Turning Bad to Good

We had another beautiful day in Brussels yesterday. Actually the weather has been just perfect nearly every day - no rain and barely any cloud. Before we left this beautiful city we had to see the Grand Place at night so after attending an English-speaking church service last night we had dinner right in amongst things on this amazing square. And I can report back to say that my day was frite-free! But still plenty of calories consumed in other ways…

Today we drove to Germany, and due to my negligence in Spain, had to pick up my boots from the organisers of the CEVMA conference who are based in Wetzlar. They also run a very large German Christian media organisation called ERF Medien (Media) who have approached us regarding Towards Belief. They will dub (translate with a German voice rather than subtitles) and broadcast Towards Belief on their network. This will also be in conjunction with another Christian distribution organisation who will licence Towards Belief in German-speaking countries in Europe. Very exciting developments from the conference! 

The town of Wetzlar "just happened" to be on the way to Bad Berneck where we are driving to tomorrow and using as our base for a few weeks. Who knows how else I would have got my beloved boots (and orthotics) back! It has become a wonderful opportunity to see them again, get a tour of their premises and continue to build a relationship with them. Thank you God! The photo is of Karl with Wolf-Dieter Kretschmer who heads up the television side of their organisation.

Tonight we are staying close by and having dinner with Wolf-Dieter and his wife. I'm sure Karl will be glad to have someone else to talk to!

Brussels - The New Favourite!

Well Brussels is my new favourite place in the world! For the following reasons...
1. The architecture is incredible
2. The people are friendly, and
3. Frites! French fries, along with mussels, is their national dish and anyone who knows me well will know how much I love frites! And a visitor just has to sample the national dish!

Our accommodation is also fantastic. We negotiated the city traffic and found our hotel-slash-modern B&B without any trouble thanks to the GPS. It's only a 15 min bus ride to the city centre. Our first sight last night of what is described as "the most beautiful square in all of Europe," Grand Place was disappointing. It was overwhelmed by an enormous stage, sound vans, lighting rigs, huge crowds and really loud music (showing my age)! Thankfully when we went back today the scaffolding was already coming down and we could see the amazing buildings that line the square without hindrance. I so wish I was an artist and could draw these buildings!

We started the day at an antique market which ended up being real antiques so we headed for the flea market up the road and something more within my price range - i.e. single digit euro rather than triple digit euro!

We walked a lot, met Belgium's favourite cartoon hero (that's Tin Tin for the uneducated!), soaked up the ambience of this beautiful city and finished a fabulous day with more mussels, frites and a belgium waffle, because we should! I think I am leaving this place 2 kg heavier in just 2 days! And even for a frites lover, I think I will abstain tomorrow…let's hope I have the self control to do so!

Mont St Michel

We only had a 3.5 hour drive yesterday to get to Mont St Michel. You could see it in the distance for miles. The weather was quite overcast but cleared more as the afternoon wore on. Our hotel is in a fantastic location - it is in the cluster of hotels and restaurants just where the causeway meets the mainland. We had to have a password to get past the boom gate to get to our hotel and we then could either walk or get a free shuttle out to MSM. Online hotel booking was a winner this time!

We had the afternoon wandering around the medieval village that surrounds the abbey. Steps galore!  I'm not very fit but there were some people really struggling to get around. Good on them for at least attempting it though! And took a few pics (massive understatement!) as the light improved later in the day - see above.

Before dinner we went back out onto the causeway to take some dusk/night photos of MSM as its beautifully lit at night. I had packed a tripod in my suitcase and hadn't yet used it. Last night it was worth the space and weight! Then this morning I went back out to get some mood shots in the fog. Not as successful as the night photos but still a different look.

The abbey tour we did this morning was fantastic - probably because we got the audio guide as well and we went early enough so there was hardly anyone there - shown by the photo of the cloisters. I loved the colours in the stone, the architectural design and the story of God's hand on this place. Apparently back in 708, Aubert, the bishop of a nearby town, dreamt that the archangel Michael commanded him to build a church on this rock - "Build here and build high." Aubert doubted his vision and Michael had to appear to him 3 times, even going so far as to drill a hole in the bishop's skull with his finger in order to convince him! That's serious persuasion! Maybe there is a lesson there for all of us!

