Departure and Arrival

I am writing from the second floor of our townhouse in the center of town in St. Aignan, France. We are in the middle of town, listening to the construction of booths outside our window in the town square--Saturday is "Market Day."  The market is so close if you go to the open window in our room you can catch a smell of the fresh fish being organized on a bed of crushed ice.  Anthon and I are the only two awake and plan to take a walk to locate the bakery around the corner (approx. 200 feet [I won't attempt the feet-meters conversion]), buy some goat cheese and some fruit or yogurt and provide this for our breakfast as the other children awake. We just heard the church bells ring seven times indicating it is seven o'clock in the morning (it is 11pm back home).

Departure

How can months of mental preparation, and weeks of packing and organization result in a whirlwind sprint to pack the car and race to the airport? 

We purchased new luggage to allow all the children to "carry" (via roller bags) their own bags. Every day we added more to the luggage (one-week of clothes, 2-3 sets of shoes, etc.) until we felt prepared. I had all our electronics identified and organized in the corner of the room.  When the time came to depart, our ride to the airport arrived (a generous client who owns a limosine company kindly donated a ride to the airport) and suddenly thoughts of our prior trip to New York City and watching the plane leave the jetway without us created a frenzied push to throw everthing reamining to be packed into our bags and out on the porch and into the back of the full-sized suburban that would be chauferring us to the airport.

Once at the airport, with bags all over the sidewalk, we then realized how much (or how little) luggage a three year old can actually drag through the airport.  George and Anthon proved to be amazing travelers, drawing the attention of many as they wheeled their own backpacks attached to their rollerbags through the Salt Lake and Las Vegas Airports.  We checked bags, went through security and grabbed some pizza and nuggets (this would only be the first round of pizza and nuggets). Then it was off to Las Vegas to catch our direct flight to Paris.  In Las Vegas, we gathered our bags, switched to the international terminal--no small feat with all the bags, crowds, shuttles, etc.  Then, round two of nuggets and pizza.

We were thrilled to meet the Olsons at the airport, who had reserved our seats together on the plane.  Scharman sat with the girls in the middle seats; I took the aisle with the two boys.  Once airborne, it was an hour or so of "Stack the States" and "Stack the Countries" (which we highly recommend as an iphone/ipad app) and George opted for a self-made bed on the floor, leaving room for Anthon to stretch-out across the seats. It was a perfect scenario for a dad who had no idea what to expect and who magnaimously offered to take "the boys" on the plane.  The girls each enjoyed a movie, Emme then fell asleep, but our poor Grace just could not get comfortable, and 10 hours later, Grace still had not slept a wink.

Arrival
We disembarked in Paris, wound our way through the Charles de Gaulle airport and through customs and finally to the baggage claim. The girls commented on the kissing; the cheek-to-cheek cultural pleasantries as good-byes and hellos were exchanged.  Then it was to the car rental counter where the foreign travel experience began. I thought most people spoke English and this was going to be "no problem."  But, so far, it has been only French at the car rental counter (thank you Erik Olson for interpreting our reservation back to the original price [saving us $2,000; we owe you dinner]), the gas station (try explaining "my iphone won't connect to the wifi" in a language you don't understand), the sandwich shop, and every stand at the market. Thankfully our landlord is British.

We rented our Peugeot Tepee, 6 speed manual transmission, diesel, packed it to the rafters with our luggage and strollers, and we were off to St. Aignan.  Within minutes, George, Anthon and Grace were asleep.  We caught glimpses of the Eiffel Tower in the distance as we skurted the east side of Paris, heading due south by southwest to the Loire (loo-wa) Valley. 160-175 kilometers an hour (100 mph = 160 kilometers per hour) down the toll road and we arrived in two and one-half hours, through beautiful French countryside of wheat fields and vineyards, and small towns.  We arrived in St. Aignan (san-tan-ya) at 9:15pm (2:15pm Utah time) and became aquainted with our landlord, Starr.

We learned where to find the dustbin (garbage can) for the rubbish, the hoover (vacuum), and the loo (toilet). It all seems right out of a movie set; but most of all we are thrilled to have arrived without incident and excited to learn what life will be like for the next three weeks in St. Aignan.

-Matt