Getting to Cinque Terre

Following the landslides, train cancellation, bus delay, we reached Turin at 20:30 on Aug. 30th. By then, there were no more trains out to Cinque Terre for the day.  Crashing at the train station seriously crossed my mind...but with 3 kids?  Better not!  Found a hotel 5 min from Turin Porto Susa train station. No reservation, just showed up, never in my lifetime showed up at a hotel without a reservation lol.  I didn't even know it would still be possible.  They happened to have a two storey family suite available.  Ha... Everyone gets a bed, the most luxurious accommodation to date 😂

The next morning, bright and early, Nick and I went to the train station and had our tickets sorted. We had a few hours to spare, enough time to have a nice breakfast. Nick was determined for everyone to have a good breakfast before we got moving. He was right. The most important meal of the day!!! We're a serious breakfast family. So we found a neighborhood cafe with espresso, croissants and sandwiches etc. I was absolutely petrified when he asked if they had American breakfast What happened to the guy who always encourages kids to adapt to the local custom in a foreign country? What's gotten into him? The server was nice, didn't seem to be offended (or he hid it well), and said they do have pancakes, eggs and bacon, just not on the menu. Oh man he was thrilled. In the end, we had our first-ever American breakfast with freshly squeezed orange juice in Italy since we left Canada, for just €25. Oh man we love Italy already.

Getting on the train headed to Cinque Terre

Arriving Monterosso, and this is what was in front of us

outside the Monterosso train station

Time to celebrate - longest travel to date

Beanie was happy to get a good meal finally

Noah's favorite Pesto Spaghetti

OMG, Italians sure know how to make pasta!

Gelato Time!!!

Night View of Monterosso

This was our first night in Monterosso.  Despite losing 24 hours, we were just happy that we got here safe and sound.  We will start our hike tomorrow, and see what other towns have to offer.  

Rough Start to Cinque Terre

I'm a planner!  Once we know where we're going and when, I start making reservations.  I booked trains to Cinque Terre out of Chambéry 4 months ago.  Good price when you book early, less than 250€ for the whole family from Chambéry to Turin, to Genoa, then finally Monterosso.  Can't beat that. 

I can't plan for Mother Nature.  Rain started to come down a few days ago and it rained and rained.  Thunder and lightning!  Not good news for us.  Our train out of Chambéry was cancelled due to a landslide.  All railroads are closed until further notice.  Alright, that's ok.  We'll take bus.  Scooped up the last 5 tickets with FlixBus into Turin.  If everything goes well, we'll still be able to make our connections in Turin.  That's a big if.  Our 7:50am bus didn't show, was delayed to 10:50am.  Ten fifty came and went, no bus.  It didn't show up until 2:30pm.  We remained hopeful.  We should be able to get in Monterosso by midnight.  

We got on the bus, feeling pretty good about the rest of the trip.  I could finally close my eyes and take a snooze.  And I did.  

An hour later, I woke up, checking our progress. Looking at the map, I was surprised to see that we were travelling away from Turin.  😂 Looked like the bus had turned around and took a different route.  Oh man... May this day end soon.  Safe and sound!!!

 

Mango Smoothie, Anyone?

So on our last day in Lyon, as usual, Nick went to get fresh du pain for us.  That's our go-to breakfast (refresh du pain, corn meal, le saucisson, and fresh fruits, and coffee for Nick, soy milk for me and the kids).  Yeah we take breakfast seriously.  

Nick: Honey, look at what I found at the market...fresh mango smoothie!

Me: Oh that looks so good...Kids are gonna love it.

Nick couldn't wait, opened it and poured a glass for himself.  It was 8am and 28 Celsius already!  Fresh mango smoothie sounded like a great option to cool down.  

Nick: Hummm...interesting...wanna a sip?

Me (took a huge gulp): This is NOT smoothie!  

Examining the label...pomme de terre and oignion...

Me: This is potato onion soup!!!

It was yummy though.  Warmed it up and had it for breakfast LOL

Aillon-le-Vieux

We left our second favorite city, Lyon, hopped on the train eastbound toward the French Alpes, rented a car, and drove to a teeny tiny village, Aillon-le-Vieux, a commune with a population of 200 or less.  It's located in the department Savoie (73) of the Rhône-Alpes region.

Map of French Regions

Map of French Departments

Aillon-le-Vieux is less than 2 hour drive to Chamonix, Mont Blanc.  This will be our base for the next eight days.  I'm super excited about this stay, looking forward to escaping the heat wave,  living in the mountains, and enjoying the fresh air from the Alpines.

The drive from Gare de Chambéry to our French Gite, le Sabot de Venus, was out of this world.  It felt like we stepped into the story book, Heidi.  Our little 5 passenger Peugeot was kicking up clouds of dust on those beautiful hills dotted by tiny houses, any of which could probably be featured in a Switzerland architecture magazine.  I kept snapping away, hoping to capture the beauty in its entirety in front of us.  We just couldn't believe our eyes.  Are we still in France?

Musée du Louvre

This was our first attempt to visit the Louvre although it was our first visit to Paris.  It's just such a taunting task, not your typical pleasant stroll through an art museum.  But since we're leaving France, and who knows when we're coming back to this beautiful country again in the future, we decided it was a must-do.  So over a month prior to our last trip to Paris, I booked the tickets to the Louvre online.  It was stressful from the beginning.  We had to decide the time of the entry 40 days before our actual visit.  So pediatric dental visits are not allowed, or any kind of unforeseen events would not take place that day. The upside of it was kids were free admission. LOL...instantly, I felt I made some precious Euro. 

