The way this trip would work for everyone was that the Freeman’s would come first to Paris, and we would travel by rent-a-car for a couple of weeks around France, and Steve would come later for the cycling.
Lee and I started putting together a rough Itinerary for the first portion of the trip. I put some ideas on the table and they put some ideas on the table and we eventually settled on a pretty solid plan. Lee’s wife Mary jumped right on it and started making arrangements for cars, hotels, AirBnB’s for the trip.
With everything finally set in stone, I started my journey on May 6th, going over to Seattle on the Wenatchee Valley airport shuttle. From there, it was Icelandic Air to Iceland (of course), change planes in Keflavik and then to Paris. This was about a week before the Freemans would arrive. This was because I would have a large bike box with me and I did not want to carry it around France in the car with the Freemans. So I got to Paris, rented a car, and drove to Chambéry. Well, mostly. I didn’t quite make it all the way to Chambéry the first day. My lack of sleep due to the travel from Wenatchee caught up with me so I had to get a hotel about half way there. But I did make it easily the next day.
Seven years ago, on my first trip to Chambéry, I stayed at the Budget Ibis for 3 weeks and the manager, Julien gave me a nice discount since I was staying on for a long term stay. I stayed in contact with Julien over the years so I asked him if it was possible to get another discount again for this trip. I was going to stay there for the entire summer instead of getting a rental place. Julien said he could give me a break on the rate, but he had changed jobs and was managing a hotel in Grésy-sur-Aix, about 10 miles from Chambéry. The B & B Hotel. So I drove to Grésy-sur-Aix instead of Chambéry and got settled in the new hotel. Julien was on vacation so I did not get to see him right away, but the staff was expecting me and were very accommodating. I think it helped being friends with the Boss.
Next, I wanted to go check on a few things in Chambéry. First I went to the Bistrot du Verger, my favorite restaurant in town, with my favorite person in Chambéry, Ingrid, who is a server there. Well, Ingrid retired so that was a huge disappointment. But Marc, the restaurant owner gave me some contact information for her so I would try to contact her anyway. Next, I wanted to go see if the second hand book store I found was still there. They had a large selection of english books and the people who worked there were helpful to me. I must have read and returned over a dozen books the last time. But they were not there anymore either. Another disappointment. C’est la vie. But despite these disappointments, I was able to get my bike stored at the hotel in Grésy-sur-Aix and do the few errands I needed to accomplish while I had a car so that was all good. So next, it was time to travel back to Paris to met the Freemans.