by Larry
If you have been following our post you’ll remember the day in Holland when I lost our cellphone, broke the camera and got oil/tar all over my running shoes. Well here’s an update.
When we got home there was a message on our answering machine from Kamloops Airport Security…. and guess what, they had our cellphone. I know I had it when I cleared security in Kamloops so it must have fallen out of my day pack somewhere between Kamloops and Vancouver. Mystery #1 solved. Then I took the Digital Camera back to London Drugs and it’s been sent off to Sony for warranty repair; 4 -6 weeks it should be back. Finally the shoes, well they traveled to south of France but after walking absolutely everywhere in my Keen Sandals I didn’t think we needed to pack them any farther, so we left them in Arles. I’m going to get some new hiking shoes when I get a chance. So in the end everything has worked out alright!
by Larry
Sunday morning in Nice we got up early walked to the nearby bus stop and for 4 euro each we caught the local bus to the Nice airport. That is definitely one thing that they really do well in France; local bus transportation is very reasonably priced. Nice is the second largest airport in France, so it was fairly busy for an early Sunday morning. We got there in lots of time so it gave us a chance to look around and there on display was a Formula 1 Grand Prix Race Car (pictures are attached).We flew from Nice direct to Amsterdam on Transvia airlines; one of Europe’s low cost carriers, where the flight was cheap, around 200 euro for both of us, however you pay for everything on board….. even water. It was also our first view of The Alps; even if it was from 30,000 ft. We arrived to a rainy, wet and cool Amsterdam. Once there we finally located our hotel, which we found on line, it was called the CitizenM at Schipool and is a new generation type hotel. It looked to me like they were going after the IPod, IPad, Mc Book, etc. generation. It was self check in (with little assistance), very bright colors, MacPro Desk work area but the coolest were the rooms. Now the hallway looked a little bit like a prison bunker or University Dorm, but the room was Cool and Funky. The room was as wide as the bed at the end which was a little larger than a king size bed. The shower and toilet were on opposite sides of the room and you used sliding curved floor to ceiling glass wall enclosures to close them off. Then the real glitzy thing was the room electronic controller touch pad that you used for all electronic functions in the room. For example you could set the mood for the room with colored lighted ceiling panels above the toilet and the shower, dim the rest of the lights, select television stations, movie channels, adjust the room temperature, set the alarm for the room to wake up, close the venetian blinds, close a the window black out curtain, select from almost any genre of music, etc. Anyway enough about CitizenM. Monday we were up early and headed for the long trip home. Lufthansa to Frankfurt then Toronto and then Air Canada from Toronto to Vancouver. Total time in the air or on planes today was 14 hrs. Delayed over an hour in Toronto for a number of reasons so late into Vancouver, but we finally made it to the hotel. So, that’s about it for our first European Adventure; we have many more stories to tell and a ton more pictures to share.