Tonight we are meeting up with Mike & Viv Jeffs at St Malo, a medieval town just south of here. They've been holidaying in Europe and were also at the CEVMA conference in Spain. Tomorrow we drive to Brussels for the weekend before making our way to Germany, and our home base for much of October.

Leonardo da Vinci

Last night when we went out to the car to get dinner we discovered a huge ding in the back. Our Peugeot is 2 weeks old and only had 7km on the clock when we picked it up in Barcelona. It was quite a shock but when we went to Reception, a guy had left his details for us which was very decent of him. So this morning with the hotel staff acting as interpreters, we lodged an accident file with the French insurance company. And so having been cautious about car theft since we arrived (warnings galore in travel books) we now look like locals with a dirty banged up car nobody would want!!! 

As a bit of background to our mornings activity, last year while we were preparing to go to Cambodia with the church team, one of the group activities was a personality test. I was thrilled when I had the same personality type as Leonardo da Vinci but as was proved today, clearly that is where any comparison stops! We spent the morning at Chateau du Clos Luce, where da Vinci spent his final 3 years. Here he was lavishly taken care of by the king and given every opportunity to continue to dream and work. It had amazing gardens and also working models of the inventions he penned back in the late 1500s before he died. He was an absolute master of art, engineering, invention, machinery and the list goes on. As it says in one of the guide books "He was like a man who had woken too early in the darkness when everyone else was still asleep."  It was a very impressive place.

In the afternoon Karl went for a ride and I did the Amboise Chateau Royal, right in the centre of town. It was here that Leonardo da Vinci was buried.

Tomorrow we leave the Loire and head to the coast to Mont St Michel.

Loire Valley

It took about 6 hours to drive to the Loire Valley from Avignon through picturesque countryside. We stuck to the freeways which are quick, but the tolls are expensive. It was good to get to our 'base camp' of Amboise. Ibis Budget here we are again…well for one night anyway. The "free wifi" ended up being free because it was useless! There are lots of things we can put up with - tiny simple rooms, modular (but perfectly clean) bathrooms, none of the extra little touches like soaps, shampoos, tissues, kettles, hair dryers or plugs but we can't do without wifi. And yes, it is supposed to be a holiday but there are always emails to check and work to attend to each day. The solution? Pay extra and check into the Novotel next door. Now Karl has a man cave for his bike with his own shower at the Ibis for the next two nights and we get to stay in a nice room with great wifi. You get what you pay for and a stunning view to boot! Yes, this was taken from our window:

Amboise is a beautiful little town in the heart of the Loire Valley. One of our favourite things to do is just sit and soak up the ambience in the town squares whilst enjoying a caffe creme or a glass of wine. I really have to pinch myself that I'm actually here in France!

We are close to many of the huge chateaus and while they are majestic and beautiful, they aren't really our thing so I think one or two will be plenty. After all, once you've seen one 15th century mansion, you've seen them all, right? This one is Chateau Chenonceau. One of the features were the beautiful fresh floral arrangements in nearly every room! (You'll have to excuse the slight lean on the flower photo - its a case of taking a quick pic before someone walks into the frame!)

Just think of all the feet that have trod on these tiles over the years!!!

Today was cloudy in the morning but clear blue day by lunchtime. We have two full days here and I'm torn between taking a break, sorting and editing photos in our luxurious room (by previous standards anyway!) and getting out and about, making the most of each moment. This afternoon I've opted for the former while Karl rides.

The Hill Towns of Provence

I think the credit card gods are against me! Last week I was checking to see whether I had received the credit for the Ibis Avignon bookings (see previous post) only to find a transaction on my card for $3,208 from Domayne Homebush (which was definitely not mine!). I rang Australia from Spain to notify them and hoped to get it sorted. At least this time we spoke the same language! Anyhow to cut a long story short, this morning I received a "Fraud Credit Adjustment" on my card for that amount. Yay! 

