Adventures by spsadventures

In the morning, the neighborhood was still rundown, although the people in the streets were old ladies walking their dogs and old men smoking cigarettes at cafes instead of druggies. You could tell that it didn't used to be this way as there are decent buildings with balconies and such. But there's a lot of graffiti and some buildings are starting to get rundown.
Just nearby though, we saw a nicer area. And on our drive out of the city, we saw that a lot of the neighborhoods didn't look too different than ours. The highway walls are completely covered in graffiti. So I'm wondering if all this is just a feature of Athens as a city, and not particularly our neighborhood. We'll find out tomorrow, I guess.
It took us a while to get out of Athens and the rush hour traffic, but once we got out of the city and onto the highway, the scenery was much nicer. Mountains sprung up in the distance. We passed rocky hills covered in green scrub. It's still winter here, so the trees are pretty bare (except the evergreens) but a few tree species are full of blooming flowers.
We popped into a rest stop for first breakfast (as opposed to my pre-breakfast banana). I got a delicious spinach pie and a tasty cheese pastry. Both had crispy flaky crust that made a delicious mess.
The scenery continued to be similar, although at some point, the mountains got higher and some of the mountains became snow-capped.
I had commented on the graffiti in the city earlier. But I'm noticing that even out on the more open road in the more rural areas, they have not escaped the graffiti. It's much less prevalent on buildings, but signs seem to have a decent amount, as well as tunnels, bridges, and other public works. It's unfortunate that it's not even artistic graffiti (street art). It's just people who wrote stuff monochrome.
One interesting thing I noticed was that there were these little "dollhouse churches" periodically on the side of the road. They're on a pole, like a mailbox, but it doesn't look (from passing) like you're supposed to put something in them. The dollhouse-sized church models come in several different architectural styles, but many had the standard Greek Orthodox domes.
I noticed that there weren't many in places that were convenient to stop, but were tons around dangerous curves. Then, we saw a few next to pictures of people and some with wreaths on them. They're roadside shrines, probably to those who died in car accidents.
Eventually, we found a simpler one that was in a good stopping location. Inside the window, we saw icons and some other religious pictures.
We continued on our was to Arachova, a cute town set into the mountainside. It appears to be a ski town, based on the number of lodges and ski shops. Since it's t-shirt weather, I'm guessing it's the town's off season. Still, the only places that were open as we walked through sold souvenirs, winter clothes, and ski gear. Most everything else was closed, even though it was 11am.
Unfortunately for us, that included restaurants.
We did eventually find an open one, but there was only one other table of patrons in the whole place.
We had a beautiful, albeit pricey, brunch. The bread was fresh and warm, the tzatziki was thick and surprisingly garlicky, the zucchini balls were ok. The star was the fried cheese with tomato and some really thick balsamic. I'd order that again in an instant.
Also, the location was pleasant. We had a view of the quaint little town, but weren't in the middle of it. The atmosphere was an odd mix of Christmas (decorations were still up, even though we're almost 2 months after Eastern Orthodox Christmas) and spring (because of the weather being so pleasant).
After finishing off our meal, we headed back to the car to drive over to Delphi.
First, we walked through the modern town of Delphi. As expected, it's mainly hotels, restaurants, and souvenir shops.
Next, we headed over to the archaeological museum and site. You'd think that they'd have better infrastructure, since they are not a new tourist site. But the toilets were missing seats, you couldn't throw toilet paper in them, and the museum didn't have guides or audioguides for hire.
That being said, in some places, they did a good job of showing what the art pieces would have looked like if they were full. That's important because a lot of the statues are missing big important hunks (standard armless or headless people). In addition to statues, the museum featured plenty of small metal offerings and lots of stone building decorations that were sort of reconstructed. It's not dissimilar to how the Brits have the Parthenon wall pieces displayed in the British museum.
