Life in France, Travel in France & beyond

All trains lead to Rome (part 1)

We’ve crisscrossed Europe by rail for decades, discovering countless destinations. For us, train travel is all about the convenience: a quick walk to the station, a relaxing ride (often with a picnic lunch!), and arrival just steps from our hotel. Amsterdam, Berlin, Brussels, Lisbon, Madrid—with more to be discovered. We’ve even explored Italian treasures like Milan, Turin, Bari, and Venice; yet, one iconic place remained unseen: the Eternal City. All roads (or in our case, rails) lead to Rome, but somehow, we’d never taken that particular route. We decided to change all of that by embarking on a special train journey from Paris (we joined it in Lyon) to that fabled destination for our 40th anniversary.

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Unknown's avatarBob5 Comments
Life in France

Rude? You talkin’ to me?

There’s an old joke about European stereotypes regarding the ideal situation vs. what might be a nightmare. The story goes that Heaven is where the police are British, the cooks are French, the mechanics are German, the lovers are Italian, and it’s all organized by the Swiss. On the other hand, Hell is where the police are German, the cooks are British, the mechanics are French, the lovers are Swiss, and it’s all organized by the Italians. Given that we live in France, I’ll take the safe way out and say, “No comment”, but I did want to address something that we often see repeated about this country: rudeness.

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Life in France, Travel in France & beyond

A refreshing break

In honor of today being the first day of summer, is the story of our wintertime visit earlier this year to Luchon in the Pyrenees mountains. It will be one year ago tomorrow when the train line into this ski and thermal baths resort town reopened after a 10-year absence.  We’re always on the lookout for a new part of the country to discover—by train—so this was a great chance to add another destination to our list. Since we seldom see snow where we live, a visit in the winter was going to be ideal.

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Unknown's avatarBob3 Comments
Life in France

The cost to live in France

Last week we talked about the concerns of Americans living overseas who were considering moving back to the States. That blog post was based on an article called “When Returning to the U.S. Seems Unaffordable” where that headline essentially states their worries. From health insurance premiums to retirement, all of the people interviewed shared their doubts about being able to afford the same quality of life back “home” that they had enjoyed in other countries. Soon after I had read that news item I saw another addressing how much money you needed to live in France. Obviously that comes with a definite “that depends” but still it prompted me to do some investigation of what others were spending to have a comfortable life here.

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Unknown's avatarBob1 Comment
Life in France

Going back would cost too much

Our move to France from the US a decade ago was never politically motivated; it was more about practicality. We’d been vacationing here for 30 years, although it was really a rehearsal of living here: renting apartments/houses, shopping in local markets, using public transportation, practicing French conversations. Round-trip flights, one year it was even four times, was money (and time) that could be spent on our own place in this country. We hadn’t really thought much about the other dollar amounts covering housing, food, health insurance, gasoline, etc. that clearly impact daily living. A newspaper article about Americans living overseas and contemplating going back addressed that very issue.

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Unknown's avatarBob9 Comments
Life in France, Travel in France & beyond

Do-it-yourself land cruise: the experience

In the last blog post we talked about our “slow travel” discovery of canal cruising in France. On four different trips, with the barge as our floating hotel, we’ve been on excursions to châteaux, museums, champagne caves, and fascinating historical sites. Back on the boat we enjoyed all of our meals, an open bar, and even learned how to make Chantilly that we might otherwise call whipped cream. While each waterway vacation shared similarities, there were enough differences to make them unique and encourage us to try another. When an advertisement for a trip on the canal de Bourgogne (Burgundy) arrived, we took a look at the port stops and the planned excursions to see if we could arrange something comparable on our own using the train.

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Unknown's avatarBob9 Comments
Life in France, Travel in France & beyond

Do-it-yourself land cruise: the inspiration

When we lived in the US, a favorite annual vacation was a week-long cruise in the Caribbean. For one upfront price we could include our accommodation, meals, and drinks. It was possible to add in the cost of excursions in advance as well, but at ports of call we preferred to walk around the harbor or simply stay onboard. After all, we’d already paid for food and beverages and with most of the other passengers out for the day, it felt as if we had the ship to ourselves. After moving to France we discovered canal cruising that was similar to what we had experienced in the Caribbean except instead of being with thousands of other travelers, we shared the floating hotel with only 20 others. When an email announcement of sailing through the “heart of Burgundy, its wines and regional flavors” arrived, it caught our attention.

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Unknown's avatarBob7 Comments