Tag Archives: Talloires

Uncategorized

Fancy in Annecy… Olympic towns! part six

On Saturday morning, we woke up to painfully gorgeous weather…  I say “painfully” because when the sun chases away the clouds in Talloires, the area is practically dazzling with beauty.  Everywhere you look, you see people enjoying the gorgeous landscape, from sailing on the pristine lake to sailing through the skies parasailing.  Incidentally, if you like to parasail, Annecy is the place to be.  We saw so many people in the sky at at least two centers.  We also saw at least a couple of hang gliders.

Annecy is also very popular with bikers.  We saw many of them on the two lane road that ran past the hotel.  In fact, on at least one occasion, Bill almost ran over a biker.  The guy somehow decided it was a good idea for him to try to pass a car on the left.  He almost hit us head on.  Bill said he could see the guy realized his mistake; it was written all over his face.  Thankfully, it wasn’t also written on the hood of my car.  Hiking is also popular in the Annecy area, although I saw a lot more people enjoying the outdoors in boats, on bikes, or with parachutes than anything else.

We began our trip to Chamonix on this road, which offered absolutely stunning views of people parasailing and swans gliding on the peaceful lake.

When I was researching Annecy, I learned that it’s very close to two cities that hosted the Winter Olympics.  Chamonix Mont Blanc is the site of the very first Winter Olympics in 1924 and is now a very popular ski town near Switzerland and Italy.  Albertville is the site of the 1992 Winter Olympics.  We visited both places on Saturday, and I must say, I’m glad we had the convertible.  The drive to Chamonix from Talloires is absolutely stunning.  It takes you through a rugged mountain pass, bisected by a rushing river and waterfalls.  I managed to take a few photos as we passed through.  It was a little stressful driving through there because of all the bikers.  Some were on motorcycles and some, who must have incredibly strong hearts and muscles, were on bicycles.

Pretty meadows, often with grazing cows…


And huge snow capped mountains…

How to pronounce Chamonix.

This was where we made the turn to Chamonix.  I noticed the beautiful mountain road on our way through, but took pictures on the way back.  Most of the best shots were on the other side of the car.

Chamonix was very tourist friendly, with plenty of restaurants advertising menus in several languages.  I noticed there was some decent shopping there, and during the winter, I’m sure the place comes alive with skiers.  On Saturday, people were mostly just enjoying the sun and the large market going on.  Once again, we spotted Jehovah’s Witnesses set up in a choke point going into the town.  They left us alone.

Downtown Chamonix.

This church was so beautiful.

A couple of interior shots… I think this might have been my favorite of the church stops we made.

A view from the church steps.  A wedding party is in the distance.

The celebration continues.

This rushing river made a good reference point for finding our way around town, not that Chamonix is the type of place where it’s necessarily easy to get lost.

We walked through a church, and later observed a newly married couple as well as a girl who appeared ready for her first communion.  Bill was asked by a co-worker to pick up some mustard, so we stopped into a gourmet market after we had lunch at a charming local eatery called Restaurant La Moraine.  I think I was drawn to it because they had a cool looking outside bar area and were playing good music.  It turned out the service was friendly and the food was good, too.

Bill really wanted a salad, but I talked him into the ribs.  I wanted to see if they were really “Texas style”.

We were seated on a terrace on the other side of the restaurant, away from the bar with the cool music.  Strangely enough, the bench I sat on seemed too high for the table.  I was sitting on a cushion, but had to set it aside so I wasn’t hunching over the table.  The restaurant had a very enticing menu, with a wide range of choices.  I decided on Bolognese lasagne while Bill had “Texas style” pork ribs.

They weren’t really Texas style, but they were tender enough and the portion size wasn’t overly huge. Bill enjoyed the ribs.  I guess we’ll have to go back to Texas for actual Texas style ribs.

This lasagne was delicious!  It was perfectly cheesy, with plain meat sauce and a nice little side salad.  I was very happy with it!