Personally, I found 2 statues that were next to each other to be most interesting. One was missing an arm. But it wasn't broken off, it was just missing. You could see the hole that it would have attached to (sort of lego-style). Next to it was a statue with a hand that was clearly attached in a similar way, but was loose enough that you could see the line for the joint. It takes away some of the mystery and wonder as to how someone could carve something so perfectly without mistakes- they don't have to if they attach parts on.
From the museum, we entered the archaeological site. The signage here was much better than the museum. At each stop along the way, the signs said what it was, but also told you what pieces on the museum came from it. So you could imagine the huge sphinx you just saw inside, but outside where it originally was located.
(Also the bathrooms were better- the toilet seats weren't stolen and the doors weren't covered in graffiti. So, if you're not pregnant or elderly and can hold it from the museum to the archaeological site, you might want to.)
We enjoyed strolling along the ruins, taking in the fabulous mountain views. We probably could have seen everything faster, but the weather was beautiful, and the site was relatively peaceful, if we kept away from the large group of noisy Russians.
I don't know if the site wasn't swarming with tour groups because it's off-season, because they're Coronavirus casualties, or if it's normal for Delphi not to be flooded with groups, but the site was calm and relatively peaceful. We were able to take everything in without being bumped or having to sneak around a blocked path.
The main ruins are impressive on their own, but I was glad I had watched My Life in Ruins and a documentary on the Oracles of Delphi before we came on the trip. They added a lot of context as to who these oracles were, why they were so important, and why people built treasuries and gave the Delphic community so much wealth.
My personal favorite part was what I'm calling the book wall. It's a huge stone wall where every stone is covered in a massive amount of text. I don't speak Greek, so I have no idea what they say or even if they're all related, but it's as if somebody carved a whole book into the wall. Just thinking about how much time it must have taken to carve all those letters in without messing up is mind-boggling.
But there are other nearby ruins that are cool as well.
Again, there's a bit of an infrastructure issue as you have to walk along a highway to get to them, but there isn't a proper sidewalk area the whole way and there aren't big signs telling you where to go.
Despite this, we found the baths that people would purify themselves in before coming to see the Oracle at Delphi. They're not so impressive empty as they were today, but it is cool to imagine them full of water and pilgrims.
A bit further down, we stopped by the Temple of Athena, which really is worth the walk. It's a smaller compound, but still quite impressive as the tall pillars still stand majestically.
Despite the infrastructure issues, Delphi is very worth coming to see. I'd recommend a guide, but we had a good time without as well.
After a long day hiking, I wanted a snack. The vending machines at Delphi didn't work, so we stopped at a Lidl grocery store on the way back to the airport. We love grocery shopping in general, but we really love seeing (and trying) all of the interesting things that you can get at grocery stores in other countries. We may have gone a bit overboard, and ended up not only getting a snack, but also dinner, midnight snack, and breakfast there. Of course, they had lots of interesting cheeses, and we picked a bunch that we had no idea what they were. We also got some eggplant dip, shrimp in a jar, cinnamon rolls, flavored bread chips, jam, bread, meat sticks, and other various items.
So far, I can say that I wasn't super-impressed with the sheep cheese we got (nice texture, but the flavor was really bland), the smoked cheese goes really well with the eggplant dip, the bread crackers are very tasty, and the chocolate milk was ok, although thicker than I prefer.
The drive back was pleasant and there wasn't too much traffic. We returned the car easily and found the metro. It's pretty clean and comfortable, at least at 8pm when it's not too crowded.

