Photo gallery

Here are some random photos from my old SLR camera.

Mt. Obiou
Mt. Obiou
Mt. Obiou

Louvre

Louvre

Louvre

Louvre

Montmartre Cemetary
Sacre Coeur from La Virgule

Sacre Coeur

Sacre Coeur

Eiffel Tower from Sacre Coeur

One of the bazillion amazing windows in Notre Dame Cathedral

Notre Dame Cathedral from the front

Notre Dame Cathedral from the side

Notre Dame cathedral from the back, walking from Gare de Lyon

Journey's end

Well, we're back, and here are some final thoughts about the journey.

Terminal 3 redeemed itself on the way out. It provides everything a traveller needs while waiting three hours to get on a plane and come home.

The Montmartre area of Paris is a terrific place to stay, especially if you want to have more than merely a tourist experience. We loved the neighbourhood, and spent hours walking around getting lost, buying our breakfast every day from a different boulangerie, buying a different wine every day from a different wine shop, and having random meals in the local cafes. It was quite a contrast, because our apartment building was 20 feet from the Montmartre Cemetary, which is as quiet as a ghost, as you can imagine, and a few hundred feet from Rue de Clichy, which is a hive of activity, especially at night. There is the matter of the sex corridor on Rue de Clichy, but that did not bother us at all.

I have always heard that Parisians are rude and arrogant, but that was not our experience. We only encountered a few goofs, and every place on earth has its share of goofs. I found the people to be friendly and helpful and easy to approach. I will be going back to Paris sometime because there is a lot left to see and experience. Paris was really the sidebar to this trip, and I am really happy the way it turned out.

I will also return to La Salette. I now know how easy it is to get there, and with Alexandre as a guide I have no qualms at all. I cannot express adequately my gratitude to Shirl for sharing this bittersweet experience with me. The drive through the Alps from Grenoble to La Salette and then to Notre Dame de la Salette will remain in our memories forever. Shirl was taking digital photos, while I was taking SLR film photos that have to be developed. I am hoping that my pictures of Mont Obiou, which I call the scene of the crime, come out well. I will post one if they do.

Au revoir.

Shopping day

Today we went to Galeries Lafayette to see what we could see. Well, it turns out that we saw the perfect cashmere sweaters. Apparently every woman should own at least one in her lifetime and who are we to argue? But rest assured, folks, we only bought one each. What a place! Pictures cannot do it justice, but here it is anyway.

So that was the end of our shopping, except for the shoes, earings, stuff for Carl, and stuff for Pat. Oh yah, and our last bottle of wine, which might turn out to be our second last. That remains to be seen.

Tomorrow, our last day, we are going to spend in Montmarte, because it is the best neighbourhood in Paris.

Tour day

Yesterday was the last day to use our three-day pass, so we did the tour bus thing. We had a hell of a time finding the starting point, mainly because I took the wrong turn. It seems as though every intersection has at least six streets radiating from it, so it is easy to miss your street. We decided not to go into the Louvre ... that is a trip on its own. I was blown away by the scale of the place.

We spent a bit of time in the Musee D'Orsay, which has a lot of Van Goghs, but is under renovation so the exhibits are very limited. There was a lovely sculpture of the young Aristotle ... what a cutie.

We had dinner in the little bistro across the street where the locals hang out. The food was great, the servers were lovely, and we met a German guy who lives in Hong Kong. A great day.

La Salette

Yesterday went off without a hitch. We arrived at Gare de Lyon in plenty of time and the trip to Grenoble was uneventful. We were both extremely tired, mostly because we were worried about the alarm going off and the wake-up call being successful. The alarm was Shirley's BlackBerry, which for some reason would not change to local time. So, we set the alarm for 10:30 at night, which was 4:30 a.m. local time. And, I set up the wake-up call, but because the automated service commented in French, I was not sure if it worked or not. Anyway, neither of us got any sleep because we did not want to miss the train.

