Wow!!! Paris was fun to be in for New Years! We have just returned from a 10 day road trip through Switzerland and France so we didn’t have big plans for New Years until the day before.  It all came together quickly, just by luck.

Breezy got a call from a fellow Canadian friend here (parents work at the embassy) and they were going to a big house party with other Canadian families and wanted her to go. The theme was ‘Great Gatsby’ for formal wear and it was a ‘swanky’, big deal; so she started watching the movie on the 30th to get some dress ideas. Then Greg got a text that his friend had put his name on “the list” to get into this high profile Paris club at 11pm (when it opened) on the Champs Elysees!  So he started arranging when he would meet these 2 other guys down in Paris and how he would get in, (technically a bar so he should be 18), because his friend just turned 18 and he is the one with connections with someone at the club, (and has the money to reserve a table for hundreds of dollars etc… ) It really is like another life here entirely, because of the families that the kids are hanging around (and their parent’s incredible wealth). So very different, but fun while it lasts!

So Chris and I found availability online for a boat cruise down the Siene at 8pm, leaving under the Eiffel Tower to see Paris by night. We booked tickets for us and Greg and then made reservations at a restaurant near the Eiffel Tower so we could walk there easily after the boat cruise. Then we figured, Greg would take the train at about 10:15 to meet up with the boys to go to the club.

So, on the 31st, Brianna left at 4:00pm to go to her friend’s house with all of her dress clothes and a sleepover bag. Then Chris and I and Greg left with a bottle of champagne in my purse (for midnight of course!) to go on the boat cruise. It was very cold out while walking past the Eiffel tower (-2 cold 🙂 and so we were happy when we finally got on the boat after 20 minutes in line with our tickets. It was a covered cruise boat glowing with Christmas lights and once you were seated you could go to the bar and each get a champagne (plastic flute glasses which I saved for later 🙂 and a plate of snacks. So while we cruised we had traditional French quiche, duck pate, fruit and macaroons desserts.  Click here, to see the boat information and tour.

New Years Eve under Eiffel Tower

Before boat cruise

After that we walked to our restaurant and had a drink and some frog legs and French Onion soup – thought we’d keep up with the traditional “French Fare’.  After the restaurant we  walked to the Trocedero Metro stop, took the subway to St. Michel in the Latin Quarter where Greg’s friends said they were, and we all got out there to look around until we knew he had met up with them.  A few minutes after we knew he was with them, Chris and I took the train to Champs Elysees which was an adventure in itself. It was sightly nerve wracking if you consider a jam packed subway station on New Years Eve in Paris to be a risk, but nonetheless, the quickest way we could get to where we were going before the light show began on the Arc de Triomphe. So we were crunched body to body on the subway-metro for 5 stops until we could get out. There were announcements on the metro that the 4 main stops were closed and unavailable for better security control, so we had to get out further from the Arc.  But that’s what we had wanted to do anyway, so it was perfect for us because most people got off at the ‘Concord’ stop and then we got off 4 stops later.  We ended up at the Arc about 11:45pm, just in time to pop our champagne on the street (like many others were) and wait for the fireworks!

After boat cruise

Midnight! Happy New Year!

It was a spectacular sight and we were able to enjoy it, knowing the kids were safe and having fun too. Greg also saw the fireworks from a different viewpoint (he was right in the centre of the Champs Eylsees) and video taped some of it. Then he got into the club right after that and we kept in touch by texting, while we went to a bar up the street from the Arc. It was a quiet outdoor (glass covered) bar with fire and heating lamps…(very cozy). We had a drink and enjoyed the ambiance with all the people walking by filtering away from the lightshow. At 1:00am Greg told us all was well and he would be there until at least 2:30am (clubs open 11:00pm-4:00am here, so we knew it would be a later night…). So, we took a train to La Defense which is where we always change trains to go home. We found out in La Defense that no more trains were running to our train station (too late) and the next one was 2:30 to the station 2km from our house. Still not easy having no control over your own transportation…