Update:
The plan was to see Athens the following day, but a family emergency ended the trip early.
I was pretty happy with the Aegean people at the airport. They were very helpful in getting me refunded what I could of our unused tickets and helping get the rebooking details settled.

Today we go on our "Babymoon," our last hurrah before everything gets complicated.
I have never seen the airport so empty in my entire life.

Tons of flights were cancelled because they were to Coronavirus countries. And non-residents who have been to those countries in the past 2 weeks have been denied entry for a while, so there are way fewer tourist groups and business travelers here that need to get home. (As an example, my big international company has banned all travel for conferences, meetings, trainings, or other non-essential reasons, even to places that don't have hese legal restrictions.)
Also, I think a lot of people don't want to take the risk of getting the virus or the hassle of being quarantined in case there happens to be an outbreak while they're in some foreign country, so they decided not to fly. But some guy with it was at my local grocery store and a bunch of other places last week, and anybody who was there at the same time is supposed to quarantine at home, so I figure it's less risky to get out for a while than stay.
So the airport was a ghost town.

most gates looked like this

However, the flight was packed. I guess anybody who needs to get out has a very limited selection of flights, and so everyone was crammed in.
Most people seemed to be behaving relatively normally. Only a few wore standard medical face masks, and I was inclined to ask them whether they were sick or stupid, but didn't in case they were the tiny percentage of the population that has some compulsion to touch their face and needs the mask to avoid it. Of course, there was one guy in one of the face masks that's actually rated to prevent virus-sized particle entry, which was actually somewhat smart.
We just washed our hands after every step where other people touched our tickets and/or passports and lysol-wiped down the passports, tray table and arm rests on the plane.
When we landed in Athens, we did the same and even lysol-wiped the things we'd touch in the rental car. I don't know if we're overreacting, but it can't hurt, and I don't particularly want to get sick.

We drove to our hotel, Tier Collection.
The hotel is nice and fancy and probably has more stars than we're used to. It's just in a part of town that seems a bit dodgy after 11pm. While I'm somewhat blissfully innocent and just noticed people were out on the street smoking, my partner paid much more attention to what they were smoking. He couldn't think of something to smoke that he didn't see. He also says he saw a prostitute, but didn't point her out at the time, and I hadn't noticed. We're debating whether it was just somebody dressed a certain way or an actual prostitute.
Despite the apparent drug issue, we didn't see anybody who looked particularly dangerous and there were other people in the street. So we ventured out a block or two to get some food. We saw some Syrian/Lebanese place that looked good. Until we approached it and I saw a rat running around the floor and under a table.
We turned away and ended up at someplace that had fries, chicken, and coleslaw. It's not the most Greek first meal, but it's a snack and almost midnight, so I'll take it.

Fortunately, there are also lots of convenience stores open that sell produce, so we were also able to get some bananas for health and also so I have something for when I wake up in the middle of the night hungry.
We took the food back to the hotel and got settled in. The food was simple, but the garlic mayo made it surprisingly good. Not sure that's the last thing I want to eat before bed notmally, but given the time, I'll take it.

On approach, all I saw out the window were farms and trees until seconds before we landed, and even then I'm pretty sure the buildings I saw were related to the airport. Minsk is clearly not a sprawling metropolis.

Welcome to Minsk Airport

The captain announced the temperature at close to room temperature, which surprised me. When I had packed 2 weeks ago, it was supposed to be near freezing. I packed gloves and a hat and saved my thermal shirt for Minsk. It seems I should have worn it in France of Scotland and just kept a t-shirt for Minsk.

Health insurance line

Upon entering the airport, everyone had to go through immigration, even if transferring. But first, you need to buy the Obligatory Health Insurance (if you don't have your own already). I wasn't sure what they'd count, so I got it to be on the safe side. It was $2 or 2€ for a day, which is about the best dollar to Euro exchange rate you'll get. You could, of course also pay by credit card.
At immigration, they are serious. They checked my health insurance papers, even though I had just gotten them a few meters away. They looked at my passport through an eye loupe, some kind of special light, and felt the texture of the picture page as well as skimmed through it. I wasn't special. They did that to everyone. I've never had anyone look so closely. Who exactly is trying to come here so desperately?
If you were going on to Russia, you needed to also fill out a customs form because I guess the border is open.
I used the ATM just inside baggage claim to get my first Belorussian rubles and headed for the bus. It's a small airport and easy to find. There's a stand out front where you can buy your ticket with a credit card, although you can also pay the driver by credit card. I'm surprised as credit cards are one of the methods of reducing corruption. Cash amounts can be fudged and pocketed, but credit card payments have records. Belarus is known as "Europe's last dictatorship" (why Russia doesn't count, I don't know) and I would have expected a much more cash-based economy and less traceable credit card-based.

