My Mom is Here!
And after 12 hours of flying with no fewer than three layovers (JFK, Reykjavik, and London!), I wasn't about to make her endure a city bus ride, and then a 40 minute train ride--not to mention having to buy train tickets in a foreign language. So I had my first long-distance driving adventure in France. And in Luxembourg. And, for about 10 minutes, in Germany. They call the area north of Metz "Pays des trois frontières," the Land of Three Borders, because, well, that's what it is. And ever since the Schengen Agreement in 1995, there are no border controls, so it's quite possible to take a wrong exit and end up in another country. Several times.
Luxembourg is interesting. There is a Luxembourgish language, a High German dialect with a lot of French loan-words, which I can usually read, but not usually understand when spoken. People in the airport will speak French or German depending on how you greet them. The airport is tiny, more like a large train station or bus terminal. The parking deck has a great system--there's a sign posted at the entrance telling you how many spaces are available on each level, and best of all, each parking space has a colored light with an automatic sensor in the ceiling. When you look down a row, you can instantly see if there are any empty spaces by the color of the light. Brilliant!
I stopped on the way to tour the Castle of the Dukes of Lorraine, a medieval fortress perched on a promontory overlooking the tiny village of Sierck-les-Bains (population: 1700). I am insanely behind on editing pictures--I'm still working on London!--so it will take me a while to get these up, but suffice to say it was magnificent. Every time I turned around--more magnificence. And it just kept *being* magnificent. Ruthlessly.
Luxembourg is interesting. There is a Luxembourgish language, a High German dialect with a lot of French loan-words, which I can usually read, but not usually understand when spoken. People in the airport will speak French or German depending on how you greet them. The airport is tiny, more like a large train station or bus terminal. The parking deck has a great system--there's a sign posted at the entrance telling you how many spaces are available on each level, and best of all, each parking space has a colored light with an automatic sensor in the ceiling. When you look down a row, you can instantly see if there are any empty spaces by the color of the light. Brilliant!
I stopped on the way to tour the Castle of the Dukes of Lorraine, a medieval fortress perched on a promontory overlooking the tiny village of Sierck-les-Bains (population: 1700). I am insanely behind on editing pictures--I'm still working on London!--so it will take me a while to get these up, but suffice to say it was magnificent. Every time I turned around--more magnificence. And it just kept *being* magnificent. Ruthlessly.