Day 10
Day 10. Road Trip!!
We were waffling a bit - should we really have another day trip? Wouldn't we be better off just spending the day in Paris? Actually, I was waffling. Cris still seemed pretty well committed to getting to Rouen. We kept our car reservation intact and thought we would just decide in the morning if we were going. We were supposed to pick up the car at 9am so we were late before we even woke up at 9:30.
We found the rental car place a little before noon. We had purposely picked a site as far outside the city center as we could get it. The metro stop that corresponded with the name of the Avis location turned out to be a bit misleading. We took the train out there and had to walk two entire metro stops closer to town before we finally found the place (dumb 'ol Avis map didn't have the metro stop on it!) So we were a little closer to the traffic and congestion than we originally wanted but we were still outside the circle of doom - the roundabout by the Arch de Triomph!
Our car was cute. It was a bit larger than we were expecting but it worked out fine. It was a stick, which meant Cris had the pleasure of doing all of the driving. The weird key card and push button starter were kinda cool.
We got out town just fine and once I figured out how to read the highway names on the map, we left the main highway and found some smaller roads to take to Giverny. We only got lost a little bit. :D Here are a few of the sites we saw along the way (forgive the less-than-stellar shots from the moving car)
(Tangent: Thank you ![[info]](http://stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
billandjane for having the foresight to give us a map of the entirety of France befor our last trip. It came in VERY handy!)
We found Monet's house pretty easily and visited both the gardens and the house. I was hoping that they would have original works there but pretty much all of his paintings were reproductions. There were originals that were in his collection, though. Having really taken our time through the gardens, we came to the conclusion that rather than try to build our dream house and garden from scratch, we would just move in to Monet's house. Why reinvent the wheel?
Us in the garden:
My favorite flowers were in full bloom
The view up to the house from the gardens
The flora and fauna were out in abundance (do insects count as fauna?)
(This picture finally knocked the one of Johnny Depp and I off my desktop :D )
The infamous footbridge (did you know there are 2?)
See what I mean about just moving in there? It was so lovely. They didn't allow picnics or I would have been happy to sit there and enjoy the surroundings for much longer. But our grumbling stomachs won out and we left the museum to find something to eat. The little hotel right near the museum provided a good lunch and we drove out of town just as it was starting to rain. (no time to visit the American Impressionists Museum - oh well, that is a reason to go back - right?)
It was already four o'clock and we had to turn in the car before seven so we couldn't affort to get quite as lost on the way to Rouen. We didn't take the big toll road but a medium sized road that led us past plenty of pretty scenery. It really did look kind of like Wisconsin - just with more medieval architecture.
When we got to Rouen, we had only a tiny little map of the city from the Lonely Planet book about all of France - finding the train station was a bit of a challenge. Actually, that isn't true. We found the station just fine. Getting to it on all of the winding, narrow, one-way roads was the challenge! We could see the station, we just couldn't get to it! It was 6:00 or so before we actually got there and got the car turned in.
Off to soak in some Joan of Arc and medieval goodness... We found the tower where Joan was imprisoned only a few blocks from the train station:
"And now I know how Joan of Arc felt as the flames rose to her roman nose and her walkman started to melt..." Sorry, just couldn't resist...
It only rained on us a bit - not even enough to justify digging out the umbrellas. Here is the church dedicated to Joan of Arc. You might be able to guess from the garish architecture, that it was completed in 1979. Not particularly attractive in my opinion but it was really cool to stand on the spot where she was burned at the stake. 
Most of the buildings in town had a definite Tudor influence. Those pesky Brits left their mark all over the North of France :D
Of course, the United States has made their contribution as well
A very pretty clock tower
We were done walking around the town (all of the museums and churches were closed so it didnt' take us long to tour the outsides of things). We found a restaurant in our guidebook, a tavern actually, that promised regional specialties. This sounded perfect since we especially wanted to try the infamous Normandy butter. So, now we come the really adventurous part of the day. Before we had left town, Cris checked the train schedule and the last train out was at 10:30. We had plenty of time.
We made our way to the tavern and sat down to look at the menu. It was a charming little place and the proprietess was very friendly and helpful. After we ordered our meals, we decided to look at the train schedule to see what train we thought we would take. As we perused the schedule, I noticed that not all of the trains run every day. This being Thursday, the latest train is not at 10:30. It is at 8:45. My stomach starts to sink as I look at my watch and it is already 7:45. We decide we have to leave the restaurant by 8:15 to make the train - we think we are about a mile away from the station but we aren't sure because our map is not very detailed. So our salads come and we wolf them down so they'll bring the entrees right away. As we sit there waiting, I am getting more and more nervous. Really, if we missed the train, all we would do is try to find a hotel room (and then we can see the light show that is projected onto the cathedral at 10pm!). So not the end of the world, BUT we had a very expensive hotel room back in Paris PLUS Friday was our last day and I didn't want part of the day taken up by travelling from Rouen. We are going to try to make that 8:45 train.
Our entrees do not get to the table until 8:15. Okay, five more minutes but that is IT. We ask for the bill as soon as the food arrives and eat as much as we can in five minutes. It was good but I was so nervous that I really did not enjoy it. We skip dessert entirely, which is too bad because it is made with the famous Normandy apples. We dash out of the tavern and head toward the station. Of course, it is uphill the entire way. And we have backpacks and shopping bags full of stuff. We didn't run (I'm useless with the running) but we walked FAST. I mean, like power walked. I couldn't talk as I was managing my breathing. We got to the station all hot and sweaty and out of breath with 10 minutes to spare! Yeay for us! Except I felt so sick from the speed eating followed by the power walking that I thought I was going to be puke all over the train station - boo! It didnt' really help that the train was an older model on the regular tracks but an express so it went really fast - old train + old tracks + super fast = lots of movement. It took every fiber of my being not to be sick on the ride home. One hour and ten minutes of seriously unpleasant sensation. I sat there picturing the little Living Arts Yoga guy, Rodney Yee, in my head telling me to relax my forehead, let the outer corners of my eyes relax backward, etc. I focused on relaxing and breathing and we made it to Paris without vomit - yeay!
We were so worked up after the adventurous trip that we were nowhere near ready for bed when we got back to the hotel around 10:30. So we went downstairs and walked around the island and St Germain des Pres in order to cool down. My headache and stomach upset had finally subsided so I felt justified in having an ice cream :D (Note: we only ate the Berthillon ice cream the one time. It was okay but I liked the nearby Italian ice place just as well and they were open until midnight!) We finally stumbled into bed around 1am to rest before our last day!