When we arrived at Grenoble, our taxi driver, Alexandre, was there waiting for us. He was a Godsend. If not for him, we would still be roaming around the Alps looking for La Salette. It is always more complicated than Google maps implies. Alexandre knows the area, although he had never been past the small town of Corps, the closest town to La Salette Fallavaux. He hunted down the last bouquet of roses in the town for me to take to the cemetary. Another bonus about Alexandre is that he took English for seven years and was eager to practice. Being that we were running on no sleep, this meant the world to us.

After Corps, the road became really rustic, a series of switchbacks, not all with guardrails, and we were at about 1,ooo metres at this point. La Salette is higher, and the Sanctuary of Notre Dame de la Salette is higher still. But the cemetary was exactly where I was hoping it would be. We came around a corner and there was the Canadian flag flying. There was a couple there from Quebec, visiting the lady's father who had died in the crash.

There was a visitor's book, and I left some information about my father that was missing from his grave. I would like to have this information added to his gravestone, and so we continued up to the Sanctuary, where I was hoping to find out who maintains the cemetary. We found out that the cemetary is the property of Canada and Quebec, and that all relevant decisions are made by the archbishop of Quebec. So that is my next project. In July 2009 a group of people went up to the crash site, brought down the wreckage, and made the sculpture which is now in the entrance to the cemetary. I placed three roses on my father's grave, one for my mother, one for my brother, and one for me.

The road from La Salette Fallavaux to the Sanctuary is even crazier that the road from Corps to La Salette. Add to this the fact that it was a cloudy day and after a certain height we were driving in the clouds. Shirley was a little concerned and asked Alexandre, because he had never been this way before, "are you afraid"? He said "absolutely not". That made her feel much better. I have been on much crazier roads in Central America, so this was nothing for me.

We made it to the Sanctuary in one piece and it was shrouded in clouds. It was a bit surreal, because here is this terribly religious place that served beer, wine, and liquor. We stayed only long enough to find out about the archbishop and headed back to Grenoble. We had to hang around there for a few hours until our train left for Paris. We got back around 10:30 and were home by 11. A long and very emotional day.

If anyone reading this blog ever gets to Grenoble and needs a guide and/or driver, you cannot go wrong with Alexandre. Here is his contact info: alexandre.marillet@taxis-grenoblois.fr. Tell him Maggie sent you.

Shirley made a couple of movies of our trip yesterday, that we have been trying to post all night. No luck ... will try again tomorrow.

Weird day

Jet lag hit us today, so we did not do much. We did a dry run to Gare de Lyon, where we get the train to Grenoble tomorrow ... at 6:30 in the morning. We have to get up at 4:30 and out by 5:00.

We did manage to go through Notre Dame Cathedral, though. I think you need a lot of time to do it justice and today was not the day for us. Other than that we did a bus tour, which we will do again on Wednesday, but on Wednesday we will stop at a couple of places, like the Louvre and Musee D'Orsay.

Tomorrow will be a long day. We leave at 6:30 and arrive in Grenoble at 9:30. Then we take a taxi to La Salette Fallavaux (see my original post from April), which is roughly two hours. I estimate that we will be there one or two hours and then we will return to Grenoble. We are booked on the 7:20 train out of Grenoble, arriving back in Paris around 10:30.

A bientot.

A day in Montmartre

Today was a blast! We walked to Montmartre, through the sex trade part of town, which appears to run about six blocks along Rue Clichy, beginning just after you pass the Moulin Rouge, going east. It is fine during the day, but it is advisable to stay away from that area after dark.

I wanted to find La Virgule and Shirl wanted to find Le Refuge des Fondues, a restaurant she had read about online. We found both eventually, totally by accident. Montmartre is a warren of tiny streets going every which way, and packed with sourvenir shops, cafes, restaurants, and art galleries. A lot of business are closed on Sundays, which is quaint for people like us who are accustomed to the 24/7 lifestyle.

