Thoughts on Europe

Driving in London
I’m not ashamed to say, I hope I NEVER have to drive in London again. It’s not just the driving on the wrong side. I’ve done that a couple of times before, in the Virgin Islands and in the Bahamas. But driving with the steering wheel on the opposite side really threw me off. I had trouble gauging how close I was to cars on my left, and on top of that the lanes in London were much narrower than what I’m used to. The car we had was relatively small, so I’m sure I had more than enough room at any time, but I couldn’t get my mind to believe it. Driving on the motorways in England was fine. In fact, driving in Europe (we also had a car in France for a few days) was so pleasant I could hardly stand it. All drivers followed the main rule of the road: STAY RIGHT EXCEPT TO PASS! (In England it was stay left except to pass, but the theory is still the same.) There wasn’t anyone just driving along in the passing lanes, as is so common here in the USA. And when folks went to pass in the passing lane they passed quickly and then got right back over into the other lane. Traffic flowed so smoothly it was almost like heaven.


Checking in to hotels
Our hotel stays in France and Belgium had some quirks to them I wasn’t used to. First, check-in was strange. In Paris we showed up, I said I had a reservation and gave them my name. As I always do in the States I put my credit card on the counter, since a) they always need help spelling our name, and b) they have to swipe it anyway. However, in Paris they simply pulled out a sheet of paper, looked at it, gave us the key and said it’s on the 5th floor. Never had us confirm the rate, never took a credit card swipe (I guess they already had one from reserving the room, but that was months ago), never even had me sign anything. The same thing happened at our other places in France and Belgium.

The other quirk is the hotel key situation. In Paris the key was a slide card with holes in it, but it had a note on it asking us to leave it at the front desk when we left. I personally hate doing that, for 2 reasons: 1) How do they confirm who you are when you come back in? Just ask for a name? Do you have to show id? Anyone could get the key, it seems. And 2) what if we are just running out real quick for a bite? Or, we think we’re leaving for a while, we drop off our key, we forget a map, have to go back, get the key, go into the room, then drop off the key again. Just seems silly.

In Bruges the key was like a normal house key, but it was on a huge brass key chain. I saw other people would come and go and just hang it up/grab their key off the rack right next to the front desk! Again, anyone could come in and grab the key, it seems. I think in Bruges they didn’t care if you kept the key or not, but left it as an option if you didn’t want to carry the huge keychain with you. I guess it’s just an old-fashioned way of handling the keys, but it doesn’t seem logical to me.

The French and their dogs
In Paris, and even in Normandy, it seems that a larger % of folks in France own dogs than in the US. Especially in Paris it seemed that almost every other local was walking a dog around the city. However, it seemed to me that practically every French person walking their dog couldn’t stand the thing. Not one of them seemed happy about the dog, even going so far as dragging them along by their collar on their leashes, yelling at them, and of course NEVER picking up their dog’s droppings. They say to be careful where you walk on the streets of Paris, and it has nothing to do with muggers or pickpockets. Instead the streets are just full of dog waste everywhere you turn. I guess the French consider themselves above picking up animal excrement – well let me tell you something, Frenchy: You’re not better than your dogs; you’re simply lazy. France is a great country – but the French don’t deserve it.

Time to eat! Or is it?
One of my biggest annoyances in France was having to schedule dinner around the restaurant’s schedule. For the most part, in Paris, this wasn’t a problem as the city is so big, there’s always something open to eat. But when we were at Mont St. Michel, a village with only about 10 restaurants, every one of them shut down between lunch and dinner, basically putting an embargo on food between 3:00 pm and 7:00 pm. I understand the whole, “traveling to a foreign country is about learning and living with other people’s cultures and customs”, and I’m cool with it. I just have a problem with the lack of a choice. We couldn’t eat an early dinner if we wanted to at Mont St. Michel because there wasn’t a choice. I would think that at least one place would realize, “hey, maybe some of the tourists might like to sit down before 6 for a bite, so I’ll stay open.” To me it comes down to 2 questions: Are the restaurants not open because people don’t eat before 7? Or do people not eat before 7 because the restaurants aren’t open? I think it’s the latter.