outdoor plane museum

The bus was playing American pop music when I got on, but the driver turned it off for the drive. At the airport exit, we passed a series of older planes that made up sort of an outdoor aviation museum. We then drove through a lot of fields of crops and grass well-groomed enough for a golf course. Forests and small stands of trees broke up the fields, but it was a while before we saw any towns. The houses were mostly plain and nondescript.

the road between the airport and city

Surprisingly, we also passed several monuments and memorials. They didn't seem to be anywhere in particular, just randomly placed on or near the side of the road.
After about a half hour, we reached the city. Here, we passed plenty more memorials and statues. Every other corner seemed to contain a park full of them.

statue in a park

For the most part, Minsk seems to be a city like any other. The traffic seems a bit better, but that may also be because the roads are so wide. Tons of people walk the wide sidewalks, and I occasionally see a biker using the bike lane. This city is clearly planned. There seem to be a general lack of the old-town narrow and winding streets of other old towns and a plethora of wide, square blocks.
For the most part, everything is in Cyrillic, although Burger King, KFC, and some other foreign brands aren't. (Dominoes and the Terminator movie posters are in Cyrillic.) But otherwise, it could be any other city.
For the most part, the architecture is pretty Soviet and bland, although there are a few buildings that are thoroughly decorated with carvings and fancy balconies, and could have been stolen from 1700s France or Austria. Or course, I saw a plaque saying one such building was built in the 1950s, so who knows what was here before the Soviets and what is new.
I downloaded this walking tour and was attempting to more or less follow it to see the main sights. For the most part, the walking tour covers the important and interesting buildings. Although there was one not on the tour that was interesting. It was clearly some sort of institution and weird animal noises were emanating from it. They seemed recorded since they were so loud and there were no animals in sight. But I couldn't figure out what was going on.
The issue is that while I can read the Cyrillic alphabet, I don't actually speak the languages. So unless the word is a name or cognate it's pretty useless to me.
Also, the tour had me crossing a bunch of streets that I couldn't cross at street level. A lot of intersections require pedestrians to use an underpass at the metro station on the corners. I didn't use the metro trains themselves, but the tunnels for it seemed pretty standard. Small shops sold snacks or other trinkets commuters might need. (I got a cherry cream pastry thinking it was cherry cheese. It didn't taste particularly different or special.) Musicians filled the tunnels with music in hopes of earning something. The only difference between this and any other metro that I noticed was the lack of escalators. If you can't do stairs, I have no idea how you'd cross the street. The flat parts of the stairs meant for bikes are too narrow for a stroller or wheelchair, but also much too steep.

plaques on buildings, not sure what they're for

The tour also only covered the large buildings, but not the tons of building-side memorial plaques. Every once in a while, I'd see a series of plaques with people's faces and a description. I couldn't understand who they were or what they did, but they were clearly important.

stadium

As for the sights on the tour, they were for the most part interesting examples of architecture. For example, the stadium looks like it has large lacrosse sticks sticking up from it. Not sure that was the intention.

Gate to the City

While the "Gates to the City" were pretty fancy, the big KFC sign on one of them did sort of detract from the old-Europe charm.

Communist decorations at the top of the Gate to the City...

...and KFC decorations at the bottom

Without condoning the animal abuse that goes on in many circuses, I love that this country has a national circus. Like all buildings here, it had a bunch of statues out front. But the clown here had a red nose that stood out from the rest of the metal statue.

circus clown

When I got to Gorky Park, it was filled with families and kids. One toddler was discovering fallen leaves as his dad tried to catch the perfect photo of the kid playing with them. Other tiny kids wheeled around on trikes and powerwheels. I don't know what differences I was expecting, but the people in the park here are doing the same things as people in parks everywhere.

