Sortie! Sortie!

If riding bikes next to the Seine was my favorite activity, getting lost in Provence was my favorite memory.

We left Paris on the train which was a nice adventure. We had almost two hours at the train station and we sat around, figured out that bathrooms cost money, and browsed the shops. Sam and I took silly pictures, as we do. Then, we figured out how to scan our tickets and walk through the gate and I DIDN’T get left behind. #winning

I’m too lazy to import these individually so here is a screencap!

After 20 minutes, the kids both passed out and I amused myself by taking videos of the passing scenery trying to get the PERFECT 20 second clip to put on my IG story but… I think they were all mostly boring. I just watched them all again, and yep, they were. Then, I discovered the map of where we were exactly on the train and tried to get screenshots of us going 300km – which I DID – but am now too lazy to transfer that photo over because it’s fairly boring as well!

I finally flipped open my computer to… do something. That’s when GG stumbled over to me and was feeling fairly ill and starting to freak out. So I switched out seats with him so he could sit “facing forward” but then spent the rest of the trip trying to get water, snacks, make sure he didn’t throw up, etc. etc. It felt a little touch and go, honestly, but luckily no vomit! Then, it was a struggle to get all the suitcases over to the door so we could “jump off” in the 3 minutes the train stayed at the station, and one of the suitcases fell down the stairs and probably significantly bruised some poor person? I don’t know. I’m still horrified thinking about it and also want to block it out of my head permanently. Anyway.

We arrive, and then it’s the adventure of getting our rental cars. I instructed all of my family to not move and JJ and I went and figured it out. It was SO hot and whatever, we got them. My Dad was getting his cars.

Except…. Except.

Our luggage did not fit in two cars.

Ohhh, the dark energy floating around our party then. Deep breathes people. I love my Mom, and the fact that… well, we didn’t really worry about the cost at the moment because was it worth our peace of mind? Yes, it was absolutely worth it. She enabled me but we marched back over and I threw down my credit card and, awesome, great, we now have three cars.

Except… Except!!

Who would drive them? I was literally obsessing over it in my head as I was buying it… There was really only one clear answer (at that moment anyway – my thinking totally changed two days later) but the answer was that Gregg was the only one who could drive.

S & T adamantly told us they would not be driving weeks ago. They didn’t want to. It wasn’t happening. Okay, great. That’s fine. Then, my two kids were… well, too young and not capable of driving in a different country, it just was not going to happen. J was not feeling great (spoiler alert, he tested positive for Covid 2 days later) and said he would prefer not to drive. So that left Gregg! He can’t hear well but he can drive fine! Right? Right.

Except… who would go with him?

Oh man. Apologies to any family members who might read this and be offended in the distant future (sorry, not sorry?) but after the bike riding adventure with T, we didn’t want to put T with Gregg becuase if they got lost, it might take 3 days to find them. I didn’t want to put my KIDS with Gregg because I also didn’t trust them with directions (changed my mind later!) and didn’t trust Gregg with them, I didn’t want to put Sharon and Gregg together… JJ and I were already driving… and well, that was that. Gregg was driving and J had to go with him. Ahh, the look on J’s face when I made that pronouncement! I think he said something about how he COULD drive and was having Gregg drive really the best option… and I think I just turned my back and ignored it because the time to give input was gone, and we needed to get moving.

Remember that we had NO CELL service! We were on day 2 of the weirdest cell outage ever!

Now… we should have spent more time actually talking over what we were doing, who had the directions, and what was happening. But we didn’t! It was basically a quick… I’m leading, Gregg would be behind me, and JJ would follow, we were driving to S&T’s hotel to drop off the bags, and then over to our hotel, where we would park two cars, and then JJ would take their car to their hotel. (Why did we all book 3 hotels again…? Good question! Actually, there was a good reason for it – but anyway.) At that time, we thought my car and JJ’s car were the only ones with live GPS (we had to pay extra for it). Later J said theirs worked.

We jumped in the car, and Sam… oh Sam. She was SO THRILLED… SO THRILLED to be in the passenger seat, in charge of where we were going, and the radio. She probably had the same sheer hysterical thoughts in her head of watching J drive off with Gregg – sheer horror but also a little… I don’t know, schadenfreude maybe? We were a little gleeful. Oops… anyway. 🙂

And after having all that bad energy for the last 30 minutes, the guilt of having to make decisions that people didn’t like, getting into the car with my kids, and Sam laughing (cackling, honestly!) was just the biggest relief that still puts a big smile on my face.