We headed back outside to order an Uber, but my phone died when the Uber was calling to confirm and was parked somewhere underneath our overpass!! So, with a dead phone, we couldn’t get any Uber, and we talked to taxis but they said it was double the rate for New Years and would be $100.- Can.. We’d already spent enough so we decided to take the 2:30am train and then walk home. We did that and got home at 3:15am and called Greg who was about to leave the club. Greg took an Uber home and got in at 4:00am. He was sober (of course:) and safe, so we couldn’t ask for more, and he’d had a great night too! There had been free drinks for his table all night so he used good sense and had been very reasonable. We are happy that we all made it out and back for a LONG night of events, with so many fun memories of the evening. Normally we have quiet New Years Eves, so it was very different!

Let’s hope that 2017 follows with good health, happiness and many more great memories for everyone!

Chris’ Highlights:

Watching the kids re-connect with old friends, babysitters, neighbours etc.

Breaking into our BMW through the window, then having to replace it (and use another rental in Switzerland) – long story!

Challenging my fear of heights by skiing in the Alps and walking villages perched on mountains

Reuniting with Sennhausers!! Our favourite Swiss/Aussie family!

Candle dipping as we used to with kids at Christmas (Swiss tradition)

Swimming in ‘Hot Bads’ in Konstanz

Walking Winterthur again which still feels like home (Manta Sandwich-yum!)

Meeting up with an ‘old’ student (Celine Heri) in Zurich – who is doing so well!

Facing my fear of heights!

Walking Winterthur and trying Swiss foods

Celine Heri – amazing student and friend!

Sennhauser hosts – best ever!

Mo’s Highlights:

Seeing the Sennhausers, Thoma’s, Renate, Marlene, and Celine again

Sitting outside on the balcony, Christmas Eve with candles all around

Skiing in the French Alps!

Exploring ancient ruins of castles, fortifications and churches

Avignon and Pope de Palais on Christmas Eve

Driving up and down winding mountain roads

Greg’s Highlights:

Cable car to the peak of Pilatus!

Skiing Puy St. Vincent above the clouds

Reuniting with my tagesmutter, Renate and hearing stories of when I was little with her (“Shogi ist mega fine!” was my favourite saying)

Seeing Jacqueline and Peter again, the chicken farm and our old house

Going to Bruderhaus and Kybourg because I have memories of them.

Visiting Einstein’s house in Bern where he discovered E=MC2

Having a beer at a restaurant deck in 15 degree sunny weather (overlooking Pilatus)

On the train with Jacqui and Peter

Revisiting the Bruderhaus

On the 2nd cable car going up Pilatus

Einstein’s stairs in his house

Standing on the edge of a 6 story drop

Skiing from the peak of Puy St. Vincent

Bri’s Highlights:

Looking around the city I was born in and seeing the hospital where I was born…

Watching the sunset from a castle ruin on the top of a hill…

Going into the house we lived in on Gratstrasse and remembering parts of it…

Seeing Peter and Jacqui Sennhauser and my tagesmutter, Marlene again…

Banana City hotel with thermal pool spa and Finnish sauna (we went 2x :)…

Konstanz thermal pools outside with the lake beside us…

Achieving ‘wifi success’ in Saou by standing on a chair in the kitchen and ‘FaceTiming’ people from the church square!

Saou forest walk…I wish it was shorter though 🙂

Skiing in the Alps after thinking I might die after looking at the height of them! Pilatus mountain peak too!

Cave dwellings in Saou forest

Puy St. Martin

Saou Forest

Saou Forest

My ‘mommy Marlene’; tagesmutter

Sunset from a castle ruin

Peak of Pilatus

The last leg of our ‘European Christmas Vacation’ took us to the most scenic part of our journey – The French Alps.  We had been to the Alps a couple of time, most memorably with brother Kelly, in Megeve.  This trip was going to take us to a more isolated area, specifically to a small village named Pelvoux at 1400m above sea level.

