The Impossibility Of Good Bread

I started out by asking people in the street where to get good bread, a perfectly reasonable question in France, but I was getting very strange – why on earth would you want to eat bread anyway? – looks. It turns out that the Spanish only eat ham. Seriously, who knew they ate so much of the stuff? There are as many shops selling ham here as there are pharmacies in France, and trust me, that is a lot. My favourite is the museo del jamón (which if my Spanish serves me is the museum of ham) which is either a really popular name for a shop selling ham or it’s a chain. Our closest Museo del Jamon is open from 8.00am – 2.00am. Try that on a 35 hour working week. So we are back on lovely white sliced bread, which at the moment, possibly due to slight translation problems comes in slices as thick as, well I don’t even know how to describe how thick it is. Basically you have to put an awful lot of ham in the sandwich to be able to taste the ham; luckily we are in the right country for that. The bread is very sweet and sticky obviously not meant to be eaten with ham, so I’m guessing you’re just meant to take you ham straight up.

Grocery shopping is lucky dip at the moment as I am shopping on the internet. It takes a long time and a lot of dictionary consultation and I am taking delivery of a lot of things I can’t remember ordering. The brand names are ever so slightly different like Cif for Jif, Dodot for Pampers and Kalia for Vanish. Toilet Duck is obviously Pato W.C.
I am pleased to report that anchovies are widely available but I just can’t find those Kleenex tissues with balm yet.

Dogs are banned here like children are in Paris, in restaurants, shops and other public places. Parisians definitely prefer dogs to children. No children, but come on in with your smoking dog.

I can’t comment on Spanish television yet but as this is the birthplace of Hello (¡Hola!) where the big news is at the moment is Carlos y Camilla I have high hopes of entertaining quality television.

Maybe it’s because I grew up in that fashion disaster that was the 70’s and had an orange vinyl waistcoat with matching orange vinyl miniskirt – yes I really did, presumably to match my hair colour and it was my very best outfit, I have the school photo to prove it, alas available only in black and white, that I find the children’s fashion here so alarming. In Madrid it’s like stepping back in time, far beyond the horrors of the 70’s. The outfits the Madrileño children are wearing are borderline ridiculous. The boys are wearing long shorts with braces (naturally) with long socks and plaid shirts with button-down collars, girls are wearing (in soft pastel blue or pink) very short dresses with frilly underwear, little cropped cardigans in very fine wool, ballet slippers and large satin bows that make their heads look like Easter eggs. These outfits are worn to the park and not just on Sundays. Of course they all have those tailored overcoats with velvet collars and if they belong to the same family they will be wearing exactly the same outfit.

Protests and pigeons

Undoubtedly Paris is a breathtakingly beautiful city; and the shopping is great once you have navigated the pitfalls of a 35 hour working week.
Is it closed on a Monday or a Tuesday?
Of course it’s closed on Sunday.
Does it close for lunch from 12.00 to 14.00?
Or 13.00-15.00?
Or maybe 12.00-15.00?
Then you can go to Madeleine Gely at 218 Avenue Saint-Germain, a shop selling handy little fur lined umbrellas and custom made umbrellas, or to Maria Luisa at 19 bis Rue Mont Thabor, the only stockist of Manolo Blahnik in Paris, carrying a small but perfectly formed collection, Or my favourite shop in Paris, BHV, though I have to admit they have reasonable opening hours; they are open on Mondays and lunchtimes. BHV is a department store (8 floors) with a fantastic Aladdin’s hardware cavern in the basement.

I’m sorry to have to bring this up but why do Parisian men have to pee on the streets?
Clearly it’s a guy thing to pee outside. Here they mark there territory on the street, that’s obviously if for some inexplicable reason they can’t do it in a car park which seems to be the preferred choice, more discreet perhaps? Or maybe it’s just a seasonal thing – car parks are preferable in the winter?

Something else inexplicable, why were the Foreign Legion marching wearing what appeared to be butchers’ aprons and carrying axes during the 14th July parade?

