Eurotrip: 2014
Cornwall, England is where my month long journey started. I met up with Dave in London. We were going to stay the night in London to see the Lion King show live and to explore London but as soon as I got into London we worked out the prices and it was going to end up to be a big chunk of money we didn’t really want to spend. London is such a high travelled place we thought that we would be back in no time and be able to make a trip out of it another time. (As time goes on you’ll see how much I’ve influenced Dave into NOT spending any money at all.) Before I met him, he was keen on spending every penny he had on stupid shit. Not being careful of his bills (which he has very few of) and not caring about spending money on food, drinks, or where he stayed. We didn’t go to London because we were going to spend a lot of money staying a night and gas money getting into the city which was only 40 minutes away. So after arriving at the airport we started our way down to Cornwall. London to Cornwall is about four hours. You also will learn Dave came sometimes be worse than a growing child, except he can speak. Every hour he has to eat something and has the smallest bladder for a grown man I’ve ever seen. I can’t talk really because I have the worlds smallest bladder as well but he will have a sip of something to drink and about 10 minutes later he will have to go to the bathroom. Needless to say we haven’t got too far on our trip to Cornwall before he has to stop to eat and go to the bathroom. We stop only one other time in four hours which must be a record thus far on our trip.
Seeing Cornwall for the first time; having this picture in my head with small villages and sheep everywhere is exactly what it was! Rolling hills plush with bright green trees inland and huge cliffs overlooking the ocean. Cows and sheep everywhere you looked, eating the fine green grass, all with amazing views of the ocean pretty much everywhere you looked. All of the roads a villages were so tiny and when I mean the roads are tiny, I mean that my eyes were closed half of the time because I was so scared we were going to side swipe the car coming towards us or the eight foot hedge on the other side of us. Reminder: the English drive on the wrong side of the road, so scary coming around corners and thinking you are going to go one way then the car and driver do the opposite. I screamed a few times and normally I’m not a screamer. Rock, Cornwall is where Dave lives and its a small quant village about six minutes away from the nearest town. First day we went out to have a “full english breakfast” eggs, bacon, sausage, tomato, beans, and toast. Nothing like a big Bob Evans breakfast or anything, you think that sounds like a lot of food but I’m used to “American” sized food plates and it was a very small amount of food, but that’s just how Europe is in general. I was in Cornwall five days total, we went out to dinner a few times, met his mom, brother and sister, they invited us over for dinner at her house. His sister goes to college in Bristol and his brother works there in Cornwall. His dad lives in France but was in Cornwall working so was staying at Dave’s house so I met him the first night. His family is all really cool, easy to talk to and very English! Met many of his friends, one night we went to Saint Kew which was just another village but there was a festival there where all his friends went to listen to the bands and have a good time. For sure had an eventful drinking evening, the next morning another couple, Dave and I went to the strawberry farm and picked strawberries and acted like little kids on the slides and in the meadows, frolicking like idiots all while pushing through our hangovers. After the strawberry farm we went for a hike along the Cornish coastline along with a jump off one of the stunning cliffs into the Titanic-like ocean. We wore full wet suits but still was breath taking because it was so cold. A few nights here and there in all the tiny villages around Cornwall it was time to set off into our real vacation! We took the drive back up towards London and to the Eurotunnel. It’s a train that carries cargo and cars under the english channel and to Northern France. 22 minutes later we are in France; heading straight to Paris.
First stop PARIS!! —
Driving into Paris was a treat. The cars in Europe are about five times smaller than any car in America and there are about ten times more of them on the roads. We saw all of the touristy things on the first day we were there; Arc de Triomphe, Champs-Elysees, Notre Dame De Paris, Eiffel Tower, The Louvre, and so much more. Amazing how many people just in the day we were there seeing all the same sites. I was more impressed with the Eiffel Tower then expected but not really with anything else. For the amount of people always around and the prices I wouldn’t book a trip there again. If I happened to go back on a whim I wouldn’t mind but it wasn’t particularly my cup of tea.
Next stop was Dijon, France…Dijon is a small French village, wasn’t expecting much to be there but I was presently surprised. We sat down for a beer and decided to walk down and explore and came upon a small market going on. Found some local food and just took in the different cultures.
Dijon was still pretty flat and next stop was Val d’Isere which is a small ski village in the French Alps. Beautiful little village but because there’s no snow yet everything was shut. It was almost like a ghost town so we spent the night there outside the village and woke up to the brisk mountain air and headed to Chambery, which was just another ski village but a little bigger. Pretty much the same thing there, only one lift open and couldn’t find much to do so we headed to Chamonix which was unreal. Mont-Blanc is the tallest mountain range in Europe and I went hiking on top of it and then paragliding off the top. We had to wear our full ski outfits, rent hiking boats and crampons (big metal spikes) to be able to go on top of the mountain. We had a mountain guide who we were harnessed to and then wore helmets and walking sticks. We walked down the biggest ridge of the mountain. Sept. 16 had at least 2 feet of snow on it. 80 degrees in the valley and still that much snow on the mountain. We had to walk foot in front of the other to stay on this ridge it was so thin. The guide told us if someone slips to one side, no matter what you have to jump to the other side or else we were all connected and we would all slip…and DIE! (He didn’t say the die part but he was very serious.) Once we walked down the ridge we then got all strapped in and took off in our paraglides over the French Alps. Stunning views of the entire mountain range and into the Chamonix Valley. We were up in the air for 35 mins or so and just landed softly in a big grassy patch next to a cow. Paraglide just softly landed behind us and he put it in his backpack. Amazing journey and will probably be the highlight of my trip. We stayed three nights in Chamonix and then started working our way into Switzerland.
Being in Switzerland three days now my view of it has completely changed. I imagined perfectly cut hedges, posh people walking around in european driving moccasins, designer sunglasses and white pants. Smelling of flowers and bentleys rolling around the streets, but that’s not the case yet. I must have missed that part of Switzerland. They are lots of open grassy fields with ringing bells because all the cows have them around there necks and what comes with cows is the poop smell. Warm sun beating down on my face as we traveling across the meadows and then WHAMMM; shit smell stuck in the car for five miles. We first stopped in Interlaken which I don’t remember what I had heard about the city but I knew I have heard about it quite a few times, but all I can say is if you aren’t asian…don’t go there. We were pretty much the only white people there. Asians and their cameras = Interlaken, Switzerland. More beautiful mountain ranges but not much else to see and I felt as if I was in an asian country instead. We took our mouton bikes up to the next village by train and thought it would be an easy ride down…We thought wrong. I had to walk my bike half the way (over an hour) and then at one point thought my brakes were going to catch on fire because I was using them so much. Downhill mountain biking was no joke in Grinwald/Interlaken. Once that little adventure turned bad, we knew Interlaken wasn’t for us. We headed for Zurich.
Current location is Zurich and it’s Saturday night…