We began our day by leaving Saou at noon after a small hiccup of locking the owners out of the house we rented because we didn’t know they didn’t have a key and we shut the door behind us. We didn’t think it would lock without locking it ourselves from the outside (we had to manually lock it before), and she said to leave the key inside. She texted later saying she was locked out and had to climb in through a window!! “Oops! Lost in translation” – we had been communicating with her solely in French …and the language barrier can cause these little problems. lol

Soon after we left Saou, we stopped prior to the steep hills and walked any ruins we found. One memorable one was the castle shell in Bordeaux. The kids were tired of ‘ancient things’, so Chris and I walked this village and had a nice view of the old castle.

Looking up through Bordeaux village

Bordeaux, a step back in time

View as walking toward castle ruin

Bordeaux building

One view of castle ruins (12th century)

Not far into the journey, near La Charce, in the Drome region was an interesting place to stop the car and read about some impressive rock formations beside the road. The striated rock formations were once horizontal and at the bottom of the sea in Paleozoic times – before dinosaurs -when only some sea crustaceans existed!!  5 million years old – one of the only places in the world to see Earth material this old…Fossils of this sea life are embedded in these rock formations. They have been pushed vertically by plate tectonics and each limestone striation is equivalent to about 20,000 years of compression at the bottom of the sea. Each indent was during an ocean warming and marks the next 20,000 years. The fault line under this region causes a massive earthquake every 200-400 years.

Then our GPS took us through some memorable ‘U’ turns on steep sections of roadway (up and down mountains and past glaciers).  The kids were laughing in the back, watching their father clutching the ‘Holy S__’ bar, reciting the Hail Mary, with his eyes closed (for those of you that know him well, you know that he has a slight fear of heights). The name of the highway was called the Lautaret Pass and it climbs to 6, 800 feet. It passes through the highest town in France, Briancon.  Greg was videotaping the edge out the window but it is pretty choppy and no pictures can capture the drop we saw when we looked down, but here is one tunnel corner we rounded…

At about 6:00pm, we reached our destination, a very charming Auberge called ‘Clot St. Joseph’.  The owners, Philippe and Sylvie, prepared a traditional Fondue dinner with Ile Flotante (dessert) for our family and two ‘mountaineers’ staying there (a lawyer and an engineer).   They had a beautiful old Alpine farmhouse that they had totally renovated and added 5 guest rooms to and we were in one with 4 beds and a bathroom.

Clot St. Joseph (our ‘gite’)

View from our ‘gite’ window

2nd view from our window

Street in Pelvoux near our ‘gite’

Old house with sloped entrance to barn

It was all stone and wood beam interior and a winding stone staircase down to the ‘cozy’ living room / dining area with a large fireplace (with real fire, like home!).We didn’t know what we would be eating; You just request ahead online if you will be having a homemade dinner there at the ‘auberge’. So it was a very nice surprise  to have fondue while in the Alps in winter – great ambiance! We asked the mountaineers/skiers, the best place to ski in the area due to the lack of snow this year in the mountains (they are really feeling the effects of global warming here), and they recommended Puy St. Vincent.

The next day we woke, had breakfast at our ‘gite’ and got dressed for skiing. Puy St. Vincent was only 12 min. from where we were staying (10 of that was climbing a mountain road :). It was a beautiful day above the clouds with no wind and a temperature of about 2 degrees. We all skied together for the first 4 runs and then Greg and I went up to the very top of the mountain (2 more chairlift connections up) and it took about 40 minutes to ski to the bottom, stopping at the odd spot to look at the view. We did that twice before meeting up with Bri and Chris for another 2 runs with them. It was a great day!           A highlight for all of us I think!

Puy St. Vincent resort

Bri – most improved skiier!

Just off the highest chairlift…

Breathtaking, silent beauty…

Chris, in fine form!

88 euros to rent;      105 euros to ski;       Skiing in the Alps – priceless!

The next day we left at 10:15 am for Paris. This last drive was also hair-raising but one of the most beautiful drives we’ve ever been on. I drove it so Chris could ‘hang tight’, but nevertheless, we all loved the scenery and stopped a few times to take it all in.

