Chateau de Versailles - We are angry!

Well, we continue our vacation in France, today we went to the palace of Versailles. Our expectations were very high (not a good thing to do) and we were disapointed.

Versailles is a very beautiful place but the administration of that place does not have a clue about what it means to provide custumers an unforgettable experience.

First, we faced the waiting lines. You have to wait in line to buy the ticket, once you have the ticket, then you go to a different place to wait in another line to enter the place, then you wait in another line to get the audioguides........ And only then you can finally begin the tour. Why can not one get the ticket, enter the place and get the audioguide at the same place??????, this will reduce the waiting time of all customers.

Once we were in we were heavily disturbed by some pieces of contemporary art from Jeff Koons, what a distateful presentation. Can you imagine one of the rooms of the palace of Versailles, full of XVII art and in the middle of the room a Hoover vacuum cleaner displayed as the main attraction of the room???

One thing I can recommend, should you decide to go to Versailles, enjoy the garden and save the 16 euros of the ticket for a coffee after you are done wandering around in the garden. Do not waste your time in Versailles, at least until they get rid of those horrible pieces of art.

Cross Country trip: recap & stats

Total miles driven: 3,071 miles - soit 4942 kilometres

Total hours driven: 46 heures et 54 minutes

Crossing 8 states - la preuve en image:

Idaho:
Utah:

Wyoming:

Colorado:
Kansas:

Kentucky:

Tennessee:
North Carolina:

Traveling cross country from Portland OR to Charlotte NC - Day 7 and Last day - October 25th 2008

Do you know this feeling, where you will accelerate your pace knowing that you are getting closer and closer from home?
Well, our last day of drive from Nashville to Charlotte, NC was very exciting. Finally, we are reaching our destination. Not only this is the final destination, but this is as well the beginning of our new life in another state! We are closing one chapter and opening a new one at the same time.

We drove 428 miles in 6 hours and 9 minutes. "We" was actually Ivan, he made the whole drive this time. What an accomplishment! I was just shooting pictures of the welcome state signs...I am starting a new collect!




Temperatures are rising, sun accompanied us during the drive, what a great way to arrive to our new home!

Traveling cross country from Portland OR to Charlotte NC - Day 6 - October 24th 2008

On the road again...We are heading to Nashville TN on our 6th day of this road trip.

We drove 549 miles, in 7 hours and 43 mn, and we went through 4 different states: Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky and Tennessee.

The Saint Louis famous Arch:


Our navigation tools:


Crossing the Ohio river:


After 6 days of driving, we are glad to arrive in Nashville. We are starting to get more and more claustrophobic inside the car and need some fresh air.

The weather in Nashville is much better than in Kansas, we can see that we are going south.



However, the hostel I picked was overpriced and very loud during the night, so it was a little bit of disappointment. It was the only one so far that didn't meet our expectations, which is a great average knowing that we booked everything online.

The unwelcoming hostel, the urge of arriving home, made us switched our plans and we decided to drive on Saturday to Charlotte, instead of staying one extra day in Nashville.

Traveling cross country from Portland OR to Charlotte NC - Day 5 - October 23th 2008

This was a traveling day, in which we had all the known weather conditions:
sun, wind, snow and rain.....

Well we had snow almost 60% of the time.

We covered 635 miles in 8 hours 34 minutes until we got to our destination for the day: Independence MO, Hometown of Harry Truman.

We stayed at a Bed and Breakfast called Serendipity. This is a nice old and big house that has a lot of "stuff", antiques mostly.

Tomorrow we are up to 550 miles of driving to Nashville TN.

Traveling cross country from Portland OR to Charlotte NC - Day 4 - October 22th 2008

Our first day of real vacation during this trip! Finally, one day where we don't have to go anywhere...just chill out and enjoy the day quietly.

After a simple but yummy breakfast at the Foot of the Mountain Motel, we decided to go first to the laundromat, and to get rid of this chore. Luckily, the laundry had wifi and a coffee shop next door, so we were able to work online and enjoy our green teas while waiting for the laundry to be done.


Then, after picking up our lunch (sandwiches at Wild Oats-Whole Foods - who knows they were the same company?), we took our car and headed to the Rocky Mountain.

Even though the main road was closed due to the climate (the main road is always closed from mid-October to June), we were able to drive few miles inside the National Park, we enjoyed the wonderful scenery during the drive up, and we watched some wild wild life under the snow.

Our last stop for the day was at the Sink, boulder's famous spot for its burgers and its graffiti art all over the walls.