kids in park

The only real difference is I didn't see a single homeless person or beggar. Sure, there were musicians performing for change in the metro, but they weren't just sitting there with a sign asking for handouts.
Unfortunately, the ferris wheel in the park wasn't moving. It's a pity because I would have loved to ride it and get a good view of the city.

guy fishing in the park

The tour path took me past their Independence Square (circle) with a big pole-monument sticking up the center, and around to the National Philharmonic Hall, changing directions at a shopping mall. Everything had tons of statues out front, even the mall.

statues in the park

Independence Square

statues at the shopping mall

DSCF4557 caption = more wall plaques

I was following the path of the tour until I got to an area where some cop was turning the cars around. As I approached the corner I needed to turn at to continue on the walk, I heard walkie talkies. I didn't see flashing lights indicating a serious emergency, so I kept going. They were filming something. The crew had large video cameras and the corner was completely blocked the way I wanted to go.
So, I turned back to the main street with intentions of picking the tour back up a few blocks further up.
But then I saw a restaurant and realized how hungry I was and how much my feet hurt. The walk wasn't that long, but I've been on my feet and walking hours more per day over the last 2 weeks than I usually am, and I'm starting to feel it.

Belorussian flags, hopefully you can see the "woven" pattern

Kiosk with the woven pattern at the bottom

The restaurant, like many of the buildings here, has the sort of "woven pattern" from the Belorussian flag on it. In the cases of some of the other buildings I've seen it on, I wondered if it had some sort of meaning. Here, I'm assuming it means the restaurant has Belorussian food. I'm glad, because so far, most of the food establishments I've seen are American fast food, bars, or the occasional cafe.
It was probably a touristy restaurant as they did have English on the menu and the waitresses all wore "traditional" costumes. However, the waitresses didn't speak English at all (water was beyond their vocab, which is ok as that's not the local language) and the Belorussian was right next to the English, I presume so that the pointing game worked.
It's certainly more of an adventure to order when you can't ask questions. First, I got a horseradish beverage. I wasn't sure whether this was going to be a sort of soda (like Dr. Brown's celray) or if this was alcoholic, but I was intrigued. It turned out to be a shot of a horseradish alcohol that burned, both from the alcohol and from the horseradish. I also got a plate of vegetables that was just that. There was no dressing, nothing added, just chopped vegetables presented on a platter. While I probably would have preferred a proper horseradish sauce, the shot did come in handy for adding some flavor to the vegetables. Finally, I got their version of latkes. They use a finer grate and the pancakes are chewier and not crispy. They came with sour cream and I enjoyed them.
When done, I considered backtracking and trying to see the rest of the walking tour that I hadn't gotten to. But it was getting late and I needed to make sure to get a bus back to the airport tonight as they don't start running early enough in the morning for me to catch one then. Still, even in the dark, I had a clear view of the many statues and wall plaques scattered about my path.

flowers left at a wall plaque

Despite the late hour, tons of people strolled through the streets and the parks. I was never in a place where I couldn't see at least a dozen people, even on side streets. The main streets continued to be full. It the sidewalks weren't as wide as a 2-way street, they would certainly feel crowded.

Kid climbing on statue

Back at the bus station, I got my ticket and waited for the bus. The other buses were going direct to places like Moscow or St. Petersburg, not cities I'm used to seeing transport to. Mine took me up the main street, giving me another chance to see most of the buildings I'd seen on foot. I also got a chance to pass more of the casinos I've seen advertised. This doesn't seem like the place I'd feel luckiest gambling, but it seems to be big business here.

Gate to the City at night

What isn't a big business is tourism. I didn't see a single souvenir shop the entire way. I saw virtually nothing in English that seemed aimed at anybody but locals. And while I was wandering around with my camera out, there weren't many others who were taking pictures at all. Compared to the sites I've seen over the last few days where you can't sneeze without hitting a tour group, not seeing a single tour guide or large group the whole time was quite a change.

