Paris to Chambery

Most of the clothes were dry, but not all, so Barbara worked on ironing them to speed along the process. We worked on final packing and on cleaning up the apartment. The person from the management company came, and we hauled our bags down the stairs since the elevator was not working. Instead of taking the metro, we walked to Place d’Italie, which wasnÕt too bad except for one hill.

I thought the rental car was going to be more difficult than it was, but it went smoothly. Barbara drove us out of the city, past the street market crowding. There was no backup in traffic, but big highway tolls as we went. The service areas were generally nice, with playgrounds galore, including a mushroom themed one. We had some fries and a sandwich for lunch at one service area, too.

Along the way, we started to see lots of fields of wheat and corn, and then sunflowers. As the sun dropped, the flowers were a wonderfully brilliant yellow. We stopped in Vezelay, a hilltown famous for its basilica. There, Barbara bought a bottle of Laurent’s family’s wine.

We headed on east towards Geneva, but stayed in Chambery. We spent some time searching for a place to stay and finally found a small hotel with rooms available. After getting two rooms at a nice place, we went back into town and had some dinner, Back at the hotel, Chloe and I took one room; Barbara and Camille took the other. We cleaned up and went to bed as it was about midnight already.