For our second day with the car we drove from Nimes to Avignon, about 45 min away along the highway to the north west. We found a parking spot right underneath the city centre.
Our first day in France we spent in Nîmes. We caught a local bus from the hotel into town. There was some disagreement on what we could or could not buy in terms of tickets from the driver, so this ended up costing us nothing.
Since visiting Paris for the first time in 2009 I haven’t been much of a fan. I enjoyed a lot of it, the museums mainly, but there was a lot that didn’t enjoy. When I went back in 2015 I was determined to like it, but Paris fought back, and I figured I didn’t need to go to Paris again.
I was looking forward to going to somewhere in France other than Paris on this trip.
A couple of years ago I was fortunate to be in the same country as The Tour de France at the same time. We were in Belgium, staying a short train ride away from where the race would wind through a small town and up a decent hill. The plan then was to catch a train and walk up the hill.
The plan this year was to rent a car from Lausanne and just pop over the border into France and see the race not too far from the end of the stage. That was about all the planning I did.
This trip to Europe like the last ones started with a conversation with dad along the lines of:
“Tim, I’m going to a conference in <European Country> in about 12 months, mum is going to come, would you like to go to Europe as well?” “Sure, can we also go to <small European country / principality / micro-state>?”