For dessert, I had tangerine sorbet with orange liqueur topped with a meringue.  They also offered “colonels”, which is lemon sorbet with vodka.  And, of course, they had several other very tempting desserts with no booze in them.

I would definitely go back to La Moraine if I ever find myself in Chamonix again!

After lunch, we went to the gourmet store for the mustard.  I got a kick out of the stuff being sold in this store, including Genepi beer.  I tried that beer some time ago, when we first moved back to Germany.  It’s kind of an alpine specialty– very herbal and often green.

Sausages galore!

Plenty of mustard!

Another sax player.  That guy was very good, actually.  We probably should have seen if he had any CDs for sale.

Locks of love.

We decided not to stay in Chamonix much longer beyond lunch because, to be honest, if you aren’t hiking, biking, shopping, or skiing, there’s not much to do there as a day visitor.  We decided to head to Albertville, simply because I was curious about what that town looked like.  But first, we had to drive back through the beautiful mountains.  Below are some shots of our trip.

 

I really could have stopped to take photos or dip my feet in the cool water, had there only been a convenient place to do it.  But yes, this was great convertible scenery.

We did make one stop so Bill could fix the GPS, which fell off the windshield.  It happened to be a convenient place to pull over, since there was a remarkably clean public restroom there.  However, the toilets were of the squat hole variety.  I was a little surprised to see that in France, although I have seen them in Italy more than a few times.  Anyway, I was just glad it was clean.

Our first view of Albertville, which seemed pretty “sleepy” compared to Annecy and Chamonix.

I loved this church, but we didn’t venture inside because there was some sort of service going on.

We spotted an Armenian restaurant, that appeared to be closing for good.  Too bad for that.  I would have enjoyed trying it.

Albertville is kind of pretty, though sleepier than I expected.  It did appear that they were encouraging visitors, though.  There was plenty of free parking.  Bill mentioned a medieval city nearby, too, which we ran out of time to visit.  

City hall.

 

I made the unfortunate choice to wear brand new sandals on our trip.  Even though they are Danskos, which are supposed to be very comfortable, I managed to get a blister.  We decided it would be better to go back to the hotel, after first stopping at Carrefour for some provisions.

They collect corks at the store.  Too bad I left my big bag of them in Germany.

Above are pictures of the pool area at Hotel Les Grillons.  We should have taken a dip.  The pool was very inviting.  I think Bill may be traumatized, though, because many pools in France require the men to wear Speedos.  He’d rather go naked.

Look closely and you can see people parasailing.  I got more pictures on Sunday.

Cocktails before dinner.  An Americano for Bill and a Kir Royale for me.

Saturday night’s dinner was pretty busy.  A large British tour group came through.

Saturday night’s wine.

We had a smoked trout starter.  This was supposed to come with a crostini on top, but I think the waiter brought them out prematurely.  Bill used some of the bread at the table to enjoy this starter, which was like very high speed tuna salad, only made with trout.

The main course was exquisite and likely inspired by the large group of Brits.  It was very tender and perfectly cooked medium rare roast beef with a carrot puree, mashed potatoes, and a delightful mustard and horseradish sauce.  This was my favorite of the entrees.  It was delicious!

And dessert, a rosemary hinted tart with raspberries and starfruit.

Once again, we went to bed tired and a little sunburnt, despite the sunscreen I diligently applied early in the day.

An evening shot of the view from our window.

Standard
Uncategorized

Fancy in Annecy… Friday night’s dinner! part five

Friday night, we enjoyed our second of three dinners at Hotel Les Grillons, the main course being a dorade filet.  Bill ordered a dry white wine to accompany it.  I should have included this in part four, but perhaps some people will appreciate a brief post for once!

 

We started with a pork terrine accompanied by a small green salad and bread.  The terrine reminded me a little bit of Fleischkäse.  It included pistachio nuts and a prune center that worked surprisingly well.  Sweet and salty is often a good combination.

Next, we enjoyed the dorade (sea bream) filet with cabbage and rice.  As you can see, it’s artfully presented with a little balsamic vinegar.

