Europe was spectacular. We saw and did some amazing things on the trip. In 3-1/2 weeks we visited 5 countries, 7 cities, and 7 UNESCO World Heritage Sites. We swam in the Mediterranean, hiked in the Alps, went to the top of the Eiffel Tower, among many other things.
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| Our Travel Route |
Jet Lag:
Coming home was definitely easier but either way is rough. I get a bad headache for 2 days and fitful sleep for 3 nights. While I'm recovering from jetlag, my mind plays tricks on me during my brief wakings. When I returned from Europe the first time in 1995, I didn't have this problem because I passed out for 2 days straight. My parents were actually pretty worried because they couldn't wake me up. When I came back from my honeymoon in Australia & New Zealand, I would wake in the middle of the night thinking I was still back in our Australia hotel... or the airport. This time coming home from Europe, I kept thinking we were staying in a castle. (What??!) The first night of these strange wakings there were even tourists walking around while we were trying to sleep (!!!!) and every time I'd get up to use the restroom or whatever, I'd go to check on the kids and get worried that I wouldn't be able to find their room. In the middle of the night and in my half-wake stage, everything looked completely unfamiliar and our house didn't look anything like our house. I still don't understand it.
It happened the second night, too! This time there were no tourists wandering around the castle (?!?!?) but I did have a moment of panic when I got up to use the bathroom and wondered where the kids and the bedroom they were staying in was.
It's completely bizarre and I'm sure I sound like a crazy person. Does this happen to anyone else?
Packing Light for an Extended Trip:
We packed super light and took just one carry-on suitcase each. Mine was a backpack style from eBags because I knew the kids would need help with their luggage and I'd be in major trouble with that when flying back solo with them. It was a very good call because there were so many damn stairs! In subway stations, in hotels without elevators, etc. Tiring. My free hands were necessary to carry the kids' suitcases.
I also took a shoulder bag for in-flight stuff (inflatable pillow, snacks for the kids, activities for the kids, scarf, etc.), Crumpet took a small backpack with electronics stuff including his Nintendo DS, the video player, and a few movies. He also took his tablet but it broke halfway into the trip during a train layover in Geneva. I'm so glad it wasn't an expensive tablet! Mars also took a small backpack filled with stuff like magazines and bottles of water. It worked out really well and was the only way we could really do this trip since we'd be moving cities every 2-4 days but it did get boring wearing the same 8 articles of clothing for almost a month. For doing laundry in the hotel room, I brought a tiny bottle of Dr. Bronners soap and also took some Zote laundry chips (I chopped some chunks off a large bar and brought them along in a zip top baggie). Both worked well but sometimes I even used a bit of shampoo.
Washing in the sink was messy so I usually just lined the wastebasket with a heavy-duty plastic poly mailer I brought from home and was able to contain the water better that way. Wringing and blotting/removing water with towels was the biggest pain in the ass. We brought a couple travel clotheslines and I brought a couple inflatable hangers, which worked very well. (Hangers worked better than the clotheslines.)
We learned the hard way that we should have brought unlocked phones. It would have been so nice to pop a sim card in our phones! We didn't have internet access in Munich and were actually "chastised" by a mobile phone provider in Munich about how the United States is the only country in the world that locks cell phones. There is no such thing in Europe. He said there wasn't anything he could do for us unless we could get our phones unlocked. T-Mobile is called Telekom in Germany but he said I wouldn't be able to call Telekom to unlock; I'd have to call T-Mobile back in the United States... or go online. <sigh> I did get online in our hotel lobby (free Macs for guests' usage, 20 minutes tops) and tried to pay off and unlock my phone but couldn't find the proper link/how to do it.
We couldn't do the BMW factory tour in Munich like we originally planned, after all, since I couldn't contact them to make reservations. Definitely should have done that before we left the United States but things were so busy and chaotic that I didn't have time and I figured I could do it once in Europe. Bad call.
Neuschwanstein Castle in Germany deserves its own post. It was a nightmare, totally not worth the 4 hours each way for us to get there that day. Long story.
