how it went these two days:

• Forecast as of Thursday Morning: Cloudy in the morning, clearing skies around noon, and for the remainder of the day. That’ll work – I’ll walk around in the morning, get the lay of the land, and then do some picture taking in the afternoon.
• Forecast update Thursday Noon: Still cloudy, clearing around 3pm, will remain cloudless through the afternoon and evening, and all day Friday. That’s fine, there’s still plenty more to explore, and I can decide what I want to go back to this afternoon and tomorrow.
• Forecast update Thursday 3pm: Pretty much a repeat of noon, just 3 hours later! (cloudy, clearing for tonight and tomorrow). Okay. I’ll try for something tonight.

Well, you can pretty much guess how this played out. It was cloudy Thursday night and Friday morning. But the forecast continued to tease about clear skies in the afternoon. Of course, that never happened! I wasn’t going to be fooled twice though (I’m no dummy!), so I gave in and took some pictures of a cloudy Luxembourg.

Luxembourg City has a population of about 120k, of which 70% is comprised of foreigners. It is a significant banking and administrative center in Europe, and it is ranked as having the highest per capita GDP in the world (2018; the U.S. is 8th).

It’s a great city for walking, because it is not particularly large. But its layout is complex, as the city is set on several levels, straddling hills and dropping into two gorges.

Okay, enough babbling, let’s get to some pictures!

Saturday, January 25 – day trip to Vianden

Vianden lies on the Our river, near the border between Luxembourg and Germany. It is known for its impressive castle and beautiful location in the Our valley.

The trip from Luxembourg City takes about an hour, split equally between a train followed by a bus. And it was nice that I could buy a public transport day pass for €4, which covered the whole trip.

Of course it was a cloudy day; actually bordering on foggy!

Sunday, January 26 – transit from Luxembourg to Liechtenstein

Here is my travel schedule for the day:

• Luxembourg City to Mulhouse, France by train; 2h 30m; 1st class (more about that in a later post!)
• Mulhouse to Zurich by train: 1h 20m; 1st class
• Zurich to Sargans, Switzerland by train; 55m; I had a 1st class ticket, but sat in 2nd class
• Sargans to Vaduz, Liechtenstein by bus; 30m
• Vaduz Au bus stop to hotel on foot; 5m

Monday, January 27 – Vaduz

Liechtenstein is a small country, with a population of about 40k (the population of Vaduz is 5k). It is 15 miles long x 8 miles wide.

Tuesday, January 21 – last day in London

I had big plans for my last day in London; enhanced by the fact that it was also my 60th birthday! I started out back at the V&A Museum, where I attended a tour/talk regarding the history of the museum. It was very interesting!

It was a beautiful day, so I decided to take a walk through the parks as I made my way to the TKTS booth in Leicester Square (planning on attending a show tonight). On the route to Kensington Gardens I stopped to get something to eat at a favorite sandwich shop. Well, let’s just say it was not as good as I remembered! Was it always marginal, and my faulty memory just made it seem better, or had it actually had a serious drop in quality over the years? Mmmm, I’ve got to go with the latter. But I am 60 after all, so you never know!

By the time I reached Leicester Square I was getting kind of tired. Still feeling the effects (or is it affects, I never get those two straight?!) from an over-strenuous weekend, or just old age? Probably both! So, sadly, I decided to head back to the hotel and get ready for my day of travel tomorrow.

Sidenote: I did put in 17k steps today, so maybe being tired was a little justified!

What a pathetic birthday, right? No arguments. I don’t even have any decent pictures to post. This is one I will try to blot out from my memory. And based on my sandwich shop issues, that shouldn’t be a problem!

But how appropriate is it that on my 60th birthday I was too tired to make a night of it!!

Wednesday, January 22 – transit from London to Luxembourg

I’ll be travelling in four different trains over a period of about 6 hours today.

Step 1: Take the tube from South Harrow to St Pancras. Duration: about 45 minutes. Class: none. Reserved Seat: yeah, right!

Step 2: St. Pancras to Brussels – Zuid through the Chunnel on Eurostar. Duration: 2 hours. Class: 2nd. Reserved Seat: Yes.

And here’s probably the only good thing about turning 60 – I now qualify for the senior discount on European train travel! Whoo Hoo!!

I had a 28 minute layover in Brussels, which turned out to be a good thing because we arrived 20 minutes late!

Step 3: Brussels to Arlon (a Belgian city near the border of Luxembourg). Duration: 2 hours 50 minutes. Class: 2nd. Reserved Seat: no.

I only had 5 minutes to catch the train to Luxembourg, but thankfully we arrived on time (as you’d expect for most of the European train systems). And my connecting train was just one track away.

Step 4: Arlon to Luxembourg City. Duration: 22 minutes. Class: 2nd. Reserved Seat: no.

Friday, January 17 – London

Began the day at the Natural History Museum to attend the annual Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibit. I been to this in previous years, and it continues to amaze! Unfortunately, no photography was allowed within the exhibit (although I did see one person taking pictures – annoying!). If you’re interested in seeing some of the images though, a link is here.

Following the photography exhibit I meandered to the north part of the city to visit the always-interesting Camden Market. For those not familiar, the market contains over 1,000 shops and stalls selling fashion, music, art and food. It’s a fun place to spend the afternoon!

Saturday, January 18 – London

A beautiful day! Temps in the 40s, low wind and clear skies. I think some walking is in order! My route of choice is the Thames Path – specifically along the north bank heading west (up river) out of the city (The Thames Path is a long distance walking trail, following England’s best known river for 184 miles as it meanders from its source in the Cotswolds through several rural counties and on into the heart of London).

I started at Hammersmith Bridge, and made my through Chiswick, Kew, Brentford, Isleworth, and finished just short of Richmond. It’s a lovely walk, especially on a day like this! I racked up a little over 27k steps for the day; just below this trip’s high mark! Doh! Below are some sights along the path…

I finished the day by spending a wonderful evening with my friends (and former landlords) Mary & Tony on Harrow on the Hill. We began the night with drinks at their beautiful Georgian home, Byron House, and then made our way to a nearby pub for dinner. This was the first proper sit down meal I’ve had so far on trip. Sad, I know! And what did I have on this rare occasion? Bangers and mash. It was very good! It was lovely to see you Mary & Tony! Thank you for your hospitality!

Sunday, January 19 – London

Great news! It’s another beautiful day! Basically a repeat of yesterday. So, I think I’ll go all Groundhog Day and make another trek on the Thames Path. I’ll mix it up a little today though. I’m going to take on the SOUTH bank, and head EAST. Crazy, I know! I started out at Embankment and made it all the way to Greenwich. Today’s step count was a little over 26k. Once again, just short of my trip PB. Ugh!

Monday, January 20 – London

What to do after the weekend of 50k steps? Rest!

I spent the day finalizing my departure details to Luxembourg on Wednesday, and figuring out how to travel from Luxembourg to Liechtenstein by train (here’s a hint: it can’t be done!).

Tomorrow concludes my stay in London, and is a big day for me. How should I spend my last day? Mmmmm…

After my weekend of walking I’ve covered nearly a quarter million steps on this trip, averaging over 16k per day. That won’t last!