Protestors are out in force as we approach the strike season, there is even a website: www.lesgreves.com to ascertain who is striking this week. The organisation of the protests is impressive. Groups from all over France arrive at different metro stations, and then make their way to the starting point on foot. Off they go, marching in an orderly fashion with flags denoting which region they have come from. They sometimes have balloons. Maia has become quite a fan, especially if they have balloons. They are followed by police who are followed by the street cleaners.

The beautiful wide boulevards of Paris so ideal for protesters and parades were not in fact built for the citizens so much as against the citizens. They were designed to be too wide to build barricades across, and straight enough to aim a canon at any citizens that might be uprising in the streets. Protestors didn’t have the support they enjoy today back in the time of Napoleon III. Paris was redesigned by Haussmann, a city planner. Personally I see a pattern, city planners against the people. It continues to this day, in one of the universities, pebbles are embedded in concrete to make it too slippery for protesting students to stand on when water canons are being aimed at them.

There are principally two problems with Parisian parks; firstly you’re not allowed to sit on the grass except for one small over subscribed patch of grass in the Jardin de Luxembourg, that leads to the second problem of trying to find a park bench that is not enshrouded in pigeon fertilizer.
The Parisian pigeons seem to be a lot larger and sleeker than the London pigeons I remember, but that could just be a cultural thing, obviously the Parisian pigeons are more concerned with grooming whilst the Londoners are out drinking on the rooftops.
We are talking about big fat fornicating birds, and I do mean that literally. All they do is chase each other, for shagging purposes and eat what I fervently hope are conceptive pills. It’s a vicious circle; they are supplied with copious amounts of baguette crumbs by the little old ladies of the hood, which then makes them too fat (or are they all pregnant?) to get any decent elevation when flying. Consequently when chased by children, they barely make it over the children’s heads (that surely could be intentional on the part of the pigeons). The little old ladies `tut tut´ and feed the pigeons more bread, possibly deliberately, to keep them flying low over the children’s heads.

I also have been living on bread as it is so magnifique and proof man can live on bread and, wine and cheese alone, with maybe an occasional salad thrown in. Surely more agreeable than the Otago University researchers who tried to prove that man, or possibly they meant students, a different species altogether, could live on beer and fish and chips, allegedly they all got scurvy. It’s amazing I haven’t turned into a smelly wine soaked baguette by now, but it could possibly take a little longer, I will press on with the study.

I have recently spent time in the suburbs (banlieue) of Paris, a very scary place for someone with absolutely no sense of direction; I need mappy to go to the supermarket.
Yes, if you live in the suburbs you can have a garden and therefore dogs – not that the lack of a private garden prevents the inner city dwellers from rampant dog ownership. Or you could live in the suburbs and have three dogs all needing psychoanalysis. Two big dogs, one of a nervous disposition whose fur falls out and eats her own tail, the other big one has halitosis and a taste for small dogs and the small dog that lives inside and thinks she’s a cat.
And yes, you could even have you own private swimming pool. Or you could have a swimming pool full of gold fish, which would be tragic if it wasn’t 13°C in July. It was tragic last year (during la canicule) when it was so hot that the acorns simultaneously decided to commit suicide one night at 10pm.
So I am looking forward to getting out of la banlieue and back to the city and into our apartment. Just as soon as our band of Portuguese builders and Romanian cabinet maker (certified at the University of Transylvania) leave. Five months and counting.

