ICE
Don't expect it. It has been my experience thus far that most of Europe doesn't have ice makers. Not in most restaurants, not in most hotels and definitely not in the average home. You can't even find "bags of ice" for sale in stores/gas stations. We found this out the hard way when we took the kids to Switzerland last July.
We were scheduled to leave early Friday morning. DJ and David went to play basketball and Sarah and I stayed home and went out to dinner. We were expecting the boys to come home around 9:30. At a little past 8, we heard a key in the door. In hobbled my boy…with an ankle the size of a melon.
Great…what does the typical person intend to do while in Switzerland? Hike. That plan just flew out the window. We iced down his ankle and hoped it would look better in the morning. It wasn't much better, but we wrapped it up so that he would have some additional support and altered our plans for a day of hiking. Since check in at the hotel wasn't until after 3:00 we packed a cooler (drinks, sandwiches and snacks) and thought we'd enjoy a picnic lunch in the Alps.
We arrived in Lauterbrunnen (highly recommended if you ever have the chance) and walked up to a waterfall that happened to be adjacent to the parking area.
DJ took it slow and his ankle seemed to be ok.
We enjoyed our picnic and headed off to the hotel to try to get an early check-in. Success!
We got our bags to the room and then were going to head out to Interlaken (Land between the lakes) for a boat tour of Thundersee. There wasn't a refrigerator in the room, so David and I went to the lobby to ask for ice to keep our drinks and snacks cold.
We were directed to the hotel restaurant. We asked the nice lady for some ice and she headed into the kitchen area. She came out about 5 minutes later with a small galvanized tub of ice. She proceeded to get a glass and put in 3 cubes of ice. I was like, really? I explained that our son had an injury and that we needed "quite a bit". She got a 2nd glass and added another 3 cubes. She obviously was not "getting it". I asked her if we could just take the ice bucket to our room and use what we needed and then bring the tub back to her. Her face contorted into a mask of horror…."no, no, no, then I will not have ice for the restaurant for the rest of the evening" she replied. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? My ice maker in the good ol' USA contains more ice than she had in that tub. I think she was cracking open the "old time" ice cube trays back in the kitchen and that is what took her so long to come back with the ice she had "harvested".
David and I left with our 6 cubes of ice and added them to our cooler….DJ's ankle was going to have to wait. We came back from a lovely boat ride around Thundersee and sent the kids back to the kitchen.
The ICE NAZI would only give them 1 cup of ice. We had drinks and meat to keep cool. No freezer to re-freeze our gel packs, no ice sold anywhere and 3 cubes of new ice. We "enjoyed" lukewarm tea and pepsi for the next 2 days and had to throw away our lunchmeat and cheeses. Lesson learned: Ice is a commodity, not to be given away indiscriminately. We no longer take a cooler for a journey of more than one afternoon.
CELL PHONE COVERAGE
I have mentioned before that we live very near the German border. That is a good thing for accessing cheaper groceries, but a bad thing for my cell phone. I have to pay "roaming" charges for phone calls and texts when I cross any border and I have no access to my data plan. I made a trip to the cable/phone provider in an effort to "add" Germany, Italy and Switzerland early last Fall. I was told that it was not possible. REALLY? I can travel across the entire USA with the same plan and you have nothing to offer me for the countries that border France?
I did receive a phone call in December from our cable provider asking if we were happy with the service and would I like to renew for an additional 5 months. I explained that my French was bad and the agent switched to English. I mentioned to him that the only "complaint" that I had was the data package outside of France. He said that my plan allowed data in other countries at an additional cost….I said sign me up…
He said that it should already work from my phone. I had just recently been to Italy, it didn't work there and had been at the grocery in Germany the day before….nope, fella, it doesn't work. He promised to look into it and get back to me. To his credit, he did get back to me. The problem was my phone, he said. "You have to change your settings and turn ON the data roaming". Oh, really?? Did he think I was stupid? I had already done that and it still didn't work. He would continue to check with his supervisor and get back to me.