Another complaint about French restaurants is the service. Again, I know that in France, as in most European countries, dinner is not about turning the tables over as fast as possible, and that’s fine. And for the most part our waiter service was not only competent, but also polite and responsive to our questions and requests for the bill, etc. But in Honfleur we had a horrible waiter. The restaurant was almost completely empty – there were only 3 tables of diners, and 2 waiters to handle the load. Our waiter, after delivering our food, made himself scarce for a good 30 minutes after. Therefore there was no way to request more drinks if we needed them, ask for the bill, etc. We had to ask the other waiter if he could get our bill for us. He said sure, and we saw him speak to our waiter. Another 10 minutes went by before our waiter dropped off our bill. He went away before I could throw down a credit card, and we waited another 15 minutes for him to come back to pick it up! You’d think, if I asked for the bill that I might want to pay it! I finally got up and walked around the restaurant to find him. He was sitting at the bar, smoking a cigarette and chatting away. I had to hand him my check, then follow him to make sure he would run my card right away so we could get out of there. No offense, but I don’t need to sit around a smoky restaurant for an hour after eating just to chit chat. I can do that anywhere, my friend. Like I said, I have no problem to let someone dawdle over their meal if that’s what they want to do, but at least look in on them once in a while to see if they need anything!

No Train information!
Before leaving from the States we knew that we’d be taking a train from Lille to Bruges. I wanted to find out how much it would cost us, so I found the Belgian National Railway site, which was very helpful. It not only had prices but also had a complete list of timetables as well as all the stops and transfer information we would need. So I knew before we even got to the Lille train station that trains to Bruges left every hour or so, and that we needed to change halfway through to get the train to Bruges. But if I hadn’t done this due diligence I have no doubt we would have gotten completely lost. In Lille I went to the ticket counter and bought 2, 1-way tickets to Bruges. The woman simply took my money, printed out two tickets and handed them to me. I did ask, “When does the next train leave?”, and she said 14:08, but that was all the info I got. So I leave the counter and look at the tickets. They simply say, “Lille to Bruges”. No times (which makes sense, since we could get on any train), but also they didn’t say if we had to change or not, or what train we should get on. There were 2 trains leaving Lille at 14:08; 1 for Anvers and 1 for Leige. I went to the information booth (closed, since it was Sunday) and picked up a train pamphlet. On it they showed all the trains that left from Lille with all the stations they stopped at. However, Bruges wasn’t listed anywhere. However it did say that Anvers is the same as Antwerp, and by looking at the train info I had printed out before living home I knew that we were supposed to get on a train headed for Antwerp and change at Kortrijk. Without anyone to ask (there wasn’t even a conductor on the platform that the Antwerp train left from), we got on the train we thought was right and hoped for the best. After a few stops a conductor did come around looking for tickets. I thought when he saw our tickets, labeled Bruges, that he would certainly tell us if a) we were on the wrong train, or b) if we were on the right train where we were supposed to change. All he did, though, was punch our tickets and go to move on down the car. I stopped him and asked if we had to change to go to Bruges. “Yes”, he said, “change at Kortrijk.” So at least the info I had printed out was correct, but also it was a savior. We stopped at Kortrijk, change to the train headed for Ostende (again, we only knew this because it was on the info I printed off of the website), and we ended up in Bruges on time. I’m guessing that most people who travel in Europe on the train already know where they change, what direction they need to head, etc. But I can’t believe that there is nowhere to find this information either on your ticket or at the train station. I would think at least your train ticket would say, “Depart: train for Anvers; Change: at Kortrijk; Depart: train for Ostende.” But this would make too much sense, and thus is not for European minds.

Life list revisited
One of the great things about our trip is that I got to cross 2 things off my life list. I got to see Arsenal play at Highbury, and I visited the D-Day beaches at Normandy. I had very high expectations for both, and I have to say, both completely lived up to those expectations. Seeing an English Football game, in one of the most classic stadiums was just incredible. The street atmosphere outside the stadium (where the line for the chip shop on the corner was well worth it), spontaneous singing of songs, and the quality of the play just turned it into a perfect day. The beaches at Normandy were also incredible to see, but for vastly different reasons. I wouldn’t call myself a WWII buff by any means, but after seeing Saving Private Ryan and Band of Brothers numerous times I wanted to see the scope of what was accomplished in beating back the Nazis in person. It was powerful and moving.

Doug’s top 10 things I did in Europe:
10. Watching Arsenal in a Brussels pub beat Italian champ Juventus
9. Seeing millions of bones in the Paris Catacombs
8. Climbing the Notre Dame towers
7. Dinner at Le Comptoir du 7 in Paris
6. The Abbey of Mont St. Michel
5. Eating frites in Bruges
4. Walking the streets of Mont St. Michel
3. Walking along Omaha Beach in Normandy
2. Seeing the gorillas at Port Lympne Animal Park
1. Going to an Arsenal game at Highbury