Summary
The third holiday this month to cause most businesses to be closed – in this case Ascencion. That, plus intermittent rain, gave us a good excuse to be productive. I exercised and we did a load of wash in the hotel laundry room then (with a good bit of difficulty) returned our rental car at the train station. Spent some time looking for high protein, very low sugar snack bars. It was difficult as 23 grams of sugar per serving is considered “low” here in France! Back to the room to chill then dinner at our hotel listening to the live Afro-folk music from the bar.
Details
Well, today may just be a pretty boring day. It’s supposed to be rainy all day and we’re not going anywhere. Tomorrow we take a bus from here in Grenoble over to Turin in Italy. For that to happen Hertz would like their car back. We have the car reserved until tomorrow but we can’t think we need it today, so we’re planning to try to return it today and see if we can save 90 euros or so.
The hotel offers a breakfast for 36 euros for the two of us, but we got a bunch of fruit and stuff, so we’ll be eating a healthy, economical breakfast in our room. It’s relaxing and tasty. We have a microwave and dishwasher. We ask AI about other “apartment-hotels” in Europe and they seem to be a big thing. This may be our new type of places to stay!
One of the things they have is a room with lots of washers and dryers. We do laundry, though I do turn the dryer heat up at the end and Karen’s afraid I may have shrunk everything. It seems I shouldn’t be allowed near a washer or dryer. [Well played, Scott. Well played.]
Lunch, too, is in the room. It’s the left over Indian food from last night and once again it’s delicious. Karen does her exercising and I work on the blog. Before we know it, we need to get the car back. The plan is to drive there, transact, and then take a long walk. On the drive over it starts to rain. Crap. The Hertz car return is at the train station. How hard can it be to find, am I right? They have to have signs, yes? Wrong.
I double park and Karen’s heads out on foot to find someone who knows something about Hertz or rental car returns or anything. This being France and May it’s a holiday and everywhere is closed or staffed by the lowest, least knowledgeable (and most disgruntled) underling. She learns nothing. I find something on GPS and we head over there, under a torrential downpour.
We do find it (yay) and are able to park the car where we’re supposed to. A guy parking next to us kindly points out the “after hours key return box”. Will fill out the French language return form, including milage, gas level, and parking spot.
We understand the “Any damage” question, but the next one (“Any tiers?”) throws us. Did we cry after we had the accident? We ask three youths passing by. They valiantly try but to no avail. They don’t understand the question either. We’re three floors underground so doing a Google Translate is out of the question. Answer? “Tiers… Are you returning the car for yourself or for someone else… 3rd party… tiers… we get it”.
At the Hertz office, upstairs, it’s dark and locked. A sign on the door explains all the days they’re closed, in May, for all the holidays, including today.
Thankfully for our walk home the rain holds off. We steer ourselves towards the Utile grocery store (part of the Super U chain) but they’re now closed (it’s a holiday). Aldi is open and we shop there. Sorry but that’s one depressing store! We buy some cheese and ham for a sandwich and chips.
Karen, due to her pre-diabetes, brought a slew of low sugar protein bars from across the pond but they’re running low. ChatGPT says maybe she can find more at a sporting goods/health food store. No luck, but she does find some at a gym.
Continuing towards ‘home’ we pass the Indian restaurant where we ate last night. We realize where we are just as our waitress is coming out the front door. She looks at us in puzzlement. I think I know those people! We all smile and wave. She thinks “are they stalking me??”
At dinner time we head downstairs to the hotel restaurant. It being a holiday most restaurants are closed but we verified our place is open. The bar is not only open but hopping. They have live music going on (African/Folk). It’s quite loud and well attended.
Back in the restaurant the music is a bit more muted, thankfully. I order a burger and Karen orders fish with a Beurre Blanc sauce. Where’s the sauce? “Well Madame, here’s what that means in France, BUT we brought you some anyway”. Karen, trained at both the Ritz Escoffier and the Cordon Bleu helpfully tries to explain “Well actually, when a menu says…“ Right though she was, I do try to crawl under the table.
On our way out of the restaurant we pass a big table with eight big burly bikers, all in black leather with their biker gang logo on the back. Them all gingerly sipping wine seems incongruous. Outside, for our after dinner walk, it’s 47°. Did we dress warmly enough? Yes. Later it starts — once again — raining. Do we have rain gear? Nope.
Photos