A lady from the company called our apartment at 8:00AM on Saturday morning. She didn't speak any English, so I handed the phone to my still sleeping husband. He attempted to tell her the issue in French (which he uses everyday) and she told him that she couldn't understand him and would send us an email….that was 2 months ago…still no data outside of France.
Fortunately, I have my Verizon Wireless "chip" in my wallet, so when I fly back to the states, I can change out my French chip and use the same phone. Did you realize that you can "suspend" your phone line? It's saving me $30 a month while I'm here!!
HOTEL BEDDING
When you make a reservation for a room in the US, you can ask for a single (King) bed or double beds. Usually, depending on the hotel chain, you could sleep 2 people in each of those double beds…our family of 4 does that frequently. Not a lot of room, but it's doable. When you make a reservation in Europe, if you want ONE bed, (called matrimonial bed) it's typically two twin beds that have been pushed together. You can NEVER have one room that would accommodate a family of 4.
Even when you request the "matrimonial bed", you sometimes have to push the beds together yourself. When we were in Madrid our hotel room had the matrimonial bed made up for us, however, halfway through the night I thought I was going to lose my husband into the crevice that opened up between the two twin beds. I asked the front desk for help the next morning and we changed rooms. They kindly offered me a "suite" that had much nicer "twin beds" topped with a large mattress pad that kept the beds from sliding apart while you slept.
RESTAURANTS/STORES BUSINESS HOURS
Nearly ALL stores are closed on Sundays in Europe. They also are closed for all holidays. That means no last minute trip to the grocery store to pick up a forgotten ingredient. France celebrates many different National holidays than we do in the states.
| 1 January | New Year's Day | Nouvel an / Jour de l'an / Premier de l'an | |
| moveable | Good Friday | Vendredi saint | Friday before Easter Sunday (observed only in Alsace and Moselle) |
| moveable | Easter Monday | Lundi de Pâques | Monday after Easter Sunday (one day after Easter Sunday) |
| 1 May | May Day/Labour Day | Fête du Travail / Fête des Travailleurs | |
| 8 May | Victory in Europe Day | Fête de la Victoire | End of hostilities in Europe in World War II |
| moveable | Ascension Day | Ascension | Thursday, 39 days after Easter Sunday |
| moveable | Whit Monday | Lundi de Pentecôte | Monday after Pentecost (50 days after Easter Sunday) |
| 14 July | Bastille Day | Fête nationale | French National Day, commemorating the 1789 Storming of the Bastilleduring the French revolution |
| 15 August | Assumption of Mary to Heaven | Assomption | |
| 1 November | All Saints' Day | Toussaint | |
| 11 November | Armistice Day | Armistice de 1918 | End of World War I |
| 25 December | Christmas Day | Noël | |
| 26 December | St. Stephen's Day | Saint-Étienne | Observed only in Alsace and Moselle |
Many shops will also be closed on Monday mornings. In July and August many business (shops AND restaurants) will close for up to two weeks at a time for summer vacations….can you imagine your local McAlister's Deli or Subway closing for two weeks? I think NOT.
Restaurants are somewhat dependent on the country. We have found that in Strasbourg, there is only 1 "seating" per night. They don't "turn" tables, so if you have a reservation, the table is yours for the entire night. While this allows the customer to take their time and enjoy the meal, it doesn't work for a tourist who didn't think about making a reservation. We have walked into a completely empty restaurant and been told that there are no tables available for the evening….really, you don't want to make an extra 50 Euro tonight?
In Strasbourg, the restaurants are typically closing up by 10:00 PM. However, in Spain, most restaurants are not opening for business until 9:00 PM, so if you skipped lunch you are in big trouble.
I could go on and on, but you are most likely bored with the differences. However, if you ever want to come to Europe, make sure that you enjoy that last EXTRA LARGE beverage from McDonald's that is FILLED with ice cubes, sold for $1 and refillable….you can't get that here.
Wishing you a blessed weekend filled with NOTHING to do, and thanking the Lord in advance for the answered prayers that are on the way.
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