Then, back to our motel for a good night sleep. Next day was going to be a long one: more than 8 hours drive to Independent, Missouri (closed to Kansas City)

Traveling cross country from Portland OR to Charlotte NC - Day 3 - October 21th 2008

After having a wonderful breakfast at the Parrish Place (cereal, muffins, fresh fruit, yogurt, orange juice), we took off for our next destination: Boulder, Colorado.
We crossed three states (Utah, Wyoming, Colorado) and drove 7 hours and 35 minutes to cover 523 miles. The drive was pretty dull: Wyoming is quite monotone and even the freeway remains surprise less: straight ahead for miles and miles.
I drove 5 hours, and Ivan did the rest.



When we approached Boulder, the scenery changed a lot and wonderful mountains, the Rocky Mountains were ahead of us. Boulder is located about 1 hour from the Rocky mountains, and therefore, the feeling of being in a small town in the middle of the mountains is a great one! Very refreshing.



Boulder is a very popular tourist destination, in summer and winter. Right now, it is quieter - not many tourists in view - however, students are everywhere, there is a beautiful campus within the city walls. As well, parks, trees, small streets makes the city a perfect location to stay few days to relax and enjoy the mountain air and view.



Luckily, we picked Boulder to stay until Thursday morning, yippee!! :)

Our motel, the Foot Of the Mountain Motel, is ideally located and is made of small wood cabins, rustic but very clean and so cute. We feel like being in chalets. Very nice.



More on the Rocky Mountains tomorrow...

Traveling cross country from Portland OR to Charlotte NC - Day 2 - October 20th 2008

The day did not start so good, Laure had to call Hugo (this is an expression that we use in Colombia, when somebody is vomiting).

She could not have breakfast and was not feeling at all very good, however we started driving again hoping that she was going to feel better as the day progressed. (Actually hoping that she would not vomit inside the car)

The drive to Salt Lake City was 6 hours and 33 min and we covered 469 miles.

The weather in Salt Lake City was great, the city was very nice (at least the neighborhood that we saw, "sugar house neighborhood") and the place where we stayed was excellent.


We spent the night at Parrish Place, a bed and breakfast house that we recommend to all the people planning to go to SLC.

In SLC we had to go and look for some medicine or cream or something that would help the mosquito bites I got in the Grand Canyon. Each and every bite I got from the mosquitos were itching like crazy and they were getting bigger and bigger.

We were lucky finding a Whole Foods, where I could buy homeopathic cream and medicine to calm down the itching.

The rest of the day was spent eating (sushi) and sleeping.

Traveling cross country from Portland OR to Charlotte NC - Day 1 - October 19th 2008

After finishing our hike through the Grand Canyon, we took a plane at 7:15am from Phoenix to Portland. There we were welcomed by the lovely Shery.
In Portland we finished to pack the few things that we had at home and at around 1pm we started our drive to our first destination: Baker City OR.

We spent the night at a very nice hotel: the Geiser Grand Hotel. We were very tired, Laure had a upset stomach and my knee and right calf were hurting so we went to sleep as soon as we could.




Our next day's destination: Salt Lake City, Utah.

Grand Canyon from Rim to Rim in one day. Oct 17th - 18th

What a nice trip we had.
Laure and I met in Phoenix AZ, she was coming from Portland OR and I was coming from Charlotte NC. Everything worked as planned and the excitement of the trip started to get bigger and bigger as we were able to meet some of the 107 people that were going to be hiking the Grand Canyon with us.
Friday Oct 17th
This was basically a traveling day. We met all the hikers at the Palm Croft Baptist Church, where we took 2 buses that would take us from Phoenix to Kanab in UT.
In Kanab we had dinner with all the hikers and our guide, Scott, gave us all the instructions for the next day.

Something very amazing was that from all the 107 hikers, 50 were going to adventure in this trail for the very first time!
Saturday Oct 18th
The challenge has arrived. We woke up 4 am, since we had to go from Kanab to The North Rim of the Grand Canyon, which is like 90 minutes from Kanab.
We started our "Grand" hike at 6:46 am. Our goal at that point was to make it to the other side the canyon by 5:30 pm. The weather was perfect and we were feeling full of energy. The scenery was magnificent, different colors, shades, trees and stones colored the trail.

Our first major accomplishment was to get to Phantom Ranch by 11 am. This first portion of the trail is a moderate hike that does not test your strength, since you are going the whole way downhill until you reach the bottom of the canyon, however your knees and feet get all the work. (You better tape your feet before you start this portion of the trail, otherwise you can be almost certain to get blisters.

