'Thanks.' He said with a half laugh half smile. 'You two off home then?'
'Off to France actually, sort of a holiday within a holiday.' I replied. Ski-ing in the alps. Holiday. Living in Scotland. Working holiday. We board the bus and our journey to les orres begins as the 4pm sun sets on edinburgh castle.
'Enjoy your trip'
We had checked in on line. We just have small ish carry on bags with us. So there wasn't any of your usual airport stuff. No line at the security check point. On we went landing was good and there we were in Grenoble. Not too much colder than the Scottish highlands. Still cold.
So at this point I think i'll put in some background information. We had decided to try couch surfing in grenoble. If you have not heard of it, couchsurfing.com is an organization which aims to get like-minded friendly people together. Take the idea sleeping on a friend's couch and expand it. Once registered on their site you can host and surf. As a host you invite people into your home, provide some accomodation, give infomation on your local area and perhaps even show people around town. As a surfer you can contact hosts in places you'd like to visit, find out if they are willing, and be a good house guest. Ideally feedback will be given by both host and surfer so others can know.
In Grenoble we had arranged to stay with this guy Xavier. It was sweet. He had given us directions to his place from the airport, which turned out to be spot on. As Grenoble sits in the mountains (Omi tells us 'when you are in grenoble you can pick any street, and you go to the end of that street, there is a mountain there') the airport is a 45 minute drive from the city. Following Xavier's directions we take the shuttle into town, ride trolly line A 5 stops and trolly line C 3 stops. We were about to call him when we here Nicki's name. He was there to meet us.
hello bonjour bonjour hello nicki xavier ross 'have you guys eat? I keep food for you come come.' He had told us previously that he was having people over this night (otherwise he would have picked us up at the bus station) and would save us some food. He was very very welcoming. He showed us in and to our room. Many times it seems hosts will have a spare room with a bed. 'you can put your stuff here and then come to get some food.' said xavier. We knew he was having people over, but we did not expect the welcoming party we received. Xavier is friends with many of the other couch surfing hosts in Greneble, and on this night there just happened to be fifteen or twenty of them gathered in his small living room eating raclette and having a gay old time.
They were all your mid-twenties crowd, all very french and very friendly. Raclette is amazing. Its like cheese( nice french variety) and meat, with onions and potatoes and other stuff; all individual like, then they have this cooking machine - wide flat and oval with hot space on top and in the middle, no moving parts looks like a mini two storey parking garage, then there are about 8 large flat metal spoons you put in the middle with the cheese in and it melts maybe some onions or salami on top - it makes like individual portions of fondue to be eaten with these other fixings. They were all very enthusiastic about showing us. Very generous with their wine. We stayed with them til perhaps 3 in the a.m. talking and playing games, one game very similar to mafia amoung others. The next day xavier continued to offer us food and gave us a key to his place so we could come and go as we pleased.
Grenoble is a very pretty city indeed surrounded by mountains. We were there on a sunday so many shops were shut. Memorable moments included 1.asking the owner of a kebab shop for directions to the train station (so we could arrange tickets to less orres). I asked in my very rudimentary basic french; something not unlike (phonetically) 'oo ay lu gard du tron.' What ensued was a lengthy and confusing transaction. He didnt speak english, and us not french. (I know coming to france and not bothering to learn... but we've been learning fast) He would say something, realize we weren't getting it, then repeat louder and slower, as you do. in the end we got there. A kilometer away in a direction. and 2. Hiking to the top of the closest hill. There was a fortress with tunnels and walls. The viw from the top was great.
So monday we had a very beautiful train journey from grenoble to gap. where our friend manu picked us up and drove us to the ski station where he works 'les orres'. At which time we learned the correct pronunciation: lezore. It is beautiful here...
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