We walked up to Sacre Coeur and I am not sure how to relate to it. Is it a circus or a church? It looks like a church, but it acts like a circus. There is acually a carousel at the bottom. Not only that, there are people hawking purses and cheap Paris souvenirs all the way up the stairs and on every landing on the way up to the basilica.




There was a mass being conducted while we were there, so we hung out inside the basilica for a while, until a nun crossed our path. They still wear habits, like in the old days, and I have to tell you she creeped me out. We had to leave, because I was flashing back to my old school days when I was surrounded by nuns, and Shirl was laughing at me.


After Sacre Coeur we wandered around Montmartre and that is when we found La Virgule. We stopped there for an excellent lunch (Shirl had a crepe and I had quiche Lorraine). This lovely couple offered to take our picture. To top it off, La Virgule has a bulldog named Maggie. Made my day.






After lunch we continued strolling and we came upon some really cute purses. Now, Shirl intended all along to find a purse in Paris, so this was according to plan. I, however, had not intented to do any purse shopping so imagine my surprise when I found myself buying not one, not two, but three purses. The prices are fantastic here. And Shirl is no slouch in the purse department. The thing with her is that she changes her mind occasionally, which results in changing one purse for another after the fact. There is nothing wrong with this, but I can tell you that now if we come within 50 feet of a store that sells purses, I yell "STEP AWAY FROM THE PURSES" to keep both of us in line.


Wandered home around five o'clock, stopping on the way for a glass of wine, and dessert and coffee. We are going to try the hop on/hop off Paris tour tomorrow.


By the way, if you thought I was kidding about the Shirley scarf situation, here is proof. And she found one more after the picture was taken.

No string for us

We kind of annoyed the string people today because we just kept saying "non, merci"; what really annoyed them was Shirl taking their picture. We don't feel too bad about annoying them, because in the annoyance sweepstakes they win hands down. They actually line people up to rip them off, as the picture illustrates.

McDonald's

You know you are blending in when someone who does not speak English asks you where the McDonald's is. That happened to us today in Montmartre and we were able to help the people out (in French). We had passed McD's a few minutes earlier and commented that it seemed out of place in this neighbourhood.

Our place

Our apartment is on the 8th (top) floor. It overlooks the street on the west and gives us an amazing view of Sacre Coeur on the east. That's right, we have two exposures. Not only that, we have a patio on each side, and the entrance to the rooftop deck is just outside our door.

The Montmarte Cemetary is amazing. If we do not make it to Pere Lachaise (where Jim Morrison et al are resting) we will explore this little one across the street.

We managed to stay awake until 7 o'clock. I woke up about 1 a.m. (Shirl woke up about 11 p.m.) and hung out on the patio looking at Sacre Coeur all lit up. Went back to sleep and woke up around 8 a.m.

We are outta here. More later.

Jetlagged walkabout in Montmartre

We love our neighourbood. We decided not to venture too far from our base yesterday because we were totally out of it due to lack of sleep. So, we went looking for a wine store mentioned on a traveller website. We found a whole bunch of wine stores on the way, as well as grocery stores, markets, every possible type of restaurant, pub, and cafe that you can imagine. We confirmed that the Moulin Rouge is indeed 472 feet from our apartment.

For some reason Shirley packed six scarves to bring to Paris, the scarf capital of the world. That is six that she will admit to.

Anyway, we were so bagged that we chose comfort over adventure for our first meal in Paris. Corcoran's Irish Pub is literally a stone's throw from our front door, so we bought our groceries (wine, baguette, anglaises (apricot for Shirl and apple for me, the best strawberries I have ever tasted, blueberries, and milk for our coffee) and headed for Corcoran's. Shirl had curried chicken and Carlsberg and I had chili and Kilkenny. Does the guy in the picture look happy or angry?

Terminal 3

Arriving at Paris CDG Terminal 3 was like going back in time to the 1960's. See for yourself.

Are those wheelchairs specifically for pretzeled Air Transat passengers? When we landed we were transported from the plane to Terminal 3 in buses. The last time I experienced that was in the 7o's at Mirabel airport in Montreal.