Detropicalization

Detropicalization: to adapt to non- tropical regions, esp. in regard to a return to Europe, esp. Paris with recently acquired apartment under renov. for an est. 4-5 month period, after three years or more in tropical regions

I’ll start at the top. No humidity (comparatively speaking) – so my hair is fabulous.
Moving on, my ears have gotten larger (no it’s not an age thing). It appears I have an allergy to cold weather. This is preposterous, for although my homeland could be described as a Pacific Island, it is by no means a tropical one and that’s not even taking into account over a decade spent in London living in a climate very similar to the one here.
I'm guessing it was the three year hiatus in more equatorial climes. In fact it happened once before in KL, just before we left. I was holding an ice cold bottle of coke on my delicate, lightly tanned, bare arms (the pigmentation was sucked out of me within hours of arrival here) and I got a strange rash in the shape of a coke bottle which took a couple of hours to clear.
It starts with my ears, they get itchy and swell (think bright red rugby player cauliflower ears), then my cheeks get red and itchy though don’t seem to puff up much and then – this is the fun part – my lips. We are talking about collagen injected inflatables. It takes about 10 minutes of exposure to reach stage one (the ears) though this can easily be averted by wearing a hat, and a further 10 minutes per stage. It takes an hour to deflate. Not exactly debilitating, yet strange all the same.

Now that Spring has sprung and all is well now on that front, however Spring has separate concerns for us. As it is now light until 9.30pm at night Maïa is having light sensitivity issues, which I guess explains why she never got jetlag. This is easily remedied with blackout curtains.

Speaking of my Little French Girl, she has become obsessive about wiping her feet. The LFG can’t walk past a door mat without thoroughly wiping her feet. I’m not really sure why this has come about as the sidewalks are remarkably free of crote de chien (the same of which cannot be said of park benches and pigeon excrement).
The streets and sidewalks are comprehensively cleaned and positively sparkle. I initially thought water mains were bursting all over Paris and commented to the FM (no longer known as the GM) what a terrible waste of water it was, when it was pointed out to me that the people in green suits were deliberately turning on the water, letting it gush down the street, and then giving it a good scrub – a fine use of water, I’m sure you’ll agree.

Sadly the LFG has finally lost her movie star wave – she just wasn’t getting the accolades from her fans when waving from a bus. The only appropriate response she got was from a boatful of tourists (mostly Asian) on the Seine. She is now focusing more on little old ladies, some of whom do in fact stop to say how cute she is especially if she is wearing her very cute (if I do say so myself) raincoat with matching boots ensemble.

The LFG hasn’t inherited the cold allergy, luckily for her as she does have an allergy to gloves and hats. She will wear a scarf, although this could be an innate chic French thing (who knows how they tie the things, I will have to wait until she is old enough to explain it to me). LFG also likes coats, then again this is fashion linked – one also needs a matching bag.

Now that the LFG and I fall under the category of mobility challenged people (have child and large buggy), we get around town via disabled bus routes. It slightly limits where we can go but at last we don’t have to ask for help from the unfriendliest people in Paris, working women. I don’t know what they are doing on buses at that time of the day – shouldn’t they be at work? There they are, not only ignoring us but being actively unhelpful whilst maintaining a disdainful expression – try it, it’s not as easy as it sounds. The men are falling over themselves to help – I guess they can’t help themselves though – woman and child in distress.

LFG’s language skills are improving more rapidly than mine, is anyone really surprised? Strangely she doesn’t seem to pick the easiest words. For example she prefers to say chaussure rather than shoe, chaussette rather than sock – you can see where her interest lies.

LFG is of at that delightful stage where she is repeating everything she hears (happily I am not driving around Paris so I’m not involuntarily contributing as much to her expanding vocabulary as I used to). We were listening to a breakfast radio discussion about the lyrics to a 50 Cent sing (the ones they don’t even print on the CD). They were going through it word by word, I was shocked - living too long in a censored society I guess – still it was only breakfast time.

And speaking of French radio brings me to French music. It isn’t quite what I thought it was – you know the same as Vegemite, an acquired taste that must be ingested from birth to be fully appreciated. Well it is if you have been subjected to the same French radio stations I have, Nostalgi and Cherie FM – dreadful, truly dreadful French songs (they really have a thing for the 80’s) and songs in English that you have never heard before, and that would be for a really good reason, that they are so naff.