At the airport, they weren't opening the check-in counters until 2 hours before the flights, so anybody who says you need to be here 2 hours ahead doesn't know what they're talking about. Also, they don't show which security you're supposed to go through until then, so if you have a connection, you're just waiting outside security until then. Fortunately, the food and souvenir shops are open late and open early, so you can eat and shop. Unfortunately, this is like the Istanbul airport where the wifi isn't free. You have to get a text message and get charged to get a code for the wifi. I really don't see why an airport would rather you pay your phone company than them for wifi.
For first snack, I got what I thought looked like yogurt with fruit. It was actually tuborog cheese with fruit, but completely unlike the tuborog we get in the grocery store. It was more like saltier, less sour solid yogurt here, as opposed to the large soft curds we get.
Another interesting difference in this airport: announcements are made in Belorussian, English, and Chinese, and the departure board rotates between the 3 languages. There must be a lot of Chinese tourists or business people coming here, although to be the largest tourist group doesn't take too much.
Also, I've never seen a contact lens machine before, but here, you can get new dailies from a vending machine. Past immigration, duty free is pretty much the same as everywhere. There are only 2 food choices though- a snack bar with muffins or Burger King.
Once I board this flight, my vacation is officially over. I'm not excited for it to end, but it's been a fabulous time overall.

Today we are off to see Mont St. Michel, which is a 3+ hour drive from Paris. We had no issues getting our rental car and were soon out of the city.
The road to Mont St. Michel is mostly highway that runs through Normandy. There are tolls every few miles. I think we must have paid about 20 Euro in tolls one way, but it's hard to know as they come in odd amounts- 3.7€ here, 5.7€ there. The scenery is mostly flat farmland with scattered forests, but not midwest-see-forever-flat, more of a flat enough you can't say there are hills, but there are gentle slopes and rolling waves in the land. It's very green here and the scenery is only occasionally broken up with a tiny industrial zone, village, or rest stop.
When there is some point of interest, the sign for it contains a sort of drawing for it in addition to the name. So even if you don't recognize the name, you can tell that it's a church, or park, or castle, or World War 2 beach.
We knew we were hungry and that food at the actual tourist site would be super expensive, so we agreed to stop somewhere before Mont St. Michel.
We attempted to stop at the first place I found, but the waiter came out to tell us that they were having a private party and he couldn't seat us. We passed some restaurants that were rejected, and found ourselves already in the Mont St Michel tourist site. We parked and decided to see if the part of the town not on the abbey island would have cheaper food. The first restaurant we ducked into was empty, but the guy told us he had no room for 2. I thought he was joking as it was pretty empty. But he was serious as they were set up for groups that were just arriving.

Mont St. Michel

We continued on our way towards Mont St. Michel, and ended up walking the whole way there. I'm glad we walked it instead of taking the shuttle bus. The walk gave us a chance to view the island from multiple angles, to look out over the grassy area and watch the sheep munching away, and to just absorb the scenery.

sheep near Mont St. Michel

There was also an option to take a (paid) horse carriage ride with some of the most loudly clopping horses.

Horse ride

As we approached, I spied what looked to me like a Shinto arch. We speculated as to what it was- maybe a high tide marking, maybe showing where the 10-year flood level would be (it said 10 years on it). Later, we found out that it was exactly what we thought- a Shinto monument at the monastery because their twin city is in Japan.

Shinto Arch

We walked through the city gates, still looking for food, and resigned to the fact that prices just doubled compared to anything we would have found outside. The first restaurant we saw had a large group in front of it. The tour guide explained that the best omelettes in the world were made here and we could look through the window to watch them do it. The lady making them just looked like she was whisking away, and they came out huge and looking more like a highly risen pancake than eggs, so we checked the prices. It was 40€ for one omelette. We were sure we could do better than that.

streets of Mont St. Michel

As we walked along the cobblestone streets past the old buildings, we noticed that a lot of the restaurants featured the "Mont St. Michel omelette." When we finally settled on a restaurant, I had to order it to see what the fuss was all about, (but paying only 16€, which felt like quite the deal.)
The omelette was too huge for it to be a one-person meal. It's best split. The outside is sort of like a skin, and the inside is foamy and somewhat runny. All of the flavor has been beaten out of it, which I didn't mind too much as I'm not a fan of eggs. But it really needed to come with something in order to make it edible past a few bites. Fortunately, the table had a powerful French mustard that helped. Still, no variety in a dish that large wasn't very appealing, even if the texture was nice.
After lunch, we continued on our way up to the abbey. The streets are steep and narrow, lined with tourist shops every step of the way. It's very uphill, and just when you think you've arrived, you start the stairs. This is a mountain after all, and I suppose we should have expected multiple flights of stairs.