There is nothing at Terminal 3 (a one-storey warehouse-looking place) but passport checkers and transportation options. We breezed through customs because there were no people there. This is not a complaint ... we just found it funny.

Air Transat cattle cartage

How do I explain the experience of travelling for seven hours in an Air Transat plane ? Hmmmm . Hmmmm . Got it . Ever see those trucks hauling animals to the slaughterhouse ? I am not saying it is EXACTLY like that , but it is close . The seats were so close together that we could not remove our shoes without turning sideways . Poor Shirl had to take Aleve to mitigate the back pain from trying to sleep sideways . The poor lady in the aisle seat put her head down on her tray table to to try to sleep . That only works if you are really short. The aisles were so skinny you had turn sideways to avoid whacking people. The bit where they tell you about the crash position came across as passive aggressive to me . They were all chirpy and enthusiastic , but the fact is that it would be impossible for a person of average height to achieve that position ... no room . To sum up ... Air Transat makes Air Canada look good. And ... notwithstanding our trip home , I do not see "any Air Transat trips in my future .

Our Paris 'hood

This is where we will be staying for our week in Paris. Can't wait to sit on the rooftop deck with a bottle of wine and look at the Paris lights. It is just a few steps to the Montmartre Museum and another few steps to a wine store. And I think one side of the aparthotel overlooks a cemetary, so it will be quiet.

http://www.holidaycity.com/montmartre-paris/index.htm

One sleep.

I read in the Globe today that there are random strikes happening in France at the moment, and that Paris transit is being affected. Apparently the French are malheureux that the government is going to raise the retirement age from 60 to 62. Cry me a river. I am hoping that they concentrate on the city transit and not the high-speed trains that will take us to Grenoble and back on Tuesday.

Alternate route

So, I did a google walk from our apartment to Sacre Coeur and it looks as though we can avoid the string people. The only problem is that we might never make it, because there are a lot of diversions on the way, such as Irish pubs, cafes, markets, and assorted other places.

I even found this cafe that I was looking for, called La Virgule, which means comma in French. The comma is one of the most discussed items among editors, so I think it will be hilarious to have someone take our picture there so I can send it to all the editors I know. Correction: only to the editors I like ... a smaller list. We should probably be careful about whom we recruit to take the picture. If it is a stringie, he or she might take the camera.

Go google!

Sacre Coeur String people

Apparently there are these "string" people who hang around the base of Sacre Coeur, who grab your wrist, tie a string around it, and then demand payment. Sounds freaky, but it is said that if you decline to pay them they will not bother you.



My goddaughter and her friend were accosted by these people in the Spring and ended up giving them 10 or so Euros, and also ended up not pleased with themselves for caving in. They should not be too hard on themselves. According to what I have read these people are quite intimidating.



Shirley and I are armed with knowledge of this little enterprise and that will contribute to a different outcome. I can explain to the string people in Quebec French, bad Spanish, and English that we are "stringophobes" and as such must decline their offerings. If all this fails, I will just show them the "Maggie face". This has frightened people in the past. We'll see.

Four sleeps.

Countdown to Paris

Seven sleeps until Shirl and I leave for Paris.

Our neighbourhood for our stay in Paris is Montmartre, which seems to be really cool, with cafes, restaurants, bookstores, artists, not to mention Sacre Coeur, and the Moulin Rouge 472 feet away.

The Annual

Every year I go to Quebec for a couple of days, because it is good for my soul. I stay with my friends Julia and Andre. We used to call this trip "the xth annual", but I have been doing it for so long that none of us can remember which "annual" it is, so it is now called simply "the annual". We usually get together with other old friends, Sue and Gaston (affectionately known as "Suepisgas") for dinner on one of the nights I am there.


They have this pond in the back yard (not like any back yard you've ever seen, and it is constantly expanding). The picture above shows only a fraction of the whole. Anyway, a lot of frogs and goldfish live in this pond, and one of the first things I do upon arrival is check in with the frogs and see how they are doing. Usually they are suspended in the water, with just their heads poking through and it takes a while to distinguish them from the lily pads. This year, this big fella was sitting on one of the rocks and just grooving. Seems to be smiling, doesn't he? I would smile too if I had his living arrangements.