And so to French television, first the fabulousness.
There is a channel (cable unfortunately) called Jimmy and they have back to back Dynasty and Dallas – great for my French skills. Unhappily now we just have regular French television which is basically variety shows and talk shows and boy can they talk. A normal talk show is 2 hours and I am not talking about an Oprah thing – I am talking about a bunch of guys (usually they’re men) who sit around a round table and argue about something for 2 hours minimum, and this is televised. One show I saw, not in it’s entirety you understand, was entitled La frite et la mode. The chef they were interviewing was dramatically disguised, in case the frite mafia got him, I suppose. One other show is presented by a gentleman with the most serious mono-brow I have ever seen – how is that allowed? I have never been able to watch it long enough to discover what it is about as I find the mono-brow too disturbing. This is Saturday night television.
Abysmal because that’s the governments cunning plan to get French people to go out and spend money.

On being a boy

I write on little bits of paper that get coffee stains and fruit juice on them that also come in handy for wiping up spillages, however the absorbency of my little bits of paper could be improved. I carry them around in my pocket and occasionally try to pay cabs with them, maybe once I’m a famous writer that will be more effective.
My brother’s address book works on much the same system, it’s actually his wallet, he keeps all those little bits of paper that people give him with their numbers on, and that’s it. It never gets transferred into an actual address book. One time I went through it with him and he had three separate bits of paper with various, different numbers on them for me, so maybe it’s a family thing.

It got me thinking about growing up, thus I got out all the letters I had kept – you have to remember we grew up in a pre-email era. One of the letters was from CP and she has drawn a picture of a telephone on it labelled ‘a very cheap phone call’ because she couldn’t afford to call me – what a weird world we grew up in. I can make the following conclusions from the letters:

· Despite what has been said all my life, I did write, though obviously not to my parents.

· I was witty (everybody says so! – one person said I was as mad as a kiwifruit, but I think that’s positive).

· Everybody (male and female) was obsessed with the opposite sex, even if the boys just list conquests the girls wonder ‘if he really likes me’.

· I seem to have had some kind of reputation for drinking alcohol.

The great shame of course is that I don’t have my letters, I can only guess at the literary masterpieces (one was actually referred to as just that – I have it in writing) that have been lost forever. I know that one should write about what you know, I shall have to make it all up – obviously I have big blanks due to excess alcohol consumption as a teenager.
The GM has suggested I should use a pen name, but I already have one - Francesca Dubois (a little too Harlequin Romance perhaps?).
When we went skiing at Tekapo, there would normally be an odd number of people and one person always had to share the chairlift with a stranger. So you had 12 minutes to weave a complete fantasy life to your unsuspecting lift mate. We kept the same names in case we happened to bump into the same person again, but I don't think I could ever have kept my glamorous life details straight had that occurred. This all came about after a particularly traumatic episode for me when I told the truth. I was 12.
I was in my first year of boarding school when I took the lift with an old woman (at least 20). And so it begins:
‘What school do you go to?’
‘I go to boarding school in Christchurch’
‘Oh - do you go to Christ's College?’
Crushed 12-year-old girl with horrible short hair because someone forced me to have it cut off before I went to school (what is that all about - sending me off to school looking like a convict? - oh I get it) replies:
‘No, actually I go to St Margaret's College (pause - waiting for embarrassed apology)’
‘Oh - I went there’
Me thinking – ‘oh my God, what am I doing at a school where people come out as stupid and insensitive as you - you wrinkled old hag!’
It's enough to drive anyone to write romance novels, or alternatively take a 12-minute flight of the imagination on the chairlift at Tekapo.

But that wasn’t the last time it happened. About 10 years ago (grown woman now with small but perfectly formed breasts and hair 10 years long) I got caught in a bit of a downpour and returned to work looking like a drowned rat with hair plastered to the side of my face. This guy I worked with stopped suddenly and said in a shocked voice – ‘God Caro I never realised how androgenous you looked!’
I looked slightly horrified (mind flashing back to chairlift and earlier unmentioned childhood trauma playground scenario – ‘let the little boy go first’), and Michael says ‘Oh no – I meant it as a compliment’ Ah yes - of course, that was the look I was going for. Michael was, and I am quite sure still is, gay.