We are now recuperating, doing laundry and groceries, and getting ready to celebrate New Years – Paris style!! Please stay tuned in to our blog – we miss Canada and it is our ‘fastest’ way to reach out to everyone at once!

Happy New Year!!     Love, The Waylings

Gruyere, Switzerland

After spending time in Bern and Gruyere (French portion of Switzerland) we drove 7 hours to the Drome Region of France.  Drome is located south of Lyon, and north of Avignon.  We spent a Christmas in this area 15 years ago (in a small town called Manas), so we were really looking forward to our return.

The Drome is located in the pre-Alps region of France.  It’s such a beautiful area, dotted with ancient hill towns, and Roman ruins.  Many of the buildings date back to the 1100’s, and have been renovated inside with all of the modern conveniences set amongst rugged stone walls and curved doorways.

Mo found an amazing rental in a picturesque village called Saou.  Our ‘flat’ was located in the centre of town, across from a church.  The village of Saou is at the mouth of valley that is home to a conservation area (Saou forest) because it is prehistorically dated with evidence of different periods in history. It has stunning alpine views and a fascinating cave system that dates back to neolithic times.

During our first full day in the Drome we visited the larger towns of Crest (to shop for a Christmas tree, and Christmas dinner – duck and a pork roast) and Avignon (to see the Palais des Popes, and Pont d’Avignon).  We also stopped by St. Remy to see the exact building and grounds where Vincent Van Gogh spent time battling his mental illness.

Christmas day was spent opening the few gifts we brought on our journey.  It was the first Christmas that the kids slept in past 10:30am!! They had opened most gifts ahead of time in Paris so they weren’t feeling the full anticipation as in years gone by.  The rest of the day was spent exploring the forest and caves near Saou, and hiking to a fascinating medieval ruin, in Soyans, at sunset (a memory we will never forget).

On our third morning, we got organized for the final leg of our Christmas vacation – skiing in the Alps and left at noon for the 3 hour drive to the Pelvoux-Vallouise ski villages.

Overall ‘La Drome’ was an excellent opportunity to slow down, take a deep breath, enjoy our surroundings and one another.  We spent time laughing and talking by candlelight on our apartment deck (main floor), and toasting to our friends near and far.  Feeling very blessed that we can spend time exploring with our kids.

We are writing a little bit after the fact, but we wanted to mention the wonderful time we had the last week of school before break when we were preparing for Christmas and getting ready to leave for our vacation. Even before that we had a beautiful dinner for friends which was at the beginning of Advent and we were grateful to be invited to that gathering and have a fantastic meal of turkey, many main dishes, champagne, and 4 or 5 amazing deserts to choose from. We were all connected to the school and each other in some way so it was a fun night!

Then lately we made some wonderful memories while walking around the Paris Christmas markets. La Defense has a very popular Christmas market and we walked and shopped around that one a few times as a family, having dinner and hot wine. Most recently, we took the train into the market on Champs Elysees which was a fun place to visit. They both sell ‘Vin Chaud’ that is very tasty and warms you up while you’re walking around.

Canadian ‘tent’ at La Defense market

Champs Elysees market

Notice Hot Wine sign?

Amazing market foods and places to eat!

Fresh fish being cooked over fire

Cheeses of every kind!

We also enjoyed a production at our school one night of Alice in Wonderland.  We encouraged Brianna to join this production but she would not bite. Not interested in being on stage (so far…), and how surprising is that?

Then just before leaving for our holiday, we decided to open some gifts early so that we wouldn’t have to bring everything with us on our ‘road trip.’ So we opened some of the gifts that didn’t need to come with us. We have our stockings and some other gifts packed for Christmas morning but there are very few compared to the past 16 years, so Christmas is spread out this year. Greg and Bri were happy to open early mind you!