For the last three years in a row we have gone to a pottery festival called "1001 Pots" (same in French and English) in Val David. It is held outside and runs for a month. Everyone should go there if they are in the area during the time it is on. See their website if you are interested. This year I got off easy, spending less than $100.00. The stuff is unique, and the atmosphere is serene.

We had dinner at "L'ange cornu", which is a charming restaurant in L'Assomption. The food is terrific, the decor is whimsical, the staff are amazing, and it also puts on theatre shows in conjunction with the arts centre next door. It is surprising to come across such an artistic vibe in a little town in the middle of farm country.

It was over too quickly, and I hit the road with my soul in good shape and some fresh veggies from one of Julia's many gardens.

A la prochaine.

Elvis @ Collingwood

I never knew that such a festival existed, but apparently it is an annual event. The photos say everything about the event itself. The two friends I was with really wanted to find some of those weird hair-hats (for Halloween), but they must have come from somewhere else. I am not sure how they relate specifically to Elvis.

For me, the real value for that day was the road trip, through areas of Ontario I had never seen, to a place I had never been. Collingwood is a pretty town. It reminded me of Niagara-on-the-Lake.

We did not stay long at the festival. Just long enough to walk up one side of the main drag and down the other, check out a couple of Elvis tribute artists, take some photos, and wax nostalgic about some old cars. There was this massive pink Cadillac, a ragtop Cutlass 442, an early Mustang and a 1968 Corvette Stingray. Cool.

We were only there for an hour. We drove back to the city and had dinner while we caught up on everybody's lives.

I think our next get-together will be in Stratford.

The road not taken - postscript

Being me, I like to wrap things up with a bow.

Now that I am re-scheduling the volcano-ized trip for September, I decided to let the Antin Trinite Hotel in Paris know why Shirley and I would not be staying with them. I emailed them, telling them that because they had penalized me in April, we would not be staying with them for our extended trip in September. I think that it is good to know the consequences of our decisions and actions, and I thought that this would bookend the first attempt nicely.

Well, imagine my chagrin when the hotel immediately wrote back, and provided proof that they had not penalized me at all. Apparently, someone on this end decided to score some insurance money. I am not amused. I am taking this up with my travel agent.

In the meantime, apologies to the Hotel Antin Trinite in Paris. Hey world, stay there if you can.

Ottawa

I was invited to this (evening) garden party in Ottawa and was of two minds about whether or not to go.

I finally decided to drive up on the day of the event, stay overnight at a B&B, try to catch up with my friend Marg the next day, and then return to Toronto.

I highly recommend the New Edinburgh Bed and Breakfast in the New Edinburgh district of Ottawa, which is a stone's throw from the GG's residence, walking distance to the Rockliffe Park area, and a 20-minute walk to the Byward Market. The owners are amazing, friendly, and helpful people. Noreen actually drove me to my event. There was a family from New Zealand staying there at the same time, and I enjoyed hearing about their travels the next morning at breakfast, which, by the way, was superb. This is an old, beautiful house and I stayed in the Queen room, which has its own bathroom ensuite. I will definitely stay there whenever I go to Ottawa.

The event was fine. The next day I walked to Byward Market along Sussex Drive, hung out there for a while, and walked back a different way. I stopped in to see Marg for a cup of tea, and to catch up, and then hit the road back to Toronto around 1:30.

I decided to come back by Highway 7 instead of the 401. It was fine until I left the 115, when it got a bit squirrelly until I got to the 407. It took longer that I had anticipated. I think it would be faster to take 7A off of 115 and go through Port Perry and Uxbridge, ending up just south of Newmarket, and then head south to Toronto. Might be more mileage but it is more straightforward. I will test out the theory next time.