Childhood Trauma

I know if it's not Bridget Jones it's all too Absolutely Fabulous, but I had always wondered why I couldn't remember my early days, it's not like I'm vague or anything. You know how people remember being born or their third birthday party, or whatever, for me it's always been a blank. I could only remember the really traumatic things like:

• Dissecting sheep and seeing how far you could stretch the intestines.
• Killing rats in a grain silo and hanging them up by their tails from the wire around the outside of the silo.
• Me screaming my head off on my runaway pony Bambi, he was already called Bambi when I got him. My parents were obviously trying to kill me; I mean who gives a scrawny wimpy little kid like me a 4 year old car shy pony as their first pony? My parents. Your first pony should be a 100 year old Shetland pony; they are very short and therefore closer to the ground, with arthritis. Bambi and I were going for a walk and a car went past, he takes off, I start screaming, he speeds up, I scream louder, you get the picture. I was screaming so loudly that neighbours were able to call up my mother when I screamed past their houses. The houses being about 800 metres from the road Bambi and I were racing on. I imagine she cackled.
• My sister M nearly drowning.
• My sister L nearly drowning.
• My brother getting lost and a search part going out at night to look for him. I think he was found eating carrots that were probably poisoned to kill rabbits.
• Nearly dying of exposure when my parents dragged me over the Routeburn pass (a track I am sure only experienced climbers should attempt, not scrawny little wimp kids like me). Actually I also remember a woman who came on the 'walk' with us who had no kneecaps, she had had them removed for some reason I can't remember. Maybe she was a mafia moll and was 'kneecapped' (well you never really know someone). Anyway the woman with no kneecaps had great difficulty going down hill (think about it) and this was a walk across the Southern Alps for God's sake - it's obvious now - she was definitely tied up with the mafia, she must have been on the run, why else would you walk from the east coast to the west coast of the south Island with no kneecaps?
• All my pets dying unnaturally - my dog was poisoned, my rabbit was eaten by a cat, my bantam eaten by a dog, my pet lambs were eaten by the entire family with mint sauce made by my mother.
• And of course Aloysius the exploding lamb.

So you see it's all deeply disturbing and writing about it would only uncover the good and no doubt deadly dull things that happened to me. Perchance I could have been Janet Frame; I have the right hair colour, if only I hadn't been bundled off to boarding school...

On Helen's Secret Service

I am now working at the New Zealand High Commission for the Defence Advisor, regrettably I cannot say much more than that. My dilemma is I could tell you what I do but I would then of course have to shoot you all and as I am not yet licensed to kill, it could be messy.

So now we get to go to glamorous ambassadorial parties. We have been to one New Zealand reception and one for France. Without wanting to cause an international incident all I will say is that at one of the aforementioned embassies is one of the rudest people I have ever met. I must also disappointingly report that there was not a Ferrero Roche in sight, which is a complete swiz.

I am getting used to working in arctic air-conditioned conditions and have to take a collection of winter clothes to work with me, scarf, gloves, balaclava and socks.
OK I exaggerate slightly; so far it's just the scarf although I am considering socks.

I have a wonderful boss and some transportation problems yet compared to London Underground it seems hardly worth mentioning, nonetheless I will.
Albeit I now take a taxi to and from work, I did try the public transport option, and it was great, it was just a major hassle to get to, not that that put me off. I had happily travelled on it about 10 times before I realised the reason it is so fantastic is that it is the longest fully automated line in the world – no drivers. That would be why I could stand at the front of the train with a view unimpeded be a train driver then. Not that that put me off, indeed London Underground should try it.

What really got me was the fact that umbrellas don’t work when it rains. The roads turn into rivers, complete with floating branches from trees hit by rain (it's that hard), and cars turn into speedboats cutting a metre high wake through the river, I mean road. Which is all very well for wakeboarding but not if you are walking along side the road on one of the few footpaths (people aren’t encouraged to walk here). Under these circumstances, nearly every day as we approach the rainy season, your umbrella acts as a cunningly devised barrier to stop the water getting away and directing the water down, with the effect of being in an shower enclosure. Resulting in getting completely drenched from head to toe not, in fact to dissimilar to a shower.