And for dessert, orange scented chocolate mousse.  Naturally, this was my favorite course and probably my favorite of the desserts.  We both skipped the cheese course.

 

The same family with the two cute little kids sat behind us.  The little boy kept coming over to our table, so I made faces at him.  He responded in a very charming way that makes me think he’ll grow up to be a heartbreaker.  On the other side of us was a group of two friendly couples from Belgium.  I noticed one of the gentlemen made a point of saying good morning in English to us every day.  It’s hard not to be convivial when there’s really good food available.

We were tired (and drunk) enough to call it an early night.  In fact, I think I pretty much went right to sleep as soon as I hit the bed.

Standard
Uncategorized

Fancy in Annecy… Our first visit to the “big city”… part four

Friday morning, we woke up to a few clouds and a nice buffet breakfast.  Breakfast at Hotel Les Grillons runs from 8:00am until 10:00am.  Make a note of that time if you decide to book there.  Bill didn’t.  More on that later.  Friday morning, we were perfectly contented to sleep in a little.

Friday night’s dinner menu.

 

Friday morning’s buffet breakfast.  It was the same each day.

The buffet breakfast offers ham, cheese, a variety of breads for toast or just jam and butter.  There’s fresh fruit, fresh pancakes, and yogurt…  and there’s also an egg boiler.  I mention this, because I’ve only ever seen these things in France.  In the fall of 2014, right around the time Bill and I moved back to Germany, we visited Colmar, France.  We stayed in a nice, family run hotel in a suburb called Bischwihr.  That hotel also boasted a wonderful restaurant and an included breakfast.

Somehow during that October 2014 visit, I didn’t realize that the eggs sitting in front of the boiling water were for people to boil to their hearts’ content.  I took an egg and found it raw.

Hotel Les Grillons had a similar set up.  They had thoughtfully provided a timetable for cooking the eggs as well as actual egg timers.  Bill decided to cook a couple of eggs.  However, he failed to realize the water wasn’t boiling.  I think he thought the longer times suggested by the sign in front of the machine meant that the eggs were intended to cook at a lower temperature.  Leave it to my husband to think of sous vide cooking when he’s boiling eggs.  He brought the eggs to the table and, sure enough, they were almost raw.  Another guest, similarly burned by the non boiling water, thought to turn up the heat.  The next day, Bill managed to cook a perfect egg for me… and a less perfect one for him, since he doesn’t like them soft.

We headed into Annecy and parked by the port, where a bunch of boats were waiting for eager tourists to take on a lake tour.  I was really tempted to go on a tour.  I was especially tempted by the big Bateaux ship that does lunch and dinner cruises…  We did one in London and had a decent time.  On the other hand, I remembered that those ships kind of force you to be a captive audience and the food quality can be really good or very poor.  Also, there is a lot of nickel and diming, which I hate.  So I told Bill I’d rather walk around the city.

I managed to get some nice shots of Annecy in action…

I was excited to see a number of signs in English.

The water in Lake Annecy is said to be extremely clean, even if I did see some signs of obvious pollution.

If you want to tour the lake by boat, you have plenty of options… and not just in Annecy.

We visited Annecy on Friday and Sunday; both days they had a big market.

They also had paddle boats.  The guys running the boats were very enthusiastic, although the clouds made me less enthusiastic.  There’s also a beach area not far from the boats where one can swim, lie in the sun, or wade.

I loved the canopy of trees.

This is the big lunch/dinner cruise ship.  We thought about doing it for lunch yesterday, but they were fully booked.

This is the area where most tourists were congregating.

The Bastille…  which I learned means jail.  There’s a restaurant named La Bastille located nearby that gets horrible reviews.

If you like good food…

Stroll through here…  if you can.

It was very obnoxious yesterday.  I’m glad I got pictures on Friday, when it was less congested.

I wished I could buy some stuff.  

Huge meringues!