Vancouver

I have had two trips since my last post, one to Vancouver and one (really short) to Ottawa.

I spent four days in Vancouver in early June, just hanging out with my brother and wandering around the city (well, wandering around the Granville Market). I managed to spend a few minutes with Emlene on the day I arrived and then she was off for a one-week holiday with her sister in the U.S.

I saw a little bit of "the boy" (nephew Roddy), but people his age seem to really come alive after we, the older folks, are thinking about going to bed. However, I did get to hear him practising on the piano, playing and singing his own material. The boy is good. He plays base in two bands, but I love to listen to his own creations.

My friend Pam was at a job fair at UBC the same week, so she stayed with us for the Saturday night and left at some godforsaken time on Sunday morning. I dragged her down to Granville Market and back (on foot). We had to stop for a beer on the way home.

Go, Westjet!!!

Thank you, Iceland volcano

My friend Shirley gave me the biggest gift today ... she informed me that she will be coming to France with me. When I told her a last month that I was going she said: "Why didn't you tell me sooner? You should not be alone on this kind of trip". And I thought (after kicking myself) "she's right, I should have told her".

She has a lot on the go this summer, but when my trip went up in smoke I let her know that if she could see her way to coming with me I would really appreciate it. Today she told me that we're on.

This changes everything. It will be now a blast, because we have the same way of looking at the world. For instance, we do not do line-ups (when we went to Expo 86 in Vancouver we saw all the obscure pavillions because the big ones had line-ups. Schedules are merely guidelines, and subject to change without notice. Most importantly, things that are troublesome and scary when you are alone are merely inconvenient or quite funny when you are with a friend.

So, thank you volcano and thank you Shirl.

Lessons learned

I learned a lot from the experience of planning a three-phase trip that involved planes, trains, and automobiles, had a duration of ten days, and was aborted by a natural disaster.

First, in the immortal words of Robbie Burns in To a mouse: "The best laid schemes o' mice an' men gang aft agley", which is why I try to minimize timetables to the extent possible.

Second, the trip was overly complicated because I despise Air Canada. If I had used Air Canada I could have eliminated one leg of the trip and a plane change. I chose BA because I could fly direct from London to Toronto going home, but going to Europe on BA involves changing planes in London. Hence the London to Lyon. It was the same for Air France, but in reverse. I can fly direct from Toronto to Paris, but coming home from London involves changing planes in Paris. We all know that adding a change of planes to a trip often results in luggage going in a different direction from its traveller.

Air Canada, on the other hand, has direct flights to and from both London and Paris. So, when I re-do the trip, I will either hold my nose and fly Air Canada or do one-way trips on other airlines, whichever makes more financial sense.

Third, almost half of the trip would have been spent getting from one place to another. If this was a road trip I would have a totally different take on that. For me, a road trip is about the journey rather than the destination. On this type of trip, however, the destination is the important thing, and the less time I spend getting there the better I like it.

So, here is what I am going to change for the September attempt:

- Eliminate the London portion. Do that next year.
- Use Air Canada or Air France, whichever is a better deal.
- Spend four or five days in Paris rather than two and a half.
- Shorten trip to eight days.

Once again from the top

I was going to try to get out and back before the end of May, but that is not in the cards. Not only is it difficult to get a flight, but the Iceland volcano is still causing intermittent closures of European airspace. Waiting in European airports with a hordes of disgruntled travellers, and competing for seats on airplanes, is not my idea of a good time.

So, September it is ... gives me time to rethink the itinerary and do the hotel search again.

Not that I will be staying put until then. I have my annual pilgrimage to Montreal sometime in July or August (I usually go on the first weekend of my friend Julia's vacation). No word yet on when that will be.

I will also be going to Vancouver in June to visit my brother. I had better get going on that one ... June is just around the corner.

Final comment on postponed trip

My friend Pam summed the whole thing up nicely with the following comment: "Well, your father is not going anywhere". There you go.