Up to this point we had covered already 14 miles. For the 2nd part of the trail we decided to take the longest one, but the one with more shade and water. From this point forward we were facing a 10 mile trail that goes upwards from the Colorado River to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon.
Our energy levels at this point, we were feeling great and the weather was just perfect, we were also glad that we were using different muscles since we were now going up.
We just kicked ass for 6 miles. At this point (in Indian Garden) we made a pit stop. This stop proved to be a not very good thing for me, since my muscles got cold and immediately after retuning the hike I started to feel a small cramp on my left hamstring and my right calf that impeded me to keep the same pace we had until then.
Laure continued to kick ass and should I have maintained the pace we had, we would had finish the trail a lot sooner.
At 4:02 we finally reach the top of the Rim, we finalized our 38 Km or 24 miles hike with at time of 8 hours 40 minutes.




After that we chill out with some of the other hikers and wait until everybody was finished, then we took the bus back to Phoenix where we arrived at 12:30 am. This allowed us to have 4 hours of sleep before we embarked in our new adventure....... Traveling cross country from Portland OR to Charlotte NC.....(But that is another story)

August 28th - September 5th: California Dream - Partie IV: We are not little chicken

Les prochains postes seront rediges par notre special guest Mseth7

Apres cette intense experience, nous nous octroyons deux jours de repos a Yosemite Valley. Nous nous decidons alors de refaire fonctionner nos gambettes (jambes) et de nous atteler a la randonnee menant a Glacier Point.


Celle ci est soutenue (4.6 miles soit 7.4 km), et la denivellation est importante (3,200 ft elevation gain soit 975 m d'elevation). La montee vaut le coup, car (NdT) la vue sur toute la vallee en haut du sommet est imprenable.


Apres quelques minutes de repos au sommet et n' ecoutant que notre "we-are-not-little-chicken" leitmotiv, nous nous engageons sur la "panorama trail" qui malgre ses 8,2 miles annonces (13.19 km), est plus facile car principalement en descente, puisque l' on se situe au Zenith de la vallee.


Chemin faisant, entiere est notre deception lorsque nous nous apercevons que la randonnee s' avere etre composee d' autant de montees que de descentes.
Apres cette deconvenue, nous nous enorgueillons d' avoir marcher 6 heures en tout, d' avoir pu observer de magnifiques point de vues et de nous avoir surpasser aussi bien physiquement que mentalement.


Traduction Libre avec l' aimable authorisation de Cherdass

After the backpacking experience, we allow ourselves two days of rest at Yosemite Valley. We decide then to go back to our favorite activity of the summer, hiking, and to tackle the Glacier Point hike.
Length: 4.6 miles ie 7.4 km
Elevation gain: 3,200 ft
The ascent is definitively worth the hike, because the view on the valley from the Glacier Point is breathtaking.


After few minutes of rest and chilling out, listening to our "we-are-not-little-chicken" leitmotiv, we headed down hill on an alternative trail, the panorama trail, which, despite the 8.2 miles length, should be easier since it will be going downhill.
However, a little bit disappointment pinches our hearts, when we notice that the trail not only goes downhill, but uphill as well.
Anyway, at the end of the journey, we are very proud of this 6 hours hike, of the great views we encounter, and the physical and mental performance of the day.

August 28th - September 5th: California Dream - Partie III: Yosemite

Les prochains postes seront rediges par notre special guest Mseth7

Le lundi suivant, a la premiere heure que nous autorise notre horloge biologique (4 heures du mat), nous decollons en direction de Yosemite National Park.


La premiere etape consiste a se rendre au plus jeune des "young lakes", situe a trois heures et demi de marche (7 miles) depuis Tuolomne Meadows, le premier arret effectue a l' interieur du parc national (nord est). Apres une excursion relevee, nous arrivons a destination: Young Lakes, 9,850 ft soit 3,002.28 metres d' altitude.


Le panorama est somptueux, nous passons une nuit au bord du lac qui, malgre le froid et les engelures sur la tente, restera memorable, et imperturbable.
Le retour se fera en passant par le "Dog Lake", nomme de cette facon en reference a la chienne et a la portee trouvee par Robert Marshall au abord du lac.

Traduction Libre avec l' aimable authorisation de Cherdass

The following Monday, early birds we are and we take off for Yosemite National Park at 4 am in the morning.
The first stage of the Yosemite discovery consists in backpacking until Young Lakes, located 3 hours and a half (about 7 miles) from Tuolomne Meadows, in the north east part of the park. After a intensive hike, we arrive at Young Lakes: 9,850 ft or 3,002.28 meters of elevation. The view is gorgeous, we spend the night along the lake, which, despite the cold and the frozen tent, remains unforgettable and unruffled.



We return to the Tuolomne Meadows hiking down by Dog lake, named in memory of a dog and its puppies found at this location by Robert Marshall in late 19s.