Food:
Every country we visited in Europe is very into their bread. In Germany and France, breakfast is pretty much bread only. In Germany, it was dense rolls and slices of cheese; in France, it was croissants and coffee. I am very sensitive metabolically to bread but since it was all that was offered, I had to suck it up and eat it. I love it but it puffed me up. I thought that all the walking (our days were spent walking! We did nothing but walk walk walk every day of the trip) would counteract all the intake but I wasn't that lucky. I got on the scale when I returned from the trip and saw that I weighed the heaviest ever. I was 8 lbs heavier than when I left!
The craziest meal I ate was in Switzerland. Not much on the menu was sounding appealing so I asked what the "raclette" was. The waitress said it was a traditional Swiss meal, pretty tasty. I ordered it.
This is what is was.....
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Raclette is a plate of melted cheese. MELTED CHEESE. Laid on top of the melted cheese were three small potatoes, 3 small sweet pickles, and 3 small pearl onions. (I also don't eat much, if any, dairy.) I ate the potatoes, the pickles, and a few bites of the cheese before feeling sick. Ugh.
Strict and careful planning will be required if you want to remain a strict Paleo dieter while vacationing in Europe, especially with kids. You won't be able to eat the breakfasts offered by most hotels or, if staying with friends, most of what is offered by your hosts. You will need to shop at a grocery store upon arriving in each city and transport it with you while sightseeing. This was simply not possible on our trip for many reasons. The change in diet wasn't a medical emergency (I am thankful I am not Celiac) but it sure was uncomfortable.
While traveling through Europe as a 20-something was a life-changing amazing adventure, traveling through Europe as a 40-something with kids is quite different. Every new city and every new restaurant was a bit stressful. Food was outrageously expensive. Goodness, so expensive! In Switzerland, we spent about $150 for sandwiches and sodas for lunch one day. And the menu items were new and unfamiliar and most of the time the kids wouldn't eat it. In Germany we got excited to see "hotdog" and the menu. The kids ordered it and it was a huge plain German sausage (I think it was weisswurst) in between a thick, heavy roll. No condiments of any sort. In France, the kids ordered hamburgers; they arrived on a plate without a bun.
Plain cheese pizza (called Pizza Margherita there) was a constant and something the kids ate most of the time. Thank goodness for that.
Shockingly, the many fish & chips we ate while in London weren't very good. Huge disappointment. I was really looking forward to some awesome fish & chips, too! We definitely have better here.
Before we left the United States I was told by several friends that Starbucks and McDonald's offer free wifi. We had McDonald's three times: in Cologne, Munich, and Paris. The time in Munich was only so that we could get free internet and we soon realized (after ordering and not being able to connect) that free wifi does not apply to McDonald's in train stations. To say that we were disappointed is an understatement. We also didn't plan on eating at the McDonald's in Paris but it was the only thing open and/or serving food at 4:00 pm after we exited a theme park. The McDonald's are different in each country and don't offer the same thing. None of them offered chocolate milk with the kids' meals. The Paris McDonald's had trash-compactor garbage bins. You put your trash in a hole and the machine would compact it with the rest of the trash. Fancy!
We went to a Starbucks once, in Munich, specifically for the free wifi.
Language Barrier:
We always tried using the native language wherever we were. I know a tiny bit of German thanks to the free Babbel cell phone app and the free Duolingo language learning website I had been using for 3-4 months prior to the trip; Mars knows a tiny bit of French. It was appreciated even though we didn't know what we were being told ~95% of the time and we couldn't be understood some of the time. As I said above, meal time ordering was most stressful because it was a crap shoot. Most of the time we didn't really know what we were ordering and we couldn't ask for clarification. Mars tried to order a pepperoni pizza at a café in Paris only to be given a bell pepper pizza. He was not happy. It was apparent, even without a language barrier, you couldn't order something not on the menu. In London we tried to order a cheese quesadilla for the kids in a Mexican/Spanish restaurant. The waitress corrected us and pointed to the menu, showing us that a simple cheese quesadilla wasn't an option. We ended up having to order the cheese & bacon quesadilla; ordering it without the bacon was not an option.
I was really glad to get home, to not live out of a suitcase, eat some "normal" food, get some routine and order back into our lives, and to do some standard hygienic stuff like buff my feet, get a pedicure, and (sorry, TMI!) trim my bikini hair.
Routine is good. Ahhh, home sweet home.
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