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Dec 26, 2010
We woke up and headed downstairs for breakfast at the hotel – one of the girls assumed the breakfast was complimentary, but it turned out it wasn’t and costed us 15 euros each, although the buffet breakfast was really good (I don’t think I’ve ever ate that much meat at breakfast). We then checked out, got our car, set our GPS to Marseille and I was the first driver! After successfully manuvering through the narrow lanes of Barcelona (without stalling), we were on the highway heading to the Spanish/French border when we noticed the GPS arrival time estimate was significantly higher than the one in our plans (by approx. 2 hours). Not thinking too much of it, we ended up taking the “scenic route” through small towns (including many stop lights and hills) until we realize the GPS is set to avoid toll roads – after fixing that 1.5 hour later, we were on a much better time estimate and driving was much easier for me as I don’t have to go through small towns anymore :). In the meantime, we stopped at a McDonalds for a bathroom break and I successfully ordered myself a Pistacchio ice cream (specialty in French McD?) in French!

Since we were somewhat behind schedule due to avoiding toll roads, and Marseille is a little out of our way (our hotel is actually at Lyon, Marseille was just a small detour we’re taking on the way), we ended up opting to stop by smaller towns that are along the way to Lyon, under the argument that these small towns are not accessible by train and since we have a rental car, we should take advantage of it. So we ended up stopping at a bunch of small towns – and not grabbing lunch at all :|. These small towns definitely gave me a first taste of France, and they include:

Narbonne

Béziers
This town was literally on the top of a hill and this is my first major failure driving stick in Europe – I stopped uphill at a stop light and couldn’t start on a green, with a queue of 5-6 cars behind me :(. After failing enough times that the light went from green back to red, I ended up struggling to pull the car aside to a little alley to let cars pass, and then backed out and successfully started again. I blame the lack of a handbrake for this failure 😛 I opted to switch drivers when we left Béziers.

Montpellier
We arrived here at sunset and was rushing to get shots with the last light of the day. The photos turned out quite amazing – definitely one of the better ones from this trip artistically speaking (I’m sure there are comparable ones later on :P).

After grabbing dinner at a local cafe at Montepellier (some yummy French food), we started our 3.5 hour drive towards Lyon. I was half napping in the backseat when I felt the car “stalling” – although it was really bizarre because the car was going around 130km/h (the speed limit for major highways in France is 130km/h) in 6th gear, and so I thought “how do you stall in 6th?”. Apparently the car just abruptly lost gas, and downshifting to 4th did not help “revive” the accelerator. Thankfully this was around 10pm and there was sparse traffic on the highway, so with the momentum of 130km/h, we successfully made it from the left lane to the right shoulder safely. After restarting the car and experiencing the same thing a short distance later in 2nd/3rd gear, we gave up and parked the car at the shoulder and called Hertz. Since having a rental car breaking down on the highway in a foreign country is not common experience any of us have, we ended up making a number of mistakes that required multiple calls.

Call 1: Our car broke down on A9 and south of D59, we’re at the right shoulder of the highway, cannot see highway markers nearby.
Hertz: We’ll send a tow truck with a mechanic to check out your car. (At least they spoke English)
<5 minutes later>
Call 2: We called a few minutes ago requesting a tow truck, and was wondering if the tow truck will be able to fit 4 people plus our luggage. (This was after I recalled the last tow truck experience with sadd3j’s mx3 in Scarborough when only 1 person was allowed to ride in the tow truck)
Hertz: No problem, 4 people can fit.
<5 minutes later>
Call 3: We called before about our rental car broken down at A9 and south of D59, but we provided the wrong address – we are actually on A7 and South of D59. (To be fair, A9 feeds into A7, and A9 does not intersect D59 at all)
Hertz: We already dispatched a tow truck, you’ll have to call 112.

Call 4 to 112: (same as above)
112: … we eventually gave up and hung up.

In the meantime, highway patrol did stop by to check on us; after reassuring them a tow truck is on the way, they left, only to have a second highway patrol car drop by another 10 minutes later, and this time they offered to stay behind us (with their flashing lights) until the tow truck arrives so we are more visible.

30 minutes later, the tow truck / mechanic arrived but he only spoke French – so we struggled to explain the problem to him, and he eventually towed our car… with all of us on board on the back of the tow truck! It was like a rollercoaster ride going through all kinds of backroads and frankly, a little disconcerting since we have no idea where he is taking us. During this time, we also theorized that the problem was possibly because… we’re out of gas! This was because throughout the day I was commenting on how odd the fuel indicator on the dash was, that the tank was still full after driving 200+km (from 10 to 2 at least). (The fuel indicator did slowly start to go down afterwards) So, we thought maybe the fuel indicator was broken and we were in fact out of gas, which seems somewhat consistent with what we experienced (I’ve never ran out of gas with my car so I wouldn’t know what to expect).