The Louvre is such a beautiful piece of architecture, no doubt about it!  I just can't get enough of it.

Our entry to the museum was uneventful although it took over 20 mins to just get through the security check, which was a bit of a joke.  Three security guys were at work, one of whom asked you to put your packs through the scanner, the 2nd guy sat in front of the screen, supposed to be scanning for any dangerous items like a weapon, but he was dozing off, catching up on his afternoon nap LOL...and the 3rd guy just stood there making sure you grabbed your packs.  These jobs would probably be replaced by AI in the future.  The kids had a good laugh about that.

Louvre is Louvre.  The reputation is there for a reason.  It's absolutely massive.  One could easily spend an entire day there and not scratch the surface.  It turned our kids into art addicts.  I had never expected them to be enthusiastic about the arts in the past.  Here we were, at the most renowned art museum, they had the patience to read through the descriptions of each art piece.  They would look at the sculptures, talk about the piece, and recognize all the gods and goddesses (mostly from reading Rick Riordan's books).  They would comment on why the sculpture looked the way it did, and the stories behind it.  To be honest, I felt this stuff was a bit out of my league, haha...

This was just one of the two floors of French sculptures.  

We only had time to cover one floor.

Napolean III's dining room.  

Louvre was his residence when he was the emperor of France.

This entire section was about him (dining, reception, ball room, bedroom, 

and an entertaining room etc..)

We had to see her.  That was on every visitor's mind.

Please watch the video and prepare yourself in case you want to visit her one day.  

I wonder if it would be a different scene if we had visited in the low season?

There she is, teeny tiny, 

but attracting people from all over the world

and you get less than 30 secs with her 

before the security guys usher you along

These two enjoying "dark" paintings

Levina's more excited about the Crown Jewel Room

The Crown Jewel Room when every single tourist had been kicked out.

We spent over 4 hours at the Louvre, and didn't feel enough at all.  I'd definitely go back.  Kids were most interested in the sculptures, and we only had time to visit the French sculpture room.  There was a room full of Italian sculptures from the renaissance period we didn't get to see.  Next time for sure.   

Walking in Normandie with Canadian Soilders

History came to life for all of us in Caen, Normandie.  No more reading stories or event time lines from the history books.  Nick's been preparing the kids (and me) for this very trip all these years by feeding us war stories and background information.  It was all too remote, out of context and hard to comprehend until we came to Caen.  It was extremely windy and rainy during our 4 days there, with occasional sunny breaks, but quite fitting considering the purpose of our visit.

We visited Mémorial de Caen where World War I, World War II and the Cold War were presented in great deal, from the background information, the motives, the triggering events, military weaponry to the aftermath of each war.  We spent a good 6 hours at the museum (took a short lunch break), and had to pick and choose which sections to cover.   One could easily dedicate a couple of days to the museum and not get bored.  So much information to absorb, and too many lessons to learn, but so little time for them all.

the Front of Mémorial de Caen

Love seeing our Canada flag waving in the wind

There was a plaque for each country in an enclosed glass display 

outside the museum.  

Here's the Canadian one.

 

Nick and I were a bit concerned with the girls' attention span on this subject.

But to our surprise, they got into it right from the get-go.  Levina took the time 

reading everything along with the pictorial presentations.

German's Enigma Machine.  It took allies years to decode this machine.

Nick explains the kids the war strategies on the map

Kids studying the timeline of Day D

Nick explaining the Fall of Berlin Wall

We visited rhe Canadian War Cemetery in Bény-sur-Mer.

On the way to the Canadian War Cemetery, located just 25 min North of Caen

 

Passing through Bény-sur-Mer, a quiet little town, 

but it surely would be a different sight over 80 years ago.

Before entering the cemetery

Both countries' flags standing tall side by side in front of the cemetery

The monument dedicated to the World War II cemetery

Not an easy walk through these rows of monuments.  Nine sets of Canadian brothers

lost their lives in World War II.  One particular family, the Westlake family, lost all three boys.

They were all buried here.

We proceeded to drive another 10 mins to visit the Juno Beach Centre, a museum dedicated to the Canadian soldiers' involvement and effort during the wars.

Nick and the kids standing on top of a bunker from World War II

The once upon-a-time sandy beaches are no longer visible.

Vegetation has spread all over the dunes over the years 

We took a guided tour down to the bunkers.   

Imaging the German soliders living and breathing in these 

wasn't distant any more.

Some of these bunkers had to be dug out due to the ever changing landscape 

The Germans constructed and placed these objects everywhere on the beach. 

The particular shape was designed for a couple of reasons.  I won't disclose them here.

  

Our tour guide, originally from Quebec, gave us an excellent tour to the bunkers.

Driving through Courseulles-sur-Mer, the small town where Juno Beach Centre is located.

We had never seen so many Canadian flags in the streets in a foreign country.  

Definitely nice to see our Canadian boys sacrifices are remembered in many different ways.

We took a quick stop to visit the Omaha Beach Memorial for one of the major allies during WWII.

This is what the beach looks like today

We had to remember the fact that we were able to enjoy playing football 

on this very beach came with a hefty price. 

If you ever visit Paris and want to get away from the crowds, I'd recommend taking a detour to Caen, and spending a couple of days there.  It'll be a trip to remember for years to come.  We enjoyed every minute of our time in Caen.