Addendum to the road not taken

There was a letter to the editor in today's Globe and Mail in which the writer, a stranded Swiss traveller, expressed his gratitude to the hotel in which he was stranded for giving him a "distress" rate for his extended stay. I see that as not only compassionate, but also as a good business decision.

The road not taken

The road I am referring to is the high road, which is the one I would hope that hotels and like business would take when unforeseen circumstances, such as the current disruption of air travel over Europe, occur. I can feel the eyes rolling already.

It appears that hotels in Europe are gouging stranded travellers by jacking up the prices of hotel rooms daily. This opportunism might seem like a profitable idea at the moment, but it is ultimately a bad business decision.

For instance, the hotel I had booked in London has charged me a ten percent penalty for cancelling (postponing, really) even though they have a week's notice and are not going to be out of pocket. However, since I am going to make this journey eventually, they are going to lose the ninety percent that I will give to some other hotel in this instance, and all the other hotel room dollars that I will not give to them or their affiliates until the end of time (well, my time anyway). I cannot even estimate the actual amount of their future lost revenue, but it will be a boatload more that the ten percent they are gaining from this decision. Ditto for the hotel in Paris, which is penalizing me the amount of one night's stay. I am actually not losing anything, because I am fully covered by insurance.

Furthermore, if I can convince even one more person to steer away from these two establishments, The Hotel Antin Trinite in the 9th district of Paris, and the Days Inn, Westminster on Belgravia Street in London SW1, then the losses increase. And they tell two friends, and they tell two friends, and so on, and so on ....

I am aware that this post is arguably an instance of me not taking the high road.

Still on the ground

Well, my flight out of Toronto has been cancelled and I will be staying put tomorrow. It is for the best, because I really do not want to fly into the complete chaos that is Europe at the moment. I shall wait until this all blows over (literally and figuratively) and re-schedule the whole thing.

Peace, out.

Still up in the air

So, all flights in and out of London for today and tomorrow (I am supposed to leave tomorrow) have been cancelled. However, although my flight is supposed to leave tomorrow, it does not get to London until the following day. Thus, I have to wait until tomorrow to find out if I go now or later.

I realize that there are a lot of tomorrows in that paragraph.

The big smoke

So, it appears that this massive cloud of volcanic ash from Iceland is causing havoc with European airspace. So much for timetables.

They say that Heathrow [where I change planes for Lyon (where I catch a fast train to Grenoble)] could be shut down for another 48 hours. That is cutting it awfully close to my time of departure. According to my travel agent, my flight is still on schedule.

If my flight out of Toronto is cancelled the whole trip, as it is currently mapped out, breaks down. It would mean re-sheduling the whole thing again. No worries. We ladies with free time can roll with these little glitches.

Trip one, phase one - La Salette Fallavaux

Where the heck is La Salette Fallavaux, you ask, and why the heck would anyone go there?

Well, I'll tell you. See the guy in the picture? He is the reason I am going to La Salette.

He is my father, Roderick Malcolm McIsaac (note the different spelling from my name. It was spelled "Mac" on my birth certificate, and I never changed it). I never knew him, because I was really young when the plane he and 57 other people were on, returning to Quebec from Rome via Paris, crashed into the Alps not far from Grenoble. Visiting his grave has been on my 'bucket list' forever, and I have decided that now is the time to do it.

There is not much there except this massive sanctuary, Notre Dame de la Salette, which is a pilgrimage site for Catholics because apparently the Virgin Mary appeared to a couple of teenagers there in the 1800's (reminiscent of the Lourdes legend).

Perhaps they created this tiny cemetary in this spot for these 58 Canadians because they (my father was part of the crew, the commisaire du bord, or purser in English) were apparently prominent Quebec Catholics who had been in Rome because of the beatification of Marguerite Bourgeois, founder of the Congregation of Notre Dame. If you have to be dead, this looks like a beautiful place to rest in peace.

I will have to wait until I get to Grenoble to figure out how to get to La Salette, but I am pretty certain that I will have to rent a car. Can't be any worse than driving in downtown Toronto.