We just wanted to update you as to how the preparations for Christmas are going and we will update you on our travels once we have some more pictures downloaded. We have to buy another electrical converter in order to charge our devices so we will get that sorted first. Otherwise, we are loving the mild weather of Paris after hearing some of the temperatures Peterborough has been experiencing.  Christmas isn’t really the same when it is 5-8 degrees above zero, but it makes walking to the grocery store bearable. 🙂

Wishing all of you much, peace, health and happiness as you prepare for this festive season. We will be thinking of all of you this Christmas!

Mo’s Blog:

I just returned from 5 days in Greece!! I left with ASP’s Varsity Girls’ Volleyball team on Wednesday morning on Aegean Air. Myself and their coach, Jessamy, were on the flight with 10 players and it was a great trip!!  These girls are world flyers from living internationally and so they are very low maintenance. We just stuck near each other in a group, but they knew how to do everything on their own and they are super relaxed and mature so there was never anything to worry about. It made for very ‘easy’ travel since they check in, keep track of their housing partner and don’t really need us for anything.

Chris and Greg were also going through ISSTs back in Paris and battling like crazy to win some games in front of a home crowd. They did not have a strong turn out this year so Chris and Greg ran the show, and Greg was the obvious stand out – the All Star according to many people who noticed him and talked about the tournament. I watched some of his play in my hotel at night through live streaming online and saw some AMAZING hits! In the end they finished 5th of 8 teams in Division 1, so not as bad as some. We’re all a little sad to see it end since it is a sport the kids both enjoy a lot now.

Back to Athens: We arrived in Athens after a slightly bumpy flight and there was a coach bus to take us to the Athen’s School. Our students met their ‘housing families’ there and then we were fed a Greek dinner during a coaches meeting. We were shuttled back to our hotel at about 7:00pm (1 hour ahead of France). It was a relaxing night there planning for our games the next day. Thursday, Friday and Saturday were round robin game play (2 out of 3 against every team there). Then Sunday we made it into the Division 2, Championship finals for Gold! We ended up in 2nd overall, so the girls brought home silver medals.

Yeah “Rebels”- GO ASP!!! 

Between games in the gym, we would try to sit outside and get 5 minutes of sun. But usually there was only time to grab lunch in the Coaches lounge and check in on Greg’s ISST play in Paris!!  (fantastic that it was live streamed but stressful!!). Our games were between 2 gyms so we were shuttled back and forth every day. Then we either took a taxi or the Metro home.  We were given money for food and transportation so it was really stress free all the time. The weather was 20 degrees and cloudy 3 of the days, but blue skies the other two.

Thursday after games, we went for a nice dinner a few streets from the hotel (authentic local Greek restaurant recommended by ‘George’).  Then we went to a bar recommended by the restaurant (Raindogs – home of anarchists of Athens). We were the only ones there and the bartender was drinking more than us, but there was great music and atmosphere nonetheless. This is where we tried ‘Mastika’ – a liquor only made in Greece, on the island of Chios, from the Masticha tree.  Then Friday after the games, Jessamy, Fadime (Dutch coach) and I went to the old city to get lost around the Acropolis and found a beautiful, quaint restaurant called Daphne’s. We sat and talked there for 2 hours.

Saturday night the girls came to the hotel after their final game, so we checked them in and then all went out together to walk around the Acropolis and see Plaka (the old city streets). We visited the Acropolis Museum which is new and wonderful, and then had dinner and a Greek show with a lot of dinner and dancing. We were all up on stage a few times as part of the show! Once we were all singing Mama Mia together, and another time we were doing a ‘belly dance’.

We got back to the hotel at 10:30pm after a Metro and taxi fiasco. The night had been all the more interesting because we had one player with a sprained ankle so she was on crutches that we borrowed from the hotel and in a wheelchair at the museum (buzzing all over because it’s electric). We had to carry her up the rock outcropping  you see below to get her the view and photo op. 🙂  Needless to say, it was a jam packed 5 days and I am exhausted and glad to be back “home”, in Paris.

‘Rebels’ from ASP!!

Zafolia Hotel, Athens