Whale of a Story - The Untold and the Final Chapter

Yes, we have fabulous memories of Europe and this is my final post in my “OMG Europe!!!!” blog, for which some people might be grateful.  After all, it is a labor of love to read through someone else’s vacation diary and to sit through all the photos of someone else’s life.  I do appreciate your attention and I know that your patience is limited.  The real beauty of blogs is that the writers never know if people really read the post or not, unlike if you were to sit in someone’s living room and appear to be interested in their old, boring, falling apart photo album.  A discerning eye might notice that you were really not paying attention to page after page of pictures of whales breaching in the Atlantic Ocean.   But luckily, we now have the internet and we don’t have to actually pick up a book of photos or an actual novel with our hands, showing our hand, with an obvious intention to read it or not.  We can sneakily log on to the computer and sneakily pull up someone’s blog and sneakily hit the backspace out of the blog and comfortably go back to reading about what’s trending on our Yahoo home page, keeping our hands and our boredom to ourselves. Hooray for that progress?

So I, as a budding writer, have to resort to tricks to keep a reader interested and since I can’t see you rolling your eyes right now, I’m assuming that you are buying into my devious little plan.  I know you.  I know you like FREE.  I know you like a good bargain and a good story and the truth about what was really between the lines of all of the great, fabulous, wonderful, amazing, stupendous blah blah memoirs in our trip to Europe.

Aw…I’ve gotcha now.

Remember playing “truth or dare” as a teenager?  That is one dangerous game.  I’ve always leaned toward the truth, not having a lot of faith in the decency of dares.  I didn’t say that I always TOLD the truth, I said I “leaned toward the truth”.  When you realize that you are a “sexual minority” as a teenager, you can become quite scared – even the title “sexual minority” had a scary connotation that didn’t make me want to tell the truth in every situation.  So I leaned toward honesty but kept my options open so I could bail and keep myself safe at any given moment……  Still doin’ it.  Yup.  But I do like to snuggle up to the truth whenever possible and show my hand and my humanity.

Europe was not totally one big happy merry go round, we fell off and the music stopped a few times.  One time was in Amsterdam in the afternoon on a cobblestone street as we were rushing to meet up with Eli and Lisa.  Jolynn fell and hit the uneven rocks, scraping up her hand and bruising her knee.  I had over packed my suitcase and had prepared for this kind of thing by bringing a ton of antibiotic gel to keep us safe from infection.  But, alas, I didn’t have it with me that afternoon when she hit the ground. Luckily, all she had was a very bad bruise and she jumped back up, brushed herself off with a hurt little face and jumped back onto the merry go round.

That same day, Jolynn was carrying my purse – yes, she was carrying my purse – you read that correctly, with my cell phone in it.  In a restaurant bathroom, she accidently let the cell phone fall out of the purse and onto the floor of the bathroom.  Two hours later we discovered that it was missing and instant panic set in – banking information, passwords, trip booking information had all been scanned into my unlocked email that would be accessible on my phone.  There’s nothing like panic to jolt one out of jetlag.  The Hyatt in Amsterdam was so helpful – they made several calls for us as we tried to retrace our steps that afternoon.  Amazingly, the cell phone had been found in the bathroom and was honestly turned into a responsible employee! Eli graciously agreed to run back to get the phone and valuable lessons were learned:  Lock up my email access, carry my phone in my pocket and relieve Jolynn from any responsibility whatsoever of carrying or holding my purse.

The next morning in this 5 star Amsterdam hotel, I was heating up my curling iron on the bathroom counter when I smelled smoke.  Seconds later, my curling iron burst into flames and both Jolynn and I burned our fingers trying to put out the fire before the Amsterdam fire department could be summoned to room 321 where the miserable redhead was trying to curl her red hair.  Note to self – American curling irons don’t work in Holland outlets.  Second note to self, do not reach out and touch a burning curling iron with your bare hands.

Then there was the constant struggling with our luggage on the trains.  We both packed too many clothes and on top of that, neither of us had the right clothes for the unseasonably warm Europe weather…so we were carrying around our American winter wardrobes, for four weeks, for the exercise, for the hellovit and to keep us humble.  It worked.  We were quite humbled by the end of the trip.

Oh and then there was Paris, the City of Love.  We were having our dinner and wine on the train to Paris as we discussed in detail our plans for our arrival in the Paris train station.  Several months earlier, I had figured out that the transportation from the train station to our downtown hotel would be challenging on the Paris subways with luggage….…there’s that luggage issue again.  So Jolynn and I calmly (thank you Pinot Noir) discussed the plan of splurging and getting a cab from the train station to the Hyatt.  Inside the station after we arrived, Jolynn went to the information desk to inquire in English to the French speaking clerk about where to get a cab while I stood with our bags against a wall watching the constant onslaught of travelers racing by.  When Jo came back to me, she had a piece of paper that looked distinctly like a subway map.  She had decided that we would take the subway instead of getting a cab. She had made the executive decision to change the plan.  Hmmmmmmm. Before I knew it, we were clunking our suitcases down the rugged concrete steps in the subway hall and heading toward the screeching sound of subway trains.   We stood on the platform for only a minute before a train came.  The only signs in English read “Beware of Pickpockets” – so comforting for two tired women with a ton of luggage who don’t speak French in a dingy, gray Paris subway station.  We weren’t entirely sure that this train was the right one so we didn’t dash into it and the doors closed. But then, Jo rethought the situation of being left on the platform with the surrounding characters staring at us and she pried open the subway doors and we squeezed onto the train with our bags, barely being able to hold onto a pole as the train sped away. 

