Spring at last?

After dropping off the rental RV in Amsterdam, we toured the Rhine valley in Germany, Strasbourg and the Alsace wine country. Excellent white wines!

Then we headed for the Swiss alps, where we hit some awesome spring skiing at Verbier. So great, in fact, that we stayed there for three days. This was pretty easy because the free parking lot at Verbier is right by the Centre Sportif (where you can get a shower for 3 Swiss Francs, and a very nice public toilet. ...and it was warm enough that we could get by without running our gas heat all the time. The temperature was somewhere around 15 C, downright hot for the mountains!

We had to drive the long way (around Lake Geneva) from Verbier to Chamonix because there is a low-clearance tunnel on the route over the pass. Of course it took us a while to realize this, so we wasted a couple of hours driving up and down the pass from the Swiss side, nearly catching our brakes on fire in the process.

The good weather was short-lived. We are now waiting out a spring snowstorm in Chamonix. Oh well, it gives us time to do our taxes.

-SK
a Chamonix, FR

The MacLouis...

So besides drinking lots of beer and having a new nephew, the other thing that has been keeping us busy is the MacLouis. And what, exactly is the MacLouis, you ask? It is our new RV! Yes, we have managed to purchase, register and insure our very own "camping-car" in France! (And when we returned the rental RV to Braitman & Woudenberg in Amsterdam, they were duly impressed by this feat.) It took a full week of phone calls to the bank, meeting with French insurance agencies, getting documents translated, phone calls to our US insurance company, international faxes, etc., but on Wednesday afternoon, we rolled out of Isle de France Caravanes with a new "home"!

We celebrated with a champagne toast at a rest area on the autoroute, where we spent the night en route to Amsterdam with our little convoy (yes, we even used our ski radios to stay in contact with each other).

So thanks to M. Gregory Werner at Ile de France Caravanes, and Mme. Edwige Rhongerud at MAAF Assurances, we are now rolling in (well, at least a little more) style!

The MacLouis Lagan 252 is on a Fiat 2.3 diesel. It is what they call in France a profilé, which means it doesn't have the over-cab part (already getting better gas mileage than the old Rimor). It is 5.6 meters long, 2.7 meters high and about 2 meters wide. All told, larger than some apartments in Les Menuiers! It holds 4 for driving, but really only 2 for sleeping. (There is a third berth, but I think it only fits if you're less than 5'4" tall, and might be a little lumpy since it is partially on the front seat.) It has a kitchen unit with a 2 burner stove and a 3-way fridge, and a bathroom with toilet and shower.

This is the first big accomplishment on the trip, and we are quite proud of ourselves!

However, it all feels like borrowed time, since our insurance can only be renewed for the period that our drivers licenses are valid, which is technically only a year. (After a year, we are supposed to get French licenses. Which doesn't sound very fun.)

While we were waiting for everything to go through, we spent lots of time getting to know le départment de l'Oise. We spent the bulk of our nights at Campix, in St. Leu d'Esserent, which is a campground built out of an old sandstone quarry. Very cool spot! From there, and unfortunately mostly in the rain, we toured Chantilly, Compiènge, Beauvais, Écouen, and of course, Cauffry, where we bought the RV, and Gisors, where we bought the insurance. In addition to having an impressive gothic cathedral, Beauvais has something we've been looking for all over Europe, a laundromat with internet access! The Musée de la Renaissance in the chateau at Écouen has some amazing pieces, including a magnificent tapestry and crazy mechanical boat. You can see some of Oise in our Tour de l'Oise photo album...

In the picture with this post, I am holding the results of our Amsterdam shopping spree. Necessary for outfitting!

-SK

Barbie, Beer and Babies!

So, I think the last entry was from the Brussels airport waiting for Craig's aunt Barbie to arrive for the Belgian Beer Festival... Her flight from Amsterdam was four hours late (yes, I think you could practically ride a bike from Amsterdam to Brussels in 4 hours, but oh well!), but she finally made it and we started our whirlwind tour of Belgian beers, starting at a tiny, smoky, neighborhood bar in Brussels called Moeder Lambic. There, we tried 5 different beers, then went on to Het Biercircus (luckily walking distance from the Phileas Fogg B&B) where we tried 6 more... you get the picture.

We did a two-day driving tour of the breweries in the Ardennes (the hilly part of Belgium, in the southeast), then swung back to Brussels for a tour of the Cantillon Brasserie, and headed to Sint Niklaas for the culminating event, the Zythos Bierfestival, a trade-show style event with over 50 breweries represented, all sampling their brews for 1 Euro a taste. By the end of the event, we had tried about 100 different Belgian beers, and the scary thing is that their was only about 5 or 6 that we wouldn't buy again -- beer is really that good here! (Steph's #1 pick: Rochefort 8; Craig's #1 pick: Dubuisson Bush 12; Barbie's #1 pick: Du Borq Triple Moine?)

It was after the first day of the Bierfestival (so we were probably up to about 75 tastings), that the phone woke us up at 7:00 in the morning. Twice.

It was Andrew calling to tell us that our nephew was born! Congratulations to Andrew and Cori, and welcome little Toby!

Catching up...

Sorry for the lack of entries lately. It has been an insane few weeks, and so much has happened that we can't get it all into one blog entry, so please read the next few to get caught up... New pictures have also been posted, so check out our photo albums as well!

-SK

à Amsterdam

Excited... and frustrated

Well, we put money down on an RV yesterday! It is very exciting to have a "home" of our own soon! Then we drove into Belgium and got stuck in the mud at our campgroud. We had to get a tow truck to pull us out. It was a major letdown to an otherwise very exciting day...

Now, we are waiting at the Brussels airport for Craig's aunt Barbie to arrive... for the Belgian Beer Festival!

-SK

a Bruxelles