Abbey

We had timed our abbey visit for the afternoon English tour. The guide was very knowledgeable and really helped us understand the abbey. She explained that the abbey was built at the very top of the mountain by a monk who the Archangel Michael came to in a dream and told to build it. It has been damaged and rebuilt several times over the more than millennium that it has been around. So, there are sections built in the Roman style, sections built in the Gothic style, and sections built in more modern styles.

Roman style section

Also, we're really only seeing the bones of the building. In the medieval times, the walls would not have been bare stone. They would have been whitewashed and painted with the colors of the day. To make an equivalent, we're seeing the studs of a modern house, after the wallpaper and drywall has been torn out.

inside the abbey

Knowing that paints quite a different picture in the mind of what it would have been like as a pilgrim here. The monks have always accepted pilgrims and tourists as it was popular to come on a pilgrimage in order to see if you could get the Archangel Michael to put in a good word for you with the guys in charge of heaven. We saw where the rich pilgrims would be put up with fireplaces and space, and where the poorer pilgrims would be put up in a slightly lesser condition. But the monks didn't have heat at all, so they were worse off, especially in winter. Except, they did have heat in the infirmary.

Abbey church

So the monks were doing their thing, accepting pilgrims (who brought donations), selling souvenirs of the pilgrimage, and adhering to a Benedictine code, when the French revolution happened and made them all flee. The French revolutionaries took over the abbey and turned it into a prison.
We saw the equipment they installed and used to haul up all of the supplies needed for the many prisoners kept here. A couple of prisoners would hop inside a big wheel and walk. That would pull a rope that raised packages of food and other supplies.

big lifting wheel

The history of the Abbey continues without monks through the time when the Germans occupied it in World War 2 (but didn't damage it), until more recent times when a group of monks and nuns were invited back. They live here today, although they aren't Benedictine per the guide.

ramparts

We walked the city ramparts back down to the entrance. They have a great view of the plain surrounding the abbey. At the time we were there, the water level was low, and the abbey was basically in a mudpit and wasn't really on a detached island. Hundreds of people walked across the mud towards the abbey, many barefoot. People still do this today as part of their pilgrimage. (We had used the bridge.)

pilgrims walking to the abbey

The ramparts were much less crowded than the city streets and had souvenir shops and restaurants on only one side. It was a pleasant walk.
At the bottom, we bought what they called a beignet, but it didn't taste any different than Dunkin to me.
The tour guide had told us to be careful with our snacks as the seagulls in the area were known to snatch sandwiches straight out of people's hands. We got to witness this first hand as a seagull made an attack. The stories are true.

Watch out! He's dangerous!

Having walked the half hour from the village to the abbey, we didn't feel the need to walk it back, so we grabbed the shuttle to the parking and headed back to Paris.
About when we wanted to switch drivers, we pulled over into a random small town that had some restaurants currently open, at least according to google. It was still a bit early for the French to be eating dinner, but we were hungry. Half the restaurants in town were closed and didn't even open until 7, so we got a nice view of the town, their pretty church, fountain, and town hall before we found a place to eat that was open. But we were able to get dinner and get back on the road.

cute town

As I drove in the dark, I realized the impact of light pollution. The roads here (including highways) are not lit at night. So as I was driving through the countryside, I mostly just saw black and car lights. But periodically, we would come across a town that emitted a red glow into the sky. It would soon pass and we would be back to darkness.