Speaking of bad hair days, I had a very scary hair experience recently whilst having my monthly manicure/pedicure. I was happily sitting there being pampered reading Hello magazine (well what else are you going to read in a beauty salon), when I was asked if I would like to have my hair done. I had heard of this before and in the interests of research, I said yes. So the deal is this: you get a big squirty bottle of water (similar to a Fairy Liquid container) and a bottle of shampoo (also very similar to the aforementioned Fairy Liquid container). You stay where you are, that is, sitting in a chair having the manicure/ pedicure. The hairdresser squirts a little from each bottle, and proceeds to lather, yes, while you are sitting in the chair. The only time you move is to rinse (obviously it’s only a matter of time before they figure that one out), but to compensate for this your manicurist will continue to work on you whilst having your hair rinsed. I was then covered in Velcro rollers, well my hair was, and stuck under a dryer. This was the really scary bit, and I hope you appreciate this was purely for your entertainment that I did this. For those who don’t know, I like my hair very, very straight (preferably ironed). Unhappily I have no before/after pictures to show what happened when I came out from under the dryer, still I’m sure you can imagine, it was big, very big, Texas big, and very scary. Unfortunately, it was completely flat again by the time I got home – about 300 metres, that’s the hell of humidity (it’s not always a bad thing).

But I digress; I was speaking of transportation. The beauty of taxi drivers is that you get from door to door without getting your hair wet or flat (if you are a big hair person). I also feel I have my finger on the pulse of KL as taxi drivers seem to be remarkably well informed on matters of sport, religion, and the government. Additionally there is of course the sense of danger and excitement (that a thrill seeker such as I require at least 5 days a week) that comes with getting in a taxi being driven by a Malaysian on Malaysian roads full of cars being driven by other Malaysians. I have only been involved in one accident so far. The taxi driver decided that a car trying to cut him off need to be rammed into, so that’s what he did. He then continued on his way, stopped at the lights, hopped out to check the damage and got back in again, he never said I word as I sat stunned in the back of the cab.

The GM’s answer has been ‘if you can’t beat em join em’, and consequently drives like a Malaysian (there isn’t a road rule that can’t be broken).

I have only recently discovered another of the reasons for traffic jams in KL, and that is accidents on the motorways. I know this causes traffic jams all over the world, usually because cars in the opposite lanes will slow down in the hope of seeing horrific injuries. In KL they don’t just slow down, they actually stop cars in the middle of the motorway and run across 4 lanes of traffic to look at the accident on the other side.

I say honeymoon, I mean Tournee des Magasin Le Vieux Campeur.

To those happy people leading completely fulfilled lives without the old camper; I deviate with an explanation. The logo is an old man with a very long white beard that actually looks like long blonde hair (weird), wearing a flat cap (I guess it could be a beret), chewing a flower. It has stores at several locations around France in Paris, Lyon, Sallanches and Thonon (only one left to go to now) and is populated by highly specialised nerds (like those people in record stores). Apparently it’s a fun place to spend many, many very interesting hours. They also produce catalogues that provide additional hours of entertainment to those who are unable to visit the stores as regularly as they would like. Au Vieux Campeur also has a website, but it’s just not the same. In short it’s a disease, a mental illness. The first step is admitting it. The GM has reached that step. He realised this when he couldn’t travel without his catalogue. No need for a book anymore, just take an Au Vieux Campeur catalogue with you. Another great idea is to keep old catalogues so you can compare the latest models of jackets/boots/mosquito nets with the previous models.

Day 1: We started off at Le Manoir at Oustau de Baumanière in Les Baux de Provence, a beautiful village but unfortunately now basically the whole village is a museum. May I highly recommend the lobster dish at the Oustau de Baumanière.

