Return to Travel……our first few days on the road

Apart from a few trips in British Columbia, the last 2 years have been wasted for us from a travel point of view, as I  imagine has been the same case for many of our readers. After pondering our options we decided on another European road trip, as we love to travel and explore by car.

It has been a busy year, as we sold our home in Madeira Park and purchased another in Sechelt. We only moved about 30 kilometers but now we are a bit less in the “outback”.  Super busy getting the house and grounds sorted out but then, that is our way. As a consequence, the planning for the trip has been a bit haphazard…..not as micro-managed, as in the past.

As the saying goes, “go big or go home”….our game plan is for an 86-day trip: fly to Paris, then Nice…pick up our leased Renault vehicle, ferry over to Corsica…several weeks there, ferry to Livorno, Italy, visit Cinque Terre, Florence, Tuscany, and Umbria and then head south through Rome to Puglia, Calabria and then ferry over to Sicily > several weeks there and then ferry back to Livorno, drive to Nice, fly to Paris and then fly home …..easy peasy !!! ….well let’s see how it goes…hope you guys will follow along with us !!

With BC Ferries from the mainland to The Sunshine Coast being affected by incompetence, pandemic, staff shortages, and aging equipment we decided to go in a day earlier to mitigate the risk of missing our flight. As a bonus, we got to see Ella and the G-kids and had dinner with Ella’s mother-in-law Bev!

Well rested Ella drove us to Vancouver International Airport…

…we gave ourselves 3 hours to check-in thinking this was overkill…..entered the airport >>> wow what a zoo…we didn’t even have time for our customary picture with the Jade Canoe: The Spirit of the Haida Gwaii (which is our travel talisman) ….following a minor meltdown as the check-in robot was not co-operating…we sorted everything out and Air France insisted we hurry on to Security > they were right, a veritable MADHOUSE…in any event, all went well, managed to get a photo with a stand-in for the Jade Canoe…

…then got to the plane and departed on time! It is a direct flight to Paris of 9 hours> which seemed almost short compared to our Asian trips…

We are flying Air France > it sure beats traveling with Air Canada, the overpriced albatross!!: a good meal, great service with flight attendants who smile and have a sense of humor…when collecting the remnants of the meal she commented, “oh monsieur what a nice collection of wine bottles”….btw if ever you travel on a 777 do what it takes and reserve the 2 person seat configuration towards the rear of the plane … so much nicer even though you are flying “peasant class”.

On-time arrival at Charles de Gaulle airport….another zoo at police control, etc., luggage in hand we made our way to the shuttle which whisked us to the Holiday Inn Express at CDG  (yeah a very exotic hotel in France !!!) easy check-in, clean new functional room with a nice view of the Concorde, 2 free beers at the bar and breakfast for Euro 104 >>> by way of comparison the same Holiday Inn would cost over 300 Euros at the Vancouver Airport !! Being old buzzards we were tired and a “nap” turned into 5 hours of sleep >>> hopefully this will set us up for a quick jetlag recovery. Afterward, we shuttled back to the airport (free) > bought an “Orange” Euro SIM card, sorted out an issue with Air France, bought dinner at Marks & Spencer > 13E for a salad, “foot long” baguette sandwich, and a bottle of Bordeaux > modest but ok …try to get that at YVR!

A winner day, as we head off to bed ..tomorrow will be interesting as we will need to hit the ground running!!