After breakfast on June 24th, it was time for us to take the shuttle from Zermatt back to Tasch, get our car and drive to France. We had lots of options for the route, but I navigated us along the south side of Lake Leman (Geneva on the other side in Switzerland), through small towns along the lake, through some back country, and into Annecy. We had reservations for 3 nights at our hotel there.
The countryside along the way, even on the autobahn and the autoroute was lovely. We did kind of wonder about these giant dishes...
To get to the Hotel du Palais de l'Isle, we had some interesting directions. We were to drive to a speaker on the pedestrian street, call the hotel, drive across the bridge (the very one you will see later in the pictures), stop at the hotel, dump out our luggage and drive to the underground parking.
It was so crowded that Friday afternoon that doing that was a huge problem. It was compounded by the fact that we had multiple bags of stuff including lots of dirty laundry. We literally dumped all of them into the tiny lobby of the hotel. Then we tried to follow the directions the desk clerk told us, but the street was so crowded we could not get through the way we were supposed to go.
So we got off the pedestrian street the best we could and then started circling the drain to try to get back to the parking area. As was normal, Trout was tired, cranky and hungry and not in the mood for doing that. Fortunately, it only took us about 15 minutes to find our way back and park, but it seemed like forever. We later walked the way we were told to go and discovered that would not have been an obvious or easy way to go, either.
We had considered taking the car out and driving around the area and maybe up to Chamonix in the French Alps, but we got so comfortable and settled in that we just left the car and explored the little town on foot.
So this is the front of our hotel.
This is the street sign on the building.
This was the window in our room. The hotel did have an elevator, thank goodness.
After taking our stuff up to the room, we set out to get some lunch. France typically has more restricted hours for eating, and we were having a hard time finding anyplace open. While looking, we stopped in this little church.
Across the street from the ATM I used to get money, we saw this place that was still open. I was up for going in and buying a picnic there, but Trout wanted to sit down somewhere. Yes, these beautiful dishes were real and for sale. None is sweet in this area, all are savory.
We did find a small place along the water to have a bite to eat. It is the one with the red umbrellas in the right of this picture. It was just a little bistro, but the pommes frites were great.
After eating we took off walking again. This is the pedestrian zone right behind our hotel.
You could tell it was June -- and white was the big color for summer.
We were heading in the direction of the laundromat the desk clerk told us about. We came upon this sizable square. I liked the combination of old and new buildings here.
You can see Trout walking toward the corner arch. Restaurants were just starting to open up for dinner again.
That was the way to the laundromat. On Saturday morning we went there somewhat early for us. I was sure it would be full of people and that it would take forever to do our clothes. But when we arrived there was only one woman about our age drying her things. During the entire time I was there (Trout went off looking for an English book store) there were a total of 5 other people who came in to wash and/or dry their clothes.
Two of them were the Australian couple we chatted with. They were about our age, had farmed cotton and had even been to Lubbock. They were traveling for about 3 months, escaping the Australian winter and were ending their trip in the US and Canada and flying home from Dallas. Sometimes it's as much fun to meet travelers from other countries as to meet locals.
The first time anyone goes to Europe, they are often surprised at the number of dogs in restaurants. There are very few places where they are not allowed, and you usually can see at least one sitting outside with their owners.
This is the arch we were supposed to drive through to get to the parking garage upon our arrival. It's lovely when it's not crammed full of people at the ice cream place. You'll see a picture of that later.
Upon walking out the way we were to have driven out, we found ourselves on a main street looking back at the entrance into the old part of the town.
The castle was just above us. The gold building on the right is our hotel.
While walking around, we saw this picture-worthy motorcycle. Trout says it is a pricey one.
There were families picnicing. I thought we were in an Impressionist painting.
There were paddle boat rentals and lots of people in and on Lake Annecy. The next posting will be all about our trip around it.
You could go on a beautiful wooden boat to tour the lake if you wanted.
There were these fun pedal horses for kids to ride.
We loved the tree bark.
And we loved the trees and dappled sunshine.
There were some very nice small boats moored in this area. Trout like this one a lot.
We were walking along the Promenade Jacquet.
Across the street was this church and on the way to it was the entrance to our underground parking.
As we were walking back down the pedestrian street, it started to get dark.
There were crowds at this ice cream place just below our window from the minute it opened in the morning until it closed at night. Look to the left and you can see the arch we were supposed to drive through. There were lots of ice cream places in the area, some huge, but the Glacier des Alpes was the most popular. It would have long lines when the others had no one in them. The sign says they make their ice cream right there, i.e. they are an artisan glacier. I went for the anise and Trout had rum raisin.
It seemed like the later it got at night, the more action there was.
So we just leaned against the wall of the main bridge and watched. This baloon guy was very popular with the kids.
After seeing so many of them, I finally had to take a picture of a Jack Russell. That was probably the dog we saw the most on the whole trip.
The old prison just got more picturesque the darker it got.
The other buildings in the area looked striking as it got darker, too.
Of course there were ducks.
"Our" street was really busy with diners and walkers. This is about how it looked when we arrived only it was lunch time.
Trout wanted me to take a picture of these bugs.
There's that charming prison again.
I'm not sure what I was doing, but Trout stepped into this church and said it was very nice inside.
The swans were a favorite with the crowds. They looked like they were too dumb to get up on the upper level, but they were actually hanging out and waiting for something edible to drop over the edge.
We had breakfast at the hotel 2 of the 3 mornings we were there, but one we slept too late. I was up for trying the little Creperie du Chateau right behind our hotel. We had a fun conversation with the older couple sitting next to us. When she couldn't think of the English word for sheep, she bleated. Some sounds are universal. I linked to a review of this restaurant on a blog called Sit Down, Dig In. It was a good meal.
The entertainment was good, too. Remember that big square? There was a food market there on Sunday morning. It closed at noon and these vehicles made their way past us and out through that arch while we were eating, leaving a view of the old part of our hotel across the street. I think this is where Trout came out when he took the spiral stairs down from our room rather than the elevator.
So Trout and I are always talking about French food. We had decent meals the whole time in Annecy. Even the one we had along the canal at the place that catered to Germans was decent. But the best were at the French places.
I already mentioned the creperie above. I had both a savory crepe and a sweet one. We also had lunch at the Atelier Gourmand des Jumeaux. We got there toward the end of their lunch hours, and were almost the last to leave, but they were happy to serve us. This is the place where the waiter spoke American-accented English and where we saw the young Asian "models" with the older French men. The food was great. The waiter said he learned his English from American movies and TV.
The other two great places we ate were Il Etait une Fois and Le Bilboquet. We had fabulous meals at both. At the former, the chef came out and talked to us in English. At the latter, Trout had a little difficulty communicating with the waitress, but all was worked out. A young man at a table close to us offered to help if we needed it.
This little town was very busy the weekend we were there. In fact, the desk clerk who was there at night said he didn't know what was going on it was so busy. This is the other place where we mostly saw families with children and few old retirees like us, or young backpackers. I'm beginning to think that was because we stayed in the heart of things in a modestly priced hotel as opposed to a typical tourist place.