Today we drove around the hill towns of Provence and it was picture-postcard stuff! It probably wasn't what I'd originally planned for the day (as we had thought we'd see some of the more major towns to the south such as Arles and Aix-en-Provence) but being a Saturday, we decided to steer clear of those towns and head for the smaller towns to the north - Gordes and Roussillon especially were fantastic.

We also visited an abbey where rows of lavender run almost up to the front door! Its quintessential Provence except lavender is not in season at the moment! According to postcards, it looks a treat at the right time of year.

Tomorrow is a long drive north to the Loire Valley. Hope you are enjoying the blog…I'm loving taking the photos! 

Avignon

Some of you will be aware of my online booking debacle for Ibis Budget Avignon. For those of you who aren't, here's the sorry tale. Due to "technical issues" my booking for this accommodation was booked 3 times…and charged to my credit card 3 times! Over the last 2 months I tried many times to explain this to the Accor Hotels group as well as the hotel directly but no one would help. It was a frustrating, and expensive, situation. Anyhow, a few days ago the credit finally appeared on my card so my solution of inviting the homeless of Avignon to share our 2 vacant, but fully paid for, rooms did not eventuate. Funnily enough, we walked out of our hotel to go for a walk yesterday, and who should be sitting on a bench directly opposite the hotel…a homeless man who did not get to stay in 'luxury' at the Ibis last night.

It is a beautiful old walled city with a feel very much like Oxford. For those of you who learnt high school French you will probably be singing a little song in your head right now about the Pont d'Avignon and something about dancing on the bridge!

We did the tour of the bridge yesterday and today I just walked around the town and visited the Palais des Papes (home to the Popes back in the 15th century) while Karl did his third major mountain climb of Mont Ventoux. Sadly for him, he needed a stranger to take his photo at the summit this time.

Here's a few pics from around Avignon...and who can resist a beautiful piece of 14th century calligraphy! And another in honour of Olive Tree Media!

Tomorrow we do a bit of a drive around the smaller towns of Provence.

Pyrenees Day 2

Well, Karl made it up the Col du Tourmelet! For those of you who are interested the stats are an 18km ride, climbing to an elevation of 2115m. I can't believe he can ride that far and that steep. Very impressive! I drove down the other side while Karl enjoyed the (freezing) breeze in his hair (helmet), stopping to take a few random photos of cows, sheep and beautiful views. 

We then drove back to our B&B accommodation (just gorgeous and much more cultural than Ibis! See below) via St Bertrand de Comminges cathedral. Set high on a hill, the cloisters were just amazing (and so was the little staircase)!

Today we drove to Avignon in the Provence region of France. We stopped off at the Pont du Gard, a Roman aqueduct built around 19BC. That is incredibly hard to believe! Equally amazing is the ingenuity of it…it is part of a 30 mile canal that, by dropping a mere inch per 350 feet, supplied the town of Nimes with nine million gallons of water per day. I cannot believe that the Romans had the expertise and equipment to do that so long ago!

Avignon is a beautiful ancient walled city and once again we are in Ibis Budget…which meant we could slightly splurge on a lovely slow baked lamb and veggies meal at a gorgeous restaurant in the central square. More on Avignon tomorrow!

Pyrenees!

Today we made an early-ish start for the Pyrenees - about a 4 hour drive north-west from Barcelona. It was a beautiful sunny day for most of it until we got high in the Alps. As you can see the scenery was absolutely stunning, most especially as we got into the Pyrenees. We would definitely not have come this route had Karl not been intent on riding the Col du Tourmalet but it was quite the experience.

Today was the practice ride from Arreau over the Col d' Aspen - just a mere 12 km up 800 metres! Quite a feat but the bigger ride is tomorrow…stay tuned! I was a bit chuffed with myself as well - I drove a European manual car for the first time up those narrow, steep and very windy roads all by myself…didn't get out of second gear though!

I guess we will soon get the hang of the fact that the shops shut at 12 until about 2pm. Then they open and the restaurants close. We wanted to shop and then eat the other way around!

