I had to prepare some speaking task for English class, so I made a short story:
An Interesting Vacation
Before we came to Canada we had had a long vacation in Europe. We visited 3 countries and several cities there. So, the order of visiting was: Berlin, Geneva, Lausanne, Zurich, Dijon, Reims, Tours, Paris and again Berlin. We got a lot of impressions, visited many interesting places. I’ll highlight only some of facts and impressions.
In 50 km to Berlin there is largest indoor tropical pool in the world. It’s a really huge dome, the 3rd largest by volume building in the world. It is a disused hangar 360 metres long, 210 metres wide and 107 metres high. It operates all year around 24 hours a day and you can even sleep there in a camp. There was some constructions works on railways so we took a taxi from the closest station. But after 15 km Mercedes had broken and we had to wait half an hour for another one sitting in a broken taxi somewhere in the field near highway. The taxi driver didn’t speak English or French. It was an adventure.
First of all I should say that cities in Switzerland are so clean and nice. Everything there is above average (standards). Immediately after arriving to Geneva we felt that all perfumes is actually in Switzerland. Everybody wears nice scent, even a waiter in a restaurant. When you arrive to Geneva Airport you can pick there free public transport ticket. Moreover, in hotel in Geneva and Lausanne we was given free transport ticket for all duration of stay in hotel. I suppose every hotel in Geneva and Lausanne does this offer (but not in Zurich). When we climbed the nearest mountain Monnetier-Mornex (the height is about 750 meters) surprisingly we found a French village just on the top of the mountain.
One hint about restaurants in Geneva. You can hardly find an open place to eat from about 3 pm to 7 pm. I think that they are closed by law to provide 8 hours working day to its personal.
Lausanne is the smallest city in the world which has a metro system. There are 2 lines and 28 stations. One line is fully automated and there are no driver in the train.
Everywhere in Zurich you feel a touch of richness. Plenty of fashion shops, expensive restaurants, banks and so on. People wear quality clothes, drive expensive cars. Nevertheless it’s easy to find a restaurant with affordable prices and superior quality of food. We spent 3 hours in the greatest aqua-park “Alpamare” which is not so far from the city. You can enjoy 10 slides with total length of 1500 m. There was just +5 outside and some of the slides has open spaces so it’s a great contrast when you’re moving through the slide indoor and suddenly you’re moving outdoor in an open-air space, and then back to the close tube. Also you can enjoy indoor wavepool and outdoor thermal sole and whirl pools and feel like being in Iceland.
A couple of words about transport. The most intelligent tramways are in Zurich. While travelling in a tram you can not only see on display the information about next stops but also the information about buses and trams to which you can transfer on the next stop. And you can see the time when next bus or train will arrive. Swiss trains arrive to station and depart from it strictly according to their schedule. You can check your watch by trains’ schedule. And this is great difference to French trains which often not follow their schedule and we had some nervous moments when trains were late and we missed the transfer to others.
What I really enjoyed in France are wine provinces. We visited only Bourgogne and Champagne-Ardenne. Despite of cold weather in November it was nice there, because there are not so many tourists as in summer. It’s easy to get to various vineries from Dijon. You don’t need a car or a guided tour. Just get a train and go to small towns near Dijon such as Beaune and Nuits-Saint-George. In small towns you can easy find a lot of vineries and degustation tours. I’ll tell about one. We visited “Patriarche Pere et Fils” Caves. You pay 10 euro for admission and then you have a long trip in caves observing numerous barrels with wines. And in the end of tour you come to the degustation area. You can taste about 17 different types of wine, but you’re helping your-self. We tasted all of them once, and then we tasted the most delicious once more. I should say we become a bit drunk after such generous degustation. But it was a very high quality wine. Actually it’s possible to buy very nice but simple and young Patriarche wine in L.C.B.O. just for $11 per bottle.
In Champagne-Ardenne province we stayed in Reims and travelled by train to Epernay. It’s an amazing place too especially when you know some French. As at Bourgogne you can enter to some wine-shops and just talk to the sales-person about life and wine and they offer you a free glass of wine or a flute of champagne even there is a price for degustation on the front door. At one champagne house we met a Russian sales-person, who spokes 4 languages. We enjoyed his work and champagne he offers to us. In an ordinary supermarket in Reims you can find plenty of champagne brands with the prices from 2 euro to 50.
I should say that the cathedral Notre-Dame de Reims is magnificent and I could say that it’s greater that Notre-Dame de Paris.
Tours city. This region is famous for its Loire castles (chateau). We visited 4 of them. In one chateau Leonardo da Vinci was buried, in other he build original stairs where ascending people don’t meet descending ones.
The last city in ours tour was Paris. I can mention La Tour Montparnasse, from the top of it you can see a beautiful panoramic view. And there is no queue to get there in comparison with Tour Eiffel. Also we visited other common places such as Champs-Élysées, l'Arche de la Défense, la basilique du Sacré-Cœur etc.
After Paris we returned to Berlin and the next day we flighted to Toronto. I really enjoyed ours trip.