We rode in silence for 4 subway stops (felt like an eternity) and then got off at the Opera stop, where we clearly had gotten off of the merry go round and the music had clearly stopped.  No signs in English about which way to go so we headed up one lonely set of steps and it just didn’t feel right.  So we turned around and clunked our bags back down and headed in another direction.  I could see that Jo’s face was showing concern as we walked into a hallway that was getting more narrow and desolate by the second and I was, well, livid.  We climbed another set of steps and found ourselves in front of the Opera House with six or seven streets branching off away from the Opera House.  The French don’t put up nicely lettered green and white signs to identify streets – they put little tiny signs on the buildings on the corners of streets and neither of us had our binoculars.  So we walked around the Opera House a couple of times, arguing about which way was the right way to get to the hotel.  It was getting dark, we were tired and lost and we had nonrefundable dinner reservations on a cruise in just a short time and we couldn’t find our hotel and this redhead became very, very miserable in the City of Love!  Suddenly, we came upon the correct avenue, thanks to Jo, and we completed the short walk to probably one of the most luxurious, expensively renowned hotels that we will ever stay in – here’s the link so you can see for yourself (and remember, it was free because of the Hyatt credit card).  It’s hard to remain miserable in such elegance.  We dressed up in our black evening attire and had probably the most memorable evening of our lives on the dinner cruise with piano and violin and the sparkling Eiffel Tower that night.  Ah, the City of Love and Forgiveness.

http://paris.vendome.hyatt.com/en/hotel/home.html

After the big entrance into Paris, celebrating our 13 years together, all of the other incidentals seemed incidental.  I fell on the limestone bathroom floor and severely bruised my arm but I didn’t break my hip again.  We took the wrong train to Montreux Switzerland but resolved it, thanks to a sweet little French family with two adorable children.  We nearly didn’t get off the train at the correct stop but then rushed down the isle at the last minute calling for them to hold the door open.  A man in a coffee shop in Amsterdam was randomly rude to me and wouldn’t let me sit on the chairs in front of the store, waving his arm and saying “go away!”.  (ok, whatever) A driver on the Big Bus Tours in Paris took several unscheduled stops and nearly caused us to miss our nonrefundable sunset tour of the Eiffel Tower, which resulted in us having to eat hot dogs, yes I said hot dogs, while running down the sidewalk to meet our tour guide.  And then there was the young French man who tried to get Jolynn to open her wallet by handing her a “gold ring” that he had “just found” and so generously wanted to give to her (a scam which we found out later is the ruse that preceeds the thief grabbing the wallet and running).   So, those little stories coupled with the blog posts that I wrote earlier, should complete the big, REAL picture of our trip to Europe. 

One last breaching whale picture – proverbially speaking.  Montreux, Switzerland was our last stop in Europe before we headed back to Amsterdam to fly home.  I can’t really tell you anything about the city of Montreux except that the city is well known for jazz and jazz festivals that bring in the big names.  We walked two short blocks from the train station to our hotel on a Saturday evening and checked into, seriously, one of the most magnificent hotels I’ve ever seen……Le Montreux Palace.  (see the link – it’s AHmazing!) http://www.fairmont.com/montreux/

I can’t tell you about the city because for two days, we didn’t leave the hotel. The front desk upgraded us to a suite on the top floor that overlooked Lake Geneva and the Swiss Alps!  The weather was warm enough to swim in the outdoor pool – so we did.  And then there was the indoor pool and the private women’s quarters where there was a hot whirlpool, an ice whirlpool, a steam shower room, a sauna, soft bathrobes and huge towels and complimentary cosmetic products….hey, this stuff makes me happy!  We laid on the lounge chairs around the pool in the Switzerland sun and chatted about our fabulous memories until the sun started to go down.  We had dinner in the hotel’s Montreux Jazz Café where Stevie Wonder had recently dined and shared a fabulously memorable dessert while the wait staff did everything possible to make us happy and comfortable.  We had a breakfast buffet at a table that overlooked Lake Geneva with unbelievable fresh, delicious food in the hotel’s elegant restaurant with pillars, arches and amazing artwork.  It was Magnificant Montreux!  And, yup, it was FREE.

Again I have to bow to La Credit Card.  When you get the Fairmont credit card (see link above and go to the bottom of the Fairmont home page to see the information about this deal), you also get breakfast and dinner coupons to use in their hotel.  I’m just sayin’……  These deals are out there waiting for you to take advantage.  I know you can do it.  (Let me know if you need help.)

I’m going to post some of our pictures of La Montreux Palace in Switzerland with the Swiss Alps and Lake Geneva.  This concludes my personal essays about our trip to Europe on this blog.  Now stop bothering me, I have a book to write. 

I will say, however, that we are forever changed and enriched by the people and the places we visited in Europe.   We are extremely grateful to Trish and Rafa for loving all of our sweet animals and our homestead and for taking such good care of every single thing while we were away and also to Ken for taking care of some important banking for us and to Mary for checking our voicemail. We appreciate your support and love!!  And we are extremely grateful to the people who took care of us while we were in Europe, Eli and Lisa, MJ and Ginny, Jacques and Marie and amazing hotel staff in Amsterdam, Paris and Montreux!!  We are so tremendously fortunate to have all of you in our lives and to have had the good fortune to experience Europe, a memory that rests contently and passionately deep in our hearts.  OMG Europe!!!!

The End.  (not really)








Copyright ©2012   Jeannine Cristina    All Rights Reserved