Tomorrow Is Another Day...

Garmisch in the Mist

Continuing on my completely out of order recap of summer travels, this installment brings us to one of the most well-known regions of Germany.  Bavaria, the land of lederhosen, cowbells, majestic peaks, and curlicue churches.  Since Colby's leave balance was scraping the barrel, my parents and I traveled without him and battled some pretty miserable wet and chilly weather, despite the fact that it was the middle of July (oh, Deutschland).  But we still managed to get out and see the sights in this beautiful part of the country.

We began our trip with an effort to dodge the raindrops by taking in as much of the indoor sights as possible.  Our first stop was at the Wieskirche in Steingaden.  The breathtakingly rococo church was built between 1745 and 1754 as a pilgrimage site to house the wooden painting, "Scourged Savior" which was said to have wept real tears in 1738.  The church is set in the middle of a rolling green field amidst cattle and wildflowers, and the interior, while certainly not to everyone's taste, is one of the most spectacular displays of architectural frothiness I have ever seen.

Our next stop was at the Schloss Linderhof, another of poor old Mad King Ludwig's palaces of loneliness.  Ludwig's much better known palace is Schloss Neuschwanstein, but unlike that project, Linderhof was completed during Ludwig's lifetime.  The more I learn about Ludwig, the more heartbreaking I find his story.  He is so obviously a man born at the wrong time in the course of history--if only he had been born today, he would undoubtedly be the most fabuloooouuuus monarch of our time.  He had a great passion for art, music, and the French, as well as flamboyant style in spades.  Linderhof was constructed as an homage to Versailles and the Sun King, Louis XIV, and is gold leafed and jewel encrusted within an inch of its life.  

Unfortunately, we couldn't take photos indoors, so I don't have a picture of the most incredible room in the palace, his take on the hall of mirrors.  Standing at just the right spot in the room, you are reflected in an infinite tunnel of gold and glass.  Ludwig ate at a private table that was raised through the floor of the dining room from the kitchen where it was laden with platters, and he would dine completely alone, surrounded by opulence.

On our second day, we stayed a little closer to "home".  We spent the week at the Familotel Leiner, a chain of kinderhotels in Germany.  Included in your stay, you receive up to 30 hours of childcare per week, as well as two evenings if you choose to use them, and all of your meals, which were amazingly delicious.  It is an absolutely brilliant business model, and one I wish we had been able to take advantage of a bit more successfully.  Unfortunately, we were only able to use the childcare once as Annabelle was not so pleased with the option of being left behind and spent a few hours letting everyone in the hotel know it.  But my parents and I were at least able to fit in a child-free visit to the stunning Partnach Gorge, just a fifteen minute walk up the road from the hotel.

That afternoon we took advantage of the sunshine and walked across the street from our hotel to the 1936 Olympic ski jump.  After taking in the views of the jumps and the stadium, we strolled around the beautiful meadows and fields that our hotel was situated beside.  We were particularly surprised to come across a herd of Alpine Alpacas!

The following day, the weather was not so much in our favor, but we were able to squeeze in one outdoor activity before the rains came.  We headed across the border into Austria for a leisurely stroll around the beautiful Plansee, a large lake nestled amongst the mountains in the Tyrol region.  As you can see, Charlotte and Annabelle had two very different reactions to their surroundings!  It was a rather exhausting week for everyone...

I'll take a pause here, but still ahead a world-famous wood carving town, a bejeweled skeleton, the highest peak in Germany, beer brewing monks and a fairy tale castle!

A Week in Provence Part 2

Lest I give the impression that our magical week in Provence was completely without disaster, let me be very clear, when faced with the combined presence of Brittany and I, there is absolutely no experience safe from the potential of absolute calamity.  In our short six days alone together we: held up a toll booth because none of my credit cards would work in the machine, smashed my phone to smithereens though a freak GPS incident, lost a parking garage ticket in the pay machine which vanished into oblivion as even the parking attendant was unable to locate it after dismantling almost the entire contraption, scraped the paint off of the side doors to our car which had thus far managed to survive ten years of existence without experiencing such misfortune, and missed the same exact tunnel exit no fewer than three times resulting in a battle to the near death with the black, rotten core of Marseille's rush hour traffic.  I just want you to remember that when you're looking at all of my carefully framed vacation snaps--there is always more to a story than meets the eye!

That said, all was certainly not as fraught as those moments, and the fact that we managed to make it out the door each morning clothed and fed meant that every day began with a minor miracle.  After our whirlwind tour of Marseille, and our trip back in time to the height of the Roman empire, we spent our next day in Avignon, most notable as home to seven popes and two delightfully dubbed "anti-popes" of the Avignon Papcy from 1305 to 1403.  While not our favorite stop in Provence, we did enjoy the East Villagy vibed Rue de Teintures, home to a number of organic, vegetarian, gluten-free eateries, artists galleries and the tie-dyed filled windows of tiny boutiques.  The massive chocolate chip cookie did not fail to raise Avignon in my estimation.

The next day, we donned our finest artist's smocks, and headed to Arles for a tête-à-tête... à-tête... with the ignoble, misunderstood Vincent Van Gogh.  Arles was the setting for perhaps Van Gogh's most prolific artistic period, (those sunflowers!) and was also, unfortunately the site of the mental breakdown which led to his eventual death in a hospital just a few miles away.  His artistic inspirations have been marked by a delightful "easel tour" which winds throughout the city.  Each easel shows the piece that Van Gogh was inspired to paint from its vantage point, undoubtedly the most famous being his Cafe Terrace at Night--now a garishly yellow tourist trap.