Day 2-3: We crossed over to Spain and stayed at the Torre Del Remei in Bolvir (right near the border). We were upgraded to a James Bond–like suite complete with circular bed and matching circular windows. The Fiat Punto was definitely a star, managing to absorb a Paella pan and a Jamón. I would also like to officially thank all those who contributed to the decoration of the Punto that saved us from a parking ticket.

Day 4: Approach Carcassone via the D11 and you get the Disneyland view of Carcassone. The Hôtel de la Cité is situated right in the old city.

Day 5: Le Vieux Logis Tremolat (Bordeaux), we dined outside under the Linden trees, whatever they are.
And it wouldn’t have been a road trip if I hadn’t gotten lost.
This time it really was a doozey, but I have many well-founded excuses of how this happened:
The scenery is so beautiful it’s very tedious to have to look at a map all the time; I was there to see the sights not take a course in orienteering. I am out of practice from reading maps, in Malaysia they are so inaccurate, and a hangover from the war – maps can’t be too accurate.
Don’t name villages in France with similar names especially if they are within say, three hours drive of each other.
And finally I am a female, there is irrefutable scientific evidence that men are better at reading maps(1), we have other much more useful attributes too numerous to mention. So if you don’t want to take the more scenic route read the bloody map yourself.

Day 6-7: Marais Poitevin, where we stayed in a real live chateau, the Château de Curzay

Day 8-9: Domaine des Hauts de Loire where we took a hot air balloon ride over the many chateaux at sunrise that was absolutely magical.

Day 10: Lyon - Au Vieux Campeur No. 2 (no. 1 was Paris)
We stayed at the Villa Florentine, a beautiful hotel in the old part of Lyon, even the bathroom had a fantastic view, and were taken out by the Lyon Barfly to his bar (of course).

Day 11-12: Chamonix - Au Vieux Campeur No. 3 (also close to No. 4 but sadly unable to visit due to lack of time).
We had a close encounter with hailstones the size of ice cubes; very exciting in a convertible with a large crack on the front windscreen. And where we went for a little walk. I thought we were just going for a little stroll on the ice and was quite unprepared for the 4 hour hike from Aiguille du Midi 3,843 m to Pointe Helbronner on the Italian side. I should have guessed, our guide was Mountain Man, (ex Advertising Man now Book publishing Man - Mountain books of course) infamous as the man who allegedly tried to kill the GMs petite Maman and Franck, on the same little walk (different weather conditions apparently). We had to borrow/hire all serious equipment (anything required in addition to jeans and t-shirt) and got very dirty looks from guided tours completely outfitted in brand new colour co-ordinated gear. We had to go most of the way roped to MM and wore crampons and the GM even got to carry an ice pick. It was awesome, definitely the highlight for me. We stayed at the Le Hameau Albert 1er and ate in the 2-star restaurant with MM (and his wife), who said to the sommelier ‘whatever you recommend’. The GM nearly chocked on his amuse-bouche. The wine in was absolutely amazing and Spanish.

Day 13: Sestriere - Think `The Shining´ (in summer, in Italy - go on use your imagination). We stayed at the Principi di Piemonte Grand Hotel, a 100-room hotel, (I think we were the only people there) last decorated in the 70s, lots of orange and brown and fringed lampshades, just outside a deserted ski resort (well it was June), spooky.

Day 14: And finally, Nice - Fabulous darlings. Stayed at the Negresco, a pale pink Belle Époque wedding cake (with pale green piping) on the Promenade des Anglais. Think lawn green, bright yellow, hot pink and velvet in rich red and gold, furnished from the 16th century with tapestries on the walls, a royal blue carpet with golden fleur de lys and an antique 4 poster bed with a fake fur bedspread. Apparently inspired by the Kings Bedroom in Versailles.

And the weather was just perfect everywhere, the hailstorm in Chamonix was just a half hour episode.

1 ‘men are better at spatial-navigational skills such as map reading and judging distances’
Kimura, D. (1987). Are men’s and women’s brains really different? Canadian Psychology, 28, 133-147.