Papa Spud's Adventures
Monday, July 30, 2007
Cannes, France
CANNES, FRANCE (the real story...)
I have already been to Cannes back in '96. There wasn't a lot to do back then but wander around town and ride the train to Nice to hang out at the beach.
This time I decided to take a tour that was offered to the Verdon Canyon, otherwise known as the Grand Canyon of Europe. It was an interesting ride up into the Alps. First real mountains I've seen in a couple of years so I enjoyed that part of it. Lots of straight up and down cliffs and switchback roads. Interesting ride if you enjoy being terrified. Imagine if you will a full sized bus traveling a road that is supposed to support two way traffic, but if anything bigger than a bicycle is coming the other way, somebody has to literally be hanging off the edge of the road. I of course have a window seat in the bus on the side closest to the ½ mile straight down drop off. Oh did I mention that they don't believe in guard rails. My hands and forearms are still sore from gripping the stupid arm rest for about 4 hours of this nightmare. It was a beautiful ride though. 
Also visited a little village stuck up between two cliffs. Started by a group of Monks in the 12 century with their monastery up in the top of the valley. Pretty cool picture too I think. The monastery is still there and the monks make enough to survive by crafting pottery to sell to anybody willing to pay way to much for the privilege of having a souvenir.
At it's deepest the canyon was literally ½ mile straight down with a river (mostly dried up at this time of year) in the bottom. Verdon apparently means "green", and if you can see the attached pictures, you can see that it is accurately named. We visited a lake that feeds the rivers...also a pretty amazing green color.
On the way back from the tour, I was getting kind of thirsty. The bus driver had been selling bottled water on the trip to try to pocket a little extra change, so I asked my buddy (sitting in the aisle seat to buy me a bottle of water. He talked to the driver, and brought me back a can of something called Limonaide. Said the bus driver told him it was good. All I cared about was that it was cold, so I popped the top and took a big mouthful. Turns out Limonaide is a type of beer with a little bit of lemon in it. All I know is that after 40 years, I got my first taste of beer ever (I know most of you don't believe that but it's true). Made me sick. But the best part is that the buddy who bought me a beer is my church Group Leader on the ship. Basic equivelant of the Bishop. He thought it was just plain ol' lemonaide too. I guess when he asks me to pass the sacrament Sunday I have to tell him I'm not worthy or something.
Of course, maybe neither of us can pass or take the sacrament after this trip anyway. We wandered up the beach front a couple of times. That's really about all there is to do. The European culture is a little different than ours. Most of the time it's not that noticeable. I took a picture of me with some beach in the background. It was just to get an idea of what the area was like. After further review, it's kind of like a "where's Waldo" picture, but the object isn't to find Waldo, it's to see how many half naked ladies you can see in the background behind Waldo. Nothing too graphic, just sorta odd if your not a local.
posted by Mama Spud at 3:18 PM
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