The short story about the rest of the trip is that I packed my bike up in Nice, took the TGV to Paris (six hours and a very pleasant trip), spent a day and a half exploring that wonderful city (and walked about 20 miles doing so), took the Metro and then the RAR to Aeroport Charles de Gaulle and flew home.
This being France and my being an American speaking tres mauvais French, it was not without some minor misadventures. Following the advice of the desk clerk at the Hotel Castex, I took the Metro to the Gare du Nord, where I bought an RAR ticket to Aeroport Roissy-Charles de Gaulle. It had been difficult to find out which hall at CdG I was supposed to depart through, but a phone call to Continental's office on the Champs Elysee- answered by an actual person on the second ring, I would add- eventually cleared that up.
At the Gare du Nord, I found the correct platform but got on the wrong RAR train (there is the RAR A and the RAR B, one of which goes to CdG and the other which does not). There were only a couple of passengers in my car, which struck me as odd, so I asked a young woman if the train went to Charles de Gaulle. She replied "Non" and then, seeing the look of shock on my face, helped me identify where to change trains to get onto the right one- even getting off the train herself to check that I was in the right place and to identify which train I needed. Changing trains, I simply rode it to the end of the line within Charles de Gaulle. Up a couple of flights of stairs and down a hallway, and I came out within 100 meters of the departure desk- a good thing since I was carrying a bike over my shoulder.
The CdG security staff were very efficient at checking passports and moving the line along quickly. I checked my bike, got my boarding pass and took my Carradice bag in hand and went to the gate, passing through Customs on the way. For the airline traveler, that is the real border of France. At the gate, I learned that my plane was two hours late coming in. This was the result of a midair collision a couple of days earlier, and the European traffic controllers were being extra careful. Unfortunately, when I checked in at the departure desk I had also found out that my connecting flight from Houston to Minneapolis had been canceled and replaced with a flight leaving 35 minutes earlier. By the time we got on the plane and were underway, I was going to have less than 40 minutes to enter the U.S., clear customs, make my way from one gate to the next. It was going to be tight, but I thought I could do it.
This flight was vastly better than the flight to France had been. For one thing, the air conditioning worked. For another, I sat next to a really nice Norwegian guy who was going to South America to meet up with his fiance (another Norwegian living there and going to school or something). As seems to be the case with Scandinavians, his English was excellent. We chatted about many things on the flight back, including the dimensions of the United States which amazed him. He was going to me stranded overnight in Houston due to the delay in the flight, and took this in stride with enviable aplomb.
In reality, we landed at George H. Bush International with 25 minutes to spare to my flight to Minnesota, not 40. In that time frame I had to claim my bike, take it and my luggage through the passport check, re-check my bike for my flight to Minnesota, clear Customs, run from one end of the airport (Gate 72) to the other (Gate 3), go through security again, and get on my plane. I got stuck in the slowest moving lines through the passport check and Customs, something I have an unerring talent for doing, and had to literally run all the way to my plane to Minnesota. I only made it thanks to being able to run on the moving walkways. I was the last passenger on, making it with about 3 minutes to spare. To their credit, Continental managed to get my bike on the plane with me! Two and a half hours later, I was in my wife's car going home.
I was in France from June 20th through July 3rd. I had a great time! The French people were wonderful- warm, helpful and friendly. They were not at all like their stereotype, even in Paris. They were very patient with my mauvais French. I found that the French were more formal that Americans, to be sure, but I didn't see that as a problem and in fact found it refreshing. The food and wine were stereotypical- in other words, wonderful. Our hosts at our gites and chambres-d'hotes in France were fabulous, and I found the hotel staff also to be very helpful and accommodating; I found their advice consistently reliable. Something I learned is that all two star hotels and better have English speaking staff. I thought that the accommodations and food were always of excellent value and generally less expensive than their equivalents in the U.S.
We rode 454 miles in 9 days- from Grenoble to Nice. The southern French Alps are wonderful for cyclists. They are of course steeped in the legends of the Tour de France and other great races, but beyond that the Alps themselves are an incredible experience in their own right. It matters not that the Col de l'Izoard is used in the Tour, it is simply a fantastic thing to ride up and to see the marvels of the Casse Deserte. Riding in the Alps surpassed all my expectations on all fronts. The roads were wonderful, the weather almost perfect (except for the heat and humidity of Day 3), the food great and easy to find, drinking water plentiful and free, the gites/chambres-d'hotes delightful. The two star hotels I stayed at were good enough- not luxurious but clean and well-run, with the bonus of English-speaking staff. I didn't like Nice and won't go back there, but even that experience had its good points once I got used to the place. If I hadn't come into Nice after 8 days in the Alps, I probably would have had a different reaction.
This was my first taste of intercontinental travel and was a good learning experience. Learning from the wisdom of other travelers was extremely helpful. Keith and Kirk had both been to Europe many times and Judy had been to Europe, the Middle East and a host of other places. I felt really rather rustic in their company, having only been outside of the U.S. to Canada a couple of times. My French was pathetique but I was able to get along between the assistance of Keith and Judy and the patience and versatility of the French. In preparing for the trip, I found that travel books were somewhat helpful but liable to have outdated information. I used mainly Cycling in France (Lonely Planet), the Michelin Green Guide to the Alps and Rick Steve's Paris 2002 guidebooks, as well as numerous resources on the Internet. Keith used the Internet to find and book our Alpine accommodations with great success; I was easily able to do the same with the Hotel Castex in Paris and the Hotel Amaryllis in Nice.
For cycling in the Alps, the Internet is the best source of information. Ground zero, in my opinion are the Trento Bike Pages. The pages that made me start dreaming about riding in the Alps were Jobst Brandt's reports of his nearly annual Alpine tours beginning in 1959, also hosted on the Trento Bike Pages. There are many other excellent reports and links on Mr. Carati's pages for touring in the Alps and many other places.
I hope you have enjoyed the stories and photos of our trip to the Alps. It was the vacation of a lifetime for me, one that I will hopefully be able to try again some day. Finally, I'd like to thank Keith, Judy and Kirk for being wonderful traveling companions; with the wrong people, the best vacation can become a nightmare. The three of them made the trip a joy.