The tow truck finally stopped at a garage (apparently the tow truck driver is the garage mechanic) and after explaining how we may not have enough “l’essence”, we fueled up the tank and the mechanic took the car for a test drive, only to experience the same issue twice. He eventually gave up diagnosing the problem, and we called Hertz. Since the car cannot be fixed on the spot, Hertz offered to send us a cab to take us to the nearest town and pay for our hotel for the night. However, we told Hertz that we have a hotel prepaid in Lyon already, so Hertz offered to give us a cab ride to Lyon instead. We waited another 30-45 minutes for the cab to come to the garage to pick us up, and by the time we got into the cab, it was around past 1am, and we’re still 1.5h to 2h away from Lyon.

Almost 2h later, the Rhone River was in sight and we arrived at Lyon, with a whopping cab fare of 480 Euros – probably the most expensive cab ride I’ll ever have in my life! We stopped in front of Hotel du Simplon (which apparently was famous enough to make it to the list in the Lonely Planet guidebook – more on this later), worried that the hotel would be closed already and we would have to wait outside in the cold for the morning before we can check-in, but alas there was someone waiting for us at the reception and we checked in successfully to our rooms. Fortunately the itinerary tomorrow was to tour Lyon using public transit, so we didn’t need to use our rental car in our plans anyway – but not that we cared at this point since we were so exhausted.

A word on Hotel du Simplon – this hotel used to be someone’s mansion, which was converted into a hotel with 35 rooms or so. The interior was antique looking (so old and classy but not dirty) – the elevator was a dinky one (it could only fit one person+luggage) and had a gate which you’ve to close manually before the elevator moved, just like in old movies :). The rooms were definitely clean and comfortable, which was assuring because we made reservations to stay here for 3 nights! Being a classic hotel, they had one strange rule where you have to leave the keys (fancy looking mechanical ones) at the front desk before you leave the hotel, and every time you come back you’ll have to ask for them again at the receptionist.

Last run of the day from the top of Tremblant, teewee spotted this view.

Europe. This destination was not the top choice for this Christmas trip – in fact our top choice would have been Brazil, but due to visa issues (not with mine, but with a friend) we settled on Europe, which doesn’t require any visa with a Canadian passport. (The 4 of us who travelled together are all Canadian Chinese).

This was not a backpacking Europe kind of trip – the primary purpose of this trip is food and wine tasting across France and northern Spain. At such, we agreed that we would dress well for this trip – as my friend put it, “‘Sex and the City’ without the sex”. Rather than being a relaxing vacation, the trip was jammed pack with adventure and events (surprise, surprise!), with lots of photos and events to share, so I’ll take it one piece at a time (which will allow me time to edit photos as well).

Dec 25, 2010
On Christmas Day, I arrived at the Sea-Tac airport for my Lufthansa flight to Barcelona with a 1 hour layover at Frankfurt. 2 of my friends traveling from Toronto were also laying over at Frankfurt, so we had the same leg from Frankfurt to Barcelona. I was concerned however, that I may miss my Frankfurt to Barcelona connection since I had to clear passport control and airport security in 1 hour, not to mention the very real possibility of flight delays due to snow. I ended up packing all my luggage (primarily 10 days of clothes + electronics) into carry-on, but the bag was so jammed pack it was like a giant rock. A Lufthansa stewardess pulled me over when I entered the airport (at the ticketing counter) and asked me to weigh my carry-on, and it was way above the 8kg limit they had. I reassured her I would repack my carry-on to be < 8kg and left (I think she wanted me to check my bag in, which I had no intention of doing). After passing through TSA, I arrived at the gate worrying that weight would be an issue. I had just over 1h before boarding, so I pulled out my macbook and did some research online, to find that Lufthansa indeed are strict about their onboard luggage requirements (size and weight) - those Germans! I even read on forums that the airline stewardess would prowl around the waiting area by the gate and ask people to weigh their bags before boarding. However, not seeing a scale at the gate, I felt more assured that maybe they won't be doing that in Seattle. To my dismay, around 30 minutes before boarding, someone did indeed going around the gate with a handheld digital scale, weighing people's bags. I immediately packed up my stuff and left the waiting area - with my large LowePro AW Rover II and my super packed carry-on, I'm sure I'll be targeted for weighing! Online forums had some tips on what to do if you get weighed, including repacking your bags to put as much on you (and not in the bag) as possible - so I took out my camera and hung it around my neck, and started stuffing clothes in my jacket. As they began boarding, I strategically waited at the back corner, and rushed up when they called my section (under the theory that they won't stop and weigh me and hold up the entire line behind me). And phew! I went by without a problem - it was just a hassle to repack everything into their original place on the plane. 10 hours later, I arrived in snow-covered Frankfurt, went through EU passport control and security check and found my 2 Toronto friends waiting at the gate with a good 15 minutes to spare. The flight to Barcelona was further delayed waiting for the runway to clear, so we arrived in Barcelona almost 1h behind schedule. We had a rental car booked with Hertz, and the 4th person (from Seattle, but took a different flight) and us agreed to meet at the Hertz counter at Terminal 2. However, all of us actually arrived at Terminal 1, so one of us called the 4th person and left a voicemail saying we're at Terminal 1. We suspected, however, that she didn't have her phone on, and would never receive the voicemail - so we ended up shuttling to Terminal 2 (which is quite far away) - only to find out she's not there either. Not sure where to find her (and since her phone isn't on) we picked up the car from Hertz and headed into Barcelona. (We later found out she actually heard the voicemail, sent a reply through e-mail (why her phone wasn't on baffles me) and ended up shuttling to Terminal 1 the same time we traveled to Terminal 2 - eventually we got into contact and she subwayed her way to the hotel to meet up).
A note about the rental car – despite traveling in style, we’re all Chinese at heart and when we booked the rental car, we opted for the cheaper option of driving manual (automatic would have costed ~$160USD more), so the 4 of us were all tasked with learning how to drive stick shift before the trip. Thanks to a Seattle friend of mine, I was actually drilled on driving stick every night of the week prior to departure, and was sufficiently proficient before I left. The girl from Toronto is actually our typical driver for roadtrips (she likes driver and drives long distance no problem) and so when we got the rental car, she was first up as a driver. Stalled once over a speedbump coming out of the parking lot, but otherwise drove from the airport to the hotel in Barcelona without issue. I should mention that the rental car we got was an almost new Volvo S60 (~1100km on it) – it is decked out with auto collapsing side mirrors, rear parking sensors etc. etc. The only thing that proved to be a problem later on was the lack of a handbrake – it used some fancy “digital” parking brake that is de/activated with the push of a button.