We're staying at a proper hotel and not a hostel, but the breakfast is basically the same. Good thing I had some veg left over from last night.
We got on the metro during rush hour, and the trains were packed. As we moved out towards the suburbs though, they cleared out. By the time we were a few stops from Disney, there was one other family in our entire car.
You may be wondering why out of all of the fabulous French things to do in Paris, I'm going to Disney.
1) I've been to Paris 4 times in the past 4 or so years, so I've already seen (and still remember) many of the wonderful sights there are to see. (See here, here, here, here, here for those blog posts.)
2) The friend I'm travelling with really wants to go.
So, we're going to have a fun day riding rides and taking pictures with Disney characters.
The train to Disney is mostly above-ground, so I got to see a wide variety of neighborhoods and architecture. Some areas contained neat little rows of quaint houses that were probably around when Les Miserables took place. Others contained funky modern factories and schools with rooftop gardens.

Disney Entrance

We arrived at Disney and the lines began. A line for security, a line to get in, a line to have your picture taken with a character, a line for the rides, a line for food, even a line for the bathrooms. Fortunately, I brought a book. While standing and reading isn't as nice as sitting, it's still an enjoyable enough day. And every once in a while, I got a reading break to go on a ride.
The rides are more or less the same as other Disney parks, but the Pirates of the Caribbean here speak French instead of English. The castle is Sleeping Beauty's instead of Cinderella's. It's smaller. But it's got the same teacup ride and same character-shaped waffles (I got mine Darth Vader-shaped).

Villan Show in front of Sleeping Beauty's Castle

Our real adventure came on the Dumbo ride. It started. Whee! And then it stopped midair and we sort of dropped a few inches. An announcement was made to just stay there, as if we had a choice, and we were lowered to the ground. As unexciting as the ride is, I admit that I would be a little upset if we had waited 20 minutes just for it to break while we were on it. They started it up again, gave us a super-short ride, and kept on as if nothing was wrong.
Another difference is the I don't remember so many people dressed up last time I was at Disney in the states. Here, tons of kids are wearing character costumes and approximately 1/3 people have some sort of Mickey/Minnie ears on. I've seen them in every color of the rainbow, every fabric from sequins and velvet to plastic and knit, and with tons of different themes. Pumpkin ears are popular, but I've seen rasta Mickey, plenty of sorcerer's hats, and even ones spouting chipmunks.
Disney does know how to entertain. Theme musicians played at the lunch spots during lunch. We got caught in a parade, and we saw a show featuring a bunch of villians (half French and half English). For those of us who are a bit older and less entertained by the same song on repeat and dancing wheat, it was interesting to admire the craftsmanship and engineering that goes into it all. It was like watching a magic show and trying to figure out how they do it.

Disney Parade

The only particularly bad thing was the food. I got a "Hakuna Matata salad" with zero flavor. I couldn't tell if the orange chunks were squash or mango, and they had the exact same flavor as the lettuce, onions, and peanuts- none.
We rode most of the rides, although we didn't ride the Peter Pan ride, despite it being #1 on my friend's list because the wait varied from 70 mins to over 110 minutes and she wasn't interested in it enough to wait that long. We also got our picture taken with Pluto and Darth Vader (who also speaks both French and English here). Here is one place where I feel this Disney excelled. You don't just catch the character and get a quick photo and autograph. The characters actually spend time with each visitor, hugging and dancing and teasing and having fun appropriate to the personality of the character.
I admit I didn't have high expectations for the day, but I had fun and came away satisfied.

Eiffel Tower

Once back in the city, we decided to check out the Eiffel Tower at night, as it was a 10 minute walk from the hotel. It is very different at night than in the day. They lit it up with lights that blink and sparkle and really make it stand out. It feels more decorative and fun at night, while during the day it seems more like a serious piece of engineering.
For dinner, I got a salad with goat cheese rounds and mustard dressing that would count as delicious any day, but compared to lunch, it was amazing. I'm not looking forward to leaving all of this amazing French cheese behind.