This will be very annoying to write thanks to stupid French keyboards. I apologise in advance for q’s that are supposed to be a’s, n’s that appear to be colons & also for my usual bad spelling.
This is also going to be long because several people said they wanted mpre travel detail 5OK, I made that up, I just want to tell stories…)
So…
I Decided when I started travelling that I was just going to chill & roll with the punches. Not too much planning & lots of flexibility. This is of course how I ended up in France in the first place. It never really factored into my initial plans.
I was sitting in a cafe in Nice trying to book accomodation here in Lyon, but the hostel was booked. No problems says the new “nothing’s a problem” version of Tim. It gave me an excuse to book at least the first night at the Radisson 4-star hotel (thank you staff card discount)and then just zork it out from there.
Next day the first of tzo trains that I had to catch ran late, meaning that I missed my connector. Not a problem for “I’m so cool you could store a side of meat in me for months” Tim. I went to the info desk and they reissued a ticket for me with an upgrade to a first-class seat for the next train!
Arriving in a totally foreign city in the dark (thanks to the late train) with no real map of how to find your hotel could stress the best of them, but I confidently strode out of the rail depot, confident that things would work out. On this occasion I was right.
A tip for new players: If you are trying to find a hotel in a foreign country when you don’t speak the language, it helps if the hotel in question is situated in the tallest building in that city, and also happens to have a large neon sign ontop of said building.
45 minutes later I am lying on my giant bed, local red wine in one hand, french chocolate in the other & a remote on my lap. Life is good.
8am sees me at my complimentary breakfast. I’d been burned by breakfasts in the states which turned out to be just free muffins, but as I tucked into my helping of Prosciutto, fresh bread and smoked salmon (having already had my bacon and eggs) I was zell pleased with this outcome.
As I walked into the lobby 50 minutes later, skin a ruddy pink colour after another leisurly shower, I was on top of the world. I strode up confindently to the desk, secure in the knowledge gleaned from my own Radisson Hotel, that surely they would have had overnight cancellations, freeing up a room for me. I asked the question and then the girl shook her head…
“Is it in the Slovak Republic, or France where the shaking of the head actually means asscent” I think. Unfortunately it is the Slovak Republic.
I returned to my room still in good spirits, after all, I still had a “Lonely Planet” book full of accomodation suggestions to fall back on. 15 minutes and a number of unsuccessful phone calls later Tim was not so confident.
I’d successfully flown by the seat of my pants for the last week, but today my jeans got their pilots license revoked. By noon I was walking the streets of Central Lyon looking for Hotel signs.
As it worked out, by 12:30 I found a place and by one I was moved into it. It was actually a fun morning in a lot of ways, but I think I will book ahead for my next couple of cities accomodation.
In other news, this it totally the time to be in Lyon. “The Festival of Light” is on for three nights, s the city is lit up and there are hundreds of thousands of people cruising around and laughing in a very “carnivalé” atmosphere. I’ll enjoy it for another day and a half before I head to Geneva.
In the mean time, your job (if you didn’t give up reading 5 minutes ago) it to write me an email so I don’t feel as alone in this city. The only bad thing about having my own room is that I have no one else to visit the city with.
I guess I’ll be back in three days…