After checking-in at the hotel, we had to find parking for the car – which proved difficult as we don’t speak Spanish and the locals don’t speak English. Even the simplest questions as to “can we park here?” and “How much is it overnight?” can’t be asked/answered! We ended up asking the hotel for a recommendation, and they pointed us to a sister hotel in the chain down the street. And here’s where the fun begins.

Since it was Christmas Day at around 2pm, my other friend (the one that rented the car) suggested he should give it a shot at driving. Apparently he didn’t learn his stick driving too well – I am not good enough to pinpoint what the problem was, but it appears he didn’t gas enough while releasing the clutch, and the car would lurge forward a bit and die every time. Despite having less traffic – there were still cars and pedestrians, and there were a lot of 1-way narrow streets too – so as I sat in shotgun I was fearing for my life (and the pedestrians around me). At one point in order to clear the backlog of cars behind him, my friend gunned it all the way to 5000rpm while on 1st gear WITH the clutch half down, resulting in a burnt clutch (we could all smell it) – and then he stalled a few times making a turn onto a 1-way, 1-laned street, to a point that the cars stuck behind us gave up honking. He eventually got out of the car and switched drivers at this point (that and there was visible smoke coming out of the hood).

The girl driver eventually parked our car at the neighboring hotel (with significant concern on getting out as there was a giant steep ramp leading up to the garage door) – I must point out with the size of the Volvo S60, parking is probably the most challenging as small maneuvers with a large car in a tiny parking lot is much less trivial in a manual than an automatic. We met up with the last person who subwayed over to the hotel, settled in to our rooms, and then decided to start our sightseeing in Barcelona. Both girls (if you didn’t follow, we had 2 guys and 2 girls) have visited Barcelona before, so they weren’t super eager in going around, but they showed us La Rambla (a tourist street with vendors and performers) and we wandered around some side alley into some historical looking square/structure. We then subwayed our way to the famous Sagrada Familia, which is a very historical church with a very scary (collapsing) looking front side, but a lot of construction as they continue to build more towers around the original structure.

As it was getting dark already, we headed back to the hotel. We discussed on the subway that of the 4 of us, we have 1 good driver (the girl), the guy who couldn’t drive, and the last girl didn’t even bother trying. Since we need at least 2 drivers for the amount of driving on this trip, it all came down to whether or not I could drive stick! (If I failed, we’d have to exchange the car for an automatic early next morning) So we took a trip to the garage so I could do a ‘driving test’ – to which I passed in 6pm traffic (albeit on Christmas Day) :). So the Volvo S60 it is! After re-parking the car (and I had my fair share of stalling while parking) we walked to a fancy restaurant nearby for dinner – it was definitely a formal dinner, with… exotic utensils that we didn’t know how to use 😛

This butter-knife looking utensil was provided for our main course (so not for bread), does not have a sharp edge, yet had funny curves on one side. We suspect it is used for tearing the tender meat apart (as opposed to cutting it…?)

P.S. No great photos on Day 1, much better on days to come, promise!