Our accommodation is a bit north of the Pyrenees in a tiny little village called Ardiege and is a B&B which I found online. Its so cute and gives us the cultural experience that Ibis Budget lacks! We drive back south tomorrow for the big ride and stay here again tomorrow! 

Barcelona

We finished up at CEVMA yesterday morning (Sunday). In the afternoon we drove 4 hours north to Barcelona with our GPS taking us the scenic route through Valencia. Our only other hiccup was that I realised I left my boots (complete with orthotics) back at the hotel. We stopped and rang - thankfully they were given to one of the organisers who lives in Germany. As it turns out their city is almost in a direct line from Brussels, where we will be at the end of September and where we will spend several weeks in Germany through October. God is good!

Our upmarket accom in Barcelona is Ibis Budget Molina de Rei...in the 'burbs of Barcelona but with free parking and wifi. Honestly, I can't fault it! It is also just a 20 min train ride into the city. Zoe from church had told us Barcelona was her favourite city and recommended tapas on La Rambla and so we obliged. It was fabulous! La Rambla is a main pedestrian boulevarde and thousands of people were out enjoying their Sunday night.

Today (Monday) we headed back into Barcelona and spent the day on the Hop On/Hop Off bus. By far the highlight was La Sagrada Familia - a modern, yet-to-be completed cathedral designed by Antoni Gaudi. It is awe inspiring but you have to wonder whether its a monument to the man or God! Either way it is quite spectacular.

We also walked up to Park Guell with beautiful views over Barcelona from a viewing platform surrounded by curving mosaic benches. The photo doesn't do it justice!

After that we then stopped off at some other Gaudi architectural creations. He certainly contributed a lot to this city! We have easily slipped into late dinners and late nights. It is now 10pm (way past my usual bedtime) and we have only just got back to the hotel and are both making the most of the wifi! Tomorrow we are off to the Pyranees! 

Suffering for the Gospel

Yes I know what you are thinking! Here in beautiful Spain and the Faases are 'suffering for the Gospel!' But I'm actually referring to some of the people here at the conference who are literally suffering for the Gospel. Yesterday we heard from an amazing guy called Kamil who spoke about the ministry he and his wife Kath run in Turkey. He has been arrested 3 times and continues to work under threat. He runs a TV/radio ministry and used to run a bible school until he had to shut it down because it was infiltrated with a spy masquerading as a Christian but was actually from the army. This man went on to do terrible things against them. Kamil even spoke of some of his ex students who were executed because they would not denounce their Christian faith. It is a privilege to be here. They are being blessed by Karl's messages and we are blessed by hearing their stories.

In the afternoon we went on a bus to l'Albufera lake for a bit of a boat tour and then had paella for dinner. Apparently for all you foodies, paella originated in this Valencia region of Spain. There are rice fields everywhere - something I didn't really expect in Europe!

It was delicious but what was even better was sharing it with people from Germany, Norway and Albania and hearing about their work in Christian media across Europe. Fascinating and incredibly encouraging.

We've Arrived!

Here we are in Cullera Spain after 45 hours in transit...that included a 5 hour drive south of Barcelona and our first experience with European tollbooths. It wasn't a good start when we lost Karl's credit card into one of those machines - we should have twigged when it said "Ticket", not Credit Card! Thankfully it was retrieved by an attendant but not before we had all the cars behind us tooting madly. Welcome to self-drive Europe!

We have just had Day One of the CEVMA (Christian European Visual Media Assoc) Conference and Karl is the Bible speaker. Already we have met some lovely people working in places such as Madrid, Ukraine, Germany, Milan…it all makes Gymea sound very dull!

We skipped the afternoon sessions and went for a walk along the Mediterranean coast then Karl went off on a bike ride (yes it arrived safely) and I went off on the first of my photographic walks. It was very quiet in the early afternoon - I assume it was siesta time!

First impressions of Cullera weren't great but after heading a few streets back from the beach I found some lovely little treasures...and I can't go past a nice bit of rusty wrought iron with strong shadows!

So that's it for Day One. Wifi is hopeless at hotel so I won't push my luck any further.