After we passed through the throng of people shopping for food, we wandered the city some more.  A couple of women approached us and tried to speak to us, but seemed scared off when we told them we don’t speak French.  We happened to notice the Jehovah’s Witnesses had set up a rather prominent display near the boats.  I wondered if they were with them.  The two women didn’t seem to be friends.  We often get stopped by people, though.  I guess we look friendly.

Canals in Annecy.

And flowers…

A pig, that people obviously tried to sit on at one time.

A sax player.

And a CBD oil/telecom store.  Guess they were branching out.

Obligatory church pictures.

At around this point, it was definitely time for lunch.

I was tempted by this ice cream stand…

Instead, we stopped at Milton Pub, which was like an oasis of peace.  They were playing really good music and offered some excellent beers.  I see they only get three stars on Trip Advisor.  What a shame.  We enjoyed our visit.

I had a very large Kwak.

Bill had charcuterie.

I had fish and chips.

And another beer…  at one point, they played music from Bizet’s Carmen and the waitresses laughed because I was dancing to it in my seat.  What can I say?  I am a frustrated musician at heart.

Nice terrace area, but not when the market is going.

One of Bill’s buddies asked for wine.  We went shopping.

No touchy!

I’m not sure what this was about. 

We stopped in for more bottles of wine to bring home.

Then we ran across this harpist, who was entertaining these kids.  

She was very kindly letting them look at her instrument.  I got Bill to buy one of her CDs.  It turns out her name is Jessica Browning and she’s from… Memphis.  😀  Bill’s dad lives near Memphis.  And she has a Web site, too.  I love to buy music from buskers.

I enjoyed a gelato and watched the water while Bill chatted with her.

And this guy, too.

Dramatic skies on the way back to the hotel.

This was the last of the clouds during our visit!

Standard
Uncategorized

Fancy in Annecy… Our first look at Hotel Les Grillons, a hotel where food is the star attraction! part three

A staffer at Hotel Les Grillons met us at the door as we approached with some of our luggage.  An adorably pregnant young woman sat behind the reception desk and greeted us in perfect British English.  Actually, at first, I thought she sounded more like an Aussie than a Brit.  However, I soon realized that her French was just as perfect as her English was.  I don’t know if she was a product of parents from two countries or just had unusually good language training.  In any case, I got the sense that this was her hotel.  She handed us the key to room 25, which was on the third floor and had a nice view of the mountains and the lake.

By the front door…

 

The lovely young woman, whom I am going to assume was Aurelie Blanchin, advised us that the pool was unheated but available, as was the heated outdoor jacuzzi.  We booked the “half-board” option, which meant dinner was included in our rate.  The chef, Sébastien, makes a four course meal each night.  If there’s something on it you don’t like or can’t eat, you can let them know before 5:00pm and they will make substitutions.  I was delighted with the three dinners we had at the hotel.  We opted to go a more casual route last night.  More on that in a future post.

This was our humongous bed.  I was glad I brought an extra pillow, as I usually do here in Europe.  Bill wished he’d brought his, too.  This bed had a light duvet, one regular sized pillow, and one throw pillow.  Naturally, there is no air conditioning, but the window can be opened for a nice lake breeze.  There are also bugs, but they didn’t bother us too much.  The mattress was a little firm for me, but I’m used to sleeping on a feather bed.  I got used to it the firmer mattress after the first night.

These were our first views from our window.  They got better the next day, when the sun came out.

The bathroom, with nice herbal scented, wall-mounted toiletries.  I’m not a fan of those divider thingies, because they never keep the water off the floor.  Such was the case here, too, although the shower got great pressure.

Separate WC.

Large wardrobe with a safe.

 

Hotel Les Grillons has rooms that face the back of the hotel, as well as a few rooms on the second floor that have small balconies.  I happened to get the last room available for Saturday night– I think a large British tour group came through– otherwise, the other nights, the hotel was reasonably full, but not packed.

Every morning, the menu is placed in a framed easel in the lobby.  The above was what we were offered on our first night.  Drinks are not included in the half board rate, but they will give you a pitcher of tap water.  Not that we stuck with tap water, mind you.

