Flight 109 to Boston

First I have to pack, and I dread it so much I am updating my blog first.
I have clothes and stuff everywhere.
Things for the kids
This will be a trick getting it all in.

I am on flight 109 seat 21b, extra leg room. powerport. SeatGuru gave me the best location for my flight.
I leave London at about 11:30, in Boston before 3PM

Dinner at Ratatouille

Dinner at Ratatouille  was wonderful. Met some old colleagues from FIL for drinks and dinner.
Located in Marylebone Ratatouille offers wonderful French cusine at reasonable rates.
I had a Cherve Chaud salad, Filet with Roquerft dressing and Pomme Tart.

Tres bien.

From Rome to London

Flew from Rome to London on Friday.
I still understand why people in Italy think its allright to cut in line.
The airport is a disorganized mess in Italy.
But once on board we had a sunny view of the Italian coast, the Swiss Alps and then clouds.
Arrival in London was easy, although my plan of using my US Passort to breeze through immigartion did not get me through the Heathrow immigration agent with speed.
Once past her unsmiling booth I was off to the Heathrow Express.
From there it was a few steps in Padington Station

I slept well in a large room

Welcome to Rome

After a delayed, but not much flight on Easyjet I made it to Rome.
The festival seating approach on this low cost carrier drives me nuts!.
I decided not to stand for 1 hour and wait until they they actually start boarding to get off my butt.
Smart move, I ended up almost at the end of the line, then after some Italian gut cut me, they seem to do that, I ended up getting on board rather quickly because they opened up ticket counter right where I was standing, I got seat 6 C, aisle near the front

It was going fine until some guy decided to jam his luggage in the bin over me by crushing everything in my backpack!  I told him to STOP and he did, hmmm where is he from.
We worked together to move the bags so his fit, and all my stuff was not broken, except maybe for my camera that no longer works.

After a very long wait, well long to me my bag came off the belt and with the great tip from the cop at the bag pickup area (who was nice and spoke perfect English) I was off to the Termni for 4 Euro, the first bargain of the trip.

I quickly found my hotel Hotel Alantico
Dont be fooled by the those nice pictures on the website, this is a true value hotel.
With a fascist era elevator and smoked filled rooms that have not been updated since I was young, you get what you pay for .

The air conditioner

View at night

After a sort crappy free breakfast , service was worse than the food I was off

I have to admit the short walk to many sites says Location, Location , Location for the hotel
See sites below.....Ciao

Tuesday was Travel Day

All day of travel Tuesday from Bangoles to Orly and then the flight on

Easyjet

The night before I had an awesome dinner that included hot boiled egg soup with cream, and some other stuff, Bon Appetit 

Then I slept well on the large bed, that had exactly the same linens as the Hotel Beryl

Busy Monday

Very busy day.
Met with Madame Beudet elderly &F cagey French  lady to clean house, she left with Euro 150.
Spent a long time Navigating French bureaucracy to pay overdue taxes.
Thoughtful Rachel at one of the many offices I visited had water company out to the house very fast.

It was then I discovered three leaks in bathroom pipes.

Hotel Gayot tonight.
Excellent food, small room and perhaps the worst internet connection in France!

Look who has the sweet spot for his Mercedes in front of the Hotel
I am off to Rome in the morning.

Sunday Evening In Bangoles

Another day & night in Bangoles
The weather has not been great, but no rain when I wanted to do something outside for long periods.
After cleaning up more of the house it was off to dinner.

Il Crocodile is right across from the Casino.

After a great dinner of Salad of Goat Cheese and some pasta it was off to the casino spending 2 hours and losing more Euros, not a lucky trip.

Tomorrow its off to the Marie in Saint Maurice to pay the taxes and meet Madame Beaudet, again?

Sunday Update Bonjour from Bangoles

The Tour De Normandie left from here today
Above you see the starting line

To the right one of the teams set of bikes




So far that has been the highlight of the day


Madame Beaudet was a no show becasue Coralee never confirmed!
Sacre Bleau!

I ran from Bangoles to the house and then went kind of all over the place as I was trying to find the bike race, however running on foot is not an effective way to catch professional bicycle racers.

I never saw them today.  They have another overcast and rainy day to race. I was lucky I did my 12k before it rained.

After the run, and a shower it off to the Lido for a salad and some frites

Arrival in Saint Maurice

After an uneventful and easy ride from the airport to the house as I feared the house was a mess.
And no water.

Needless to say , I am staying at a Hotel.

Coralee at the Office Du Tourisme got the water department out to me house fast, but they figured out that the town shut it off!

I have to go to the Marie Monday to get the water back on.
Coralee then hooked me up with Madame Beaudet Sunday at 11 to see if she wants to clean the house.
Big excitement of the day was the Tour De Normandie, bike racing through Bangoles

Dinner was at Cafe De Paris

Arrival at CDG

Little did I know that they had angels working at the Hertz counter.

After gietting a bunch of Parisian attitude for being in the Hertz # line without my card, they have not sent me one in years, the Hertz angel gave me a brand new Mercedes automatic to drive

Boston to Paris

My AA flight from Boston to JFK was really delayed
I had to run like OJ at JFK, but when I got to the plane they upgraded me to business class
Nice!

All flight attendants are over 50 now, but the one filling my champagne glass non-stop was nice.
East flight to Paris

No pics since I left Suzanne's camera at the Boston Admirals club, not surprisingly no one "found it" when I called!

Flow Control At JFK

Or at least thats who they are blaming now for my flight being delayed more.
They tell me that I will 10 minutes to get from my flight to the next
Perfect except what about my bag??
Looks like the 10PM flight out of JFK,
American does not care about me.

Leaving for Europe Flight Delayed

My 3:05 PM flight is now 3:25
But the nice lady at the Admirals Club check in desk assures me I will easily make my connection at JFK

and she gave me 2 free drinks

Saint Maurice, Rome & London march - April 2010

Its back to Europe to check on the house in Saint Maurice, a visit with the pope in Rome and then overnight in London