But, not to be outdone by that hapless artiste, the Romans once again stand seemingly impervious to the ravages of time.  A recently restored, glaringly white amphitheater rests majestically on a hill in the center of town, and a somewhat less intact Roman theater nearby still plays host to musical acts and performers.  While dismissed by many as grubby and workaday, we were charmed by Arles and counted it among our favorite stops.

For our final day in Provence, we crammed in as much of the hill villages as possible.  We started our day in the red-ochre hilltop village of Roussillon, arriving just in time to catch the end of its market before lunch.  The terracotta colored buildings reminded us of nothing so much as the American Southwest--feeling at some points as though we had been suddenly transported to New Mexico.

From Roussillon, we made our way to Lacoste with a brief stop at one last Roman ruin located just off the highway, Pont Julien.  This graceful bridge dates to 3 BC and unbelievably was used for car traffic until 2005.  Those Romans, man, they knew what they were doing.  In Roman days, this bridge was a part of the Via Domitia, a highly traveled road which served to connect Italy with its territories in France.

Our final stop on our journey was in Lacoste, where mysteriously, there was not an alligator or polo shirt to be found.  Instead, we discovered a near ghost town of winding alleys, grey stone buildings, the Marquis de Sade's crumbling castle, and of course a charming cafe just begging to be Instagrammed.  And so ended our unforgettable holiday in Southern France just as a it should--avec café et une belle vue!

A Week in Provence Part 1

Here in Germany, we are already leaving summer in our rearview mirror.  Temperatures are beginning to drop, days are becoming noticeably shorter, the commissary is consistently out of canned pumpkin--fall is truly upon us!  So, it seems only right to talk about what I did on my summer vacations!  It was perhaps the busiest summer of my life.  From the south of France, to the Alps in Germany, from the Baltic coast to the Dalmation, I managed to hit twelve countries in a little less than three months.  Then I came home and was immediately struck down with the absolute worst cold I have ever experienced.  Two weeks straight of voicelessness, hacking coughs, an excruciatingly sore throat and fevers.  But now, at long last, the time has come to recap my summer sojourns--before I forget everything completely!

Choosing completely at random, I'll start with my sisters' trip to Provence at the beginning of August.  My sis and I ditched Colby and absconded with the girls for an exotic, ruins-filled trip to the Mediterranean coast.  We stayed in a beautiful apartment in Marseille for the week, using it as a base to explore the city and the surrounding areas.  Having already experienced the French Riviera for a week last summer, we zeroed in on western Provence, and I must say, I found it far more interesting and worthwhile than the Cote d'Azur.  (Though the infinity pool and views of the cerulean Med from our vacation home last year are essentially unbeatable for relaxation purposes.)

Marseille has gotten itself a pretty negative reputation in the vacationing world, but both my sister and I fell in love with it.  While it is certainly quite different from the surrounding quaintness that is the calling card of most Provencal villages, we loved the hum of electricity that buzzed through the town, the exotic, enthralling miasma of Turkish, African, Mediterranean and European culture.  On our first day we visited the Arab market, a Tunisian bakery, the waterfront, La Charité Museum, the Cathédrale de la Nouvelle Major, and took in the view of the majestic Notre Dame de la Garde, perched on the highest point in Marseille.

We also had a bit of an adventure when a not so slick pickpocket strolled casually by us while we were consulting a map and attempted to palm my sister's cell phone.  Eagle eyed, bold as brass Brittany spotted the move instantly and tore off after the guy, grabbing his wrist and wresting the phone back from him with a snarl as I shouted "Nice try!" from the safety of 10 feet back!  Hoo boy, it is always something when you're traveling!

The next day, we headed out into the countryside to visit the Pont du Gard, a 2000 year old Roman aqueduct.  The entire aqueduct was once 31 miles long, and ran largely underground, but this bridge is the only portion remaining today, preserved after the fall of the Roman Empire largely due to its purpose as a toll bridge and now as a UNESCO Heritage site.  Incredibly, this bridge still stands without mortar, and up until the year 2000, traffic still flowed across it.  Now, traffic has been diverted,  there are gorgeous visitor's centers, a lovely beach area and it is among France's most visited tourist attractions.

We continued our tour of Roman history with a stop in Orange to visit the Théâtre antique d'Orange, one of the best preserved Roman theaters still in existence.  It was built early in the 1st century AD and functioned through 391 AD when it was abandoned due to an edict from the Christian church.  It went on to become a defensive structure during the Middle Ages, a refuge for townspeople during the religious wars of the 16th century, and now functions once again as a theater and major tourist draw.  Before entering the theater, we hid out from some bad weather in a charming cafe, then when the coast was clear, entered the theater just in time to catch an orchestra practicing for a performance taking place later that night.  History and a show--what could be better!

Ahead of us was still a visit with the former Palace of the Popes, communing with Vincent Van Gogh and a surreal visit to the red rock, Southwesternish village that we dubbed "New Franxico", but I'll save that for my next installment of the travel journal!  À bientôt