Actually, we had a couple of big, French beers…

Bill soaks in the atmosphere as I watched the fish in the big aquarium next to where I was sitting.  My husband has come to love France.  Dinner service begins at 7:30pm and guests are invited to sit where they’d like between 7:30 and 8:30.

Bill chose a nice local red to go with dinner.  The wines were very reasonably priced.  In fact, I think they were a better deal than the beers.

First course… A carrot mousse, with fresh salad greens.  Every dinner also included a basket of fresh bread.

I made sure to get this wine on film so I can look for it locally.  It was a very pleasant, dry red that tasted of currants.

Next came perfectly cooked duck breast with cabbage, pears, and polenta…

Bill had a cheese course, which included a couple of local cheeses.  One was from a fromagerie just down the road from the hotel.  We passed it on our unplanned alternate route to the lake.

I had dessert, which Bill skipped.  It was a very light vanilla mousse with pineapple, whipped cream, and a fresh strawberry.

Once dinner was over, we were more than ready to call it a day.  And both of us were raving about how good the food and the service were.  It seemed odd not to tip anyone, but there’s really no way we could have.

Incidentally, during our first two nights, there was a family with two young children sitting near us.  The kids were well accommodated.  They even had a menu for them.

Standard
Uncategorized

Fancy in Annecy… but first, a little Swiss piss… part two

The weather on May 3rd, 2018 was looking kind of cold and dismal.  It was chilly enough in Germany, and it appeared that we might have some bad weather in France, too.  In fact, The Weather Channel was even predicting avalanches for the Annecy area.  Because I wasn’t sure what to expect, I packed clothes for every occasion.  I ended up bringing more than I really needed to, especially since after the first night, we had absolutely glorious weather.

A couple of weeks ago, Bill and I got stuck in a horrendous traffic jam on A81 when we decided to go to the ADAC office at Breuningerland in Sindelfingen to pick up a couple of Swiss vignettes.  For those who don’t know, here’s a brief explanation.  If you drive through Switzerland, you need a “vignette”, which is basically a sticker that proves you paid the yearly toll.  It costs 40 Swiss Francs or 35,75 euros.  The 2018 vignette is valid from December 1, 2017 until January 31st, 2019.  The stickers are available at the border, or you can order them and have them sent in the mail.  Most of the time, it’s very easy to just go to the mall and get them, although we may think twice about that next year!

Anyway, after Bill took the dogs to Max’s and put the sticker on my Mini Cooper convertible, we were ready to go.  The Mini Cooper is another reason why I wanted to leave the dogs in Germany.  Annecy is the kind of place that just begs for a convertible.  My car doesn’t get driven enough and it’s super fun to take it on the Autobahn, even if my husband’s RAV 4 is somewhat more comfortable and roomy.  When I saw the clouds in the sky on Thursday morning, I was afraid the trip might be wasted in my little car.  Luckily, as you’ll see as this series progresses, we had perfect convertible weather.

I guess these things had to come from somewhere.

Our trip south started off relatively uneventfully.  We headed down A81, passed the big phallic looking tower near Rottweil, and crossed into Switzerland.  I always get a kick out of the area near the border, since there’s a big Wunderbaum factory there.  Wunderbaum is the company that makes those “trees” you hang in your car to make it smell “fresh”.  Other than that, the Swiss/German border is a pretty boring place.  Actually, I was hoping for a beautiful drive like we had last year when we drove through Switzerland to get to Italy.  Unfortunately, the GPS sent us a different way.  Apparently, the main highway was closed for some reason.  Consequently, we went through some truly ugly parts of Switzerland… very industrial and not at all picturesque.

As the morning continued, I started getting hungry.  Bill agreed it was time for lunch.  He went into a town and then, inexplicably, decided that it wasn’t a suitable place to find food.  Time went on… I got hungrier.  Then I had to pee.  For some reason, Bill kept driving.  He was hoping to find a nice local restaurant, rather than a fast food place or highway restaurant.  Usually, when we travel with the dogs, we end up eating fast food.  Since we didn’t have them with us this time, he wanted to avoid that.  Good plan.  Except I get super bitchy when I’m hungry and have to pee.

Finally, as we got closer to Bern, I told Bill I didn’t care where he stopped, but I really needed to whiz.  At that point, I’d been holding it for a couple of hours.  It was also getting pretty late for lunch. Just as restaurants in Germany close for “pauses” between lunch and dinner, so do they in Switzerland and France.  It was about 1:30pm when he finally started searching for a place.  We passed an Italian restaurant that had parking out front and was curiously co-located with an Indian restaurant that also sold saris.  I kind of demanded that Bill stop there.  Drei Könige to the rescue!

Bill, being the sport he is, took the liberty of ordering a half carafe of house red while I took care of business.  Then, he took his turn.

See that look on Bill’s face?  I wasn’t the only one who needed to pee.

 

There was only one other guy in the restaurant when we visited and he was finishing up.  We had the waitress’s undivided attention as we decided on pasta dishes.

I had Spaghetti Carbonara, a dish I’d never had before I started dating Bill.  It’s pretty rich, since it’s made with egg, cream, and bacon.  The waitress brought me a huge serving, too.  It looked like they’d dumped a whole box of spaghetti into the pot.  I didn’t come close to finishing this and we couldn’t take it with us.  I will admit that it hit the spot, almost as well as the surprisingly good house red was. I don’t know what the house red was, but it was excellent.

Bill had spicy penne pasta that came in a more manageable size.  I liked his dish, with its sassy little peppery kick.

This was in both the men’s and ladies’ rooms.  It’s basically a natural aid for guys with large prostates.  I don’t know why this was in the ladies room, but I couldn’t resist sharing it.  I love this kind of stuff.

 

Switzerland is expensive.  This simple lunch set us back about 88 Swiss francs– that’s roughly akin to the same amount in US dollars.  However, the waitress was very kind to us and even mistook us for Germans.  I was surprised about that, since although we were speaking German, it was pretty terrible German.  She seemed genuinely surprised that Americans were dining in her restaurant.  She asked if I wanted to take the rest of the pasta, but it wasn’t feasible.  She agreed that it was a very large portion of pasta, even for a “truck” like me.  (“Truck” is a nickname a chef at a restaurant where I once waited tables gave me because I could carry up to nine entrees at a time.)

I snapped this photo as we were leaving…  just in time for them to take their “pause”.  Yes, I would eat there again.  The food was good, even if it was a bit too much in terms of quantity and price.

 

We got back on the road and promptly hit traffic as we approached the French border…

I was a little slow on the draw, but you can see we were nowhere near Paris.

This was a bummer…

But I got a kick out of the change kiosk.  They don’t have one of these fancy ones at the German border.

Yea!

 

Okay… so here’s about where Bill started getting really antsy for Annecy.  There was a lot of traffic.  We had to pay about 7 euros in tolls and Bill didn’t get close enough to the machine to collect his change.  Then, we were in one of many confusing traffic circles.  Some guy honked at Bill when he was trying to figure out which exit to take, causing him to take the wrong one.  He started cussing and I told him to chill out.  And then, blessedly, we got on the right road to Annecy, although it was not the most direct route.  I started to see why so many people fall in love with this area.  The scenery is just stunning.

Suddenly, I saw misty mountains by the crystal clear lake…

I snapped pictures while Bill pissed off all the people behind him, including one woman who was very animatedly showing how exasperated she was.

But I’m glad Bill slowed down so I could get a few shots.  This was our only totally cloudy day.  We only had a few clouds on Friday.

 

Talloires is a world away from Annecy, which is a true city in every sense of the word.  There are several hotels in this area, as well as a large campground and a place that appeared to rent “tiny” houses by the lake.  We didn’t take the time to explore the camping or tiny house options, but I wanted to mention it for those who are into that kind of thing.  Here’s a Web site for one place we noticed last night.

We pulled into the parking lot at Hotel Les Grillons at about 5:00pm… just in time to freshen up for dinner.

Standard