We pulled out of the parking lot, figured out where to go, and Sam was shouting at me, we saw “Sortie” printed on the pavement and on the signs, and we had our GPS system showing us where to go.

Whyyy can’t I embed YouTube shorts? Whyyyy. Anyway. This video is so epically (boring) but Sam’s cackle at the end is everything, and I remember the music being louder and more fun (and French!) but I am still posting it as my one and only live proof of that moment.

But we got on the freeway and just drove. I love driving. I especially loved driving for the first time in France!

It took about 15 minutes and we passed our hotel which was the Renaissance Hotel (NOT the Marriott but it was the Marriott brand!). We made a note of it and kept following the GPS to S&T’s hotel. It was in the middle of Aix-en-Provence and we turned the corner, saw the hotel on the side of the road and NO parking lot for it. There was a lot of traffic and I saw a one-lane road that was next to the entrance so I pulled it.

I looked in my review mirror and… I can still picture it in my mind, JJ driving with both hands on the wheel, looking straight ahead driving past us.

What!?

Okay, well… we can figure this out. Our cell phones don’t work but it’s fine. I put the car in drive, and I looked ahead of me and a car was coming directly at me in the one-lane road. Apparently I was going the wrong way? I looked at the car and the person looked back at me. I don’t think they were rude but my blood pressure totally shot up. Or maybe it was my anxiety? Something. Sam, of course, was loosing her mind at that point.

So I reverse the car and there are BUSSES, there are SO MANY cars and somehow I back out into the main (very busy!) street and Sam is yelling… and Griffin finally stopped reading a book on his phone and is looking around wondering what is going on.

So I go to the first street and turn right. I said, “Let’s just go around the block and I’ll pull up in front and we will wait for them to get there. NO PROBLEM.”

And it should be simple enough to just make 4 right turns and get back to where I’m going….

But all the sudden the right turn is going into something called the Centre Ville (city center in French?) and I had to take a parking ticket and I couldn’t back up because there were cars behind me, and I couldn’t make an immediate turn to go out because it just went doooowwwwnnnnnnn a level, and then another level, and then we kept having to drive through the parking garage through ANOTHER level.

and we just kept seeing

SORTIE! SORTIE!

And that’s what Sam and I kept screaming until Griffin screamed back at us to STOP SAYING SORTIE!

And then we said it a few more times.

Sortie means EXIT if you haven’t figured that out yet.

And then Sam and I laughed and laughed and almost cried until we finally went all the way back up and out. It felt like it took at least 10 minutes to go through 4 levels. We got stuck behind a car waiting for someone to pull out and then take their parking spot.

So once we finally got out into the bright sunshine, we took a big sigh of relief and tried navigating back to the hotel… but as we drove by it we realized we had the same problem of WHERE to park! So, I circled the block again (correctly!) and made a plan with the kids.

“Griffin! I am going to drop you off, I want you to walk in, and find out if they checked in. Ask some good questions and just figure out what’s going on, and then walk back outside and I will drive around and meet you so we can figure out what’s going on, okay?”

“Okay… so… what questions should I ask? Tell me again what I have to do?”

“Nevermind…. SAM! I want YOU to…”

And wow, Sam was ready. She rattled off questions she would ask. Then said she was ready to just walk back to our hotel because we had seen it earlier. But I said NO, I will keep circling this block until you come back out!

So I dropped her off on the corner, drove around, and then when we came back, she was there with JJ. haha

It was the craziest thing. I guess they ended up passing the hotel, and then Gregg drove past them (or us?) and they lost them. So JJ dropped S&T off, but then she couldn’t figure out how to get to the hotel. So she had to park and walk back in and get directions which is when Sam found her.

And then Gregg and J went to two stores to ask for directions. And the only reason that they knew where in the world they were going is because I had given J a set of all of our travel arrangements at the beginning of the trip and he had them in his backpack! Except he kept remembering ‘Marriott’ and not Renaissance and then finally remembered he had the paperwork. So by the time we got to the hotel, they had been there for at least 10 minutes.

That was an adventure.

Oh, we laughed and laughed about it.

But as we got checked in, J was feeling terrible and the kids just wanted room service. And I… I just wanted out! I grabbed the FedEx package of meds that Sharon shipped to me and got out of the hotel. I took a picture with the super weird statue (fun tip, typing in ‘super weird statue aix-en-provence’ did not immediately give me what I was looking for… haha) and then walked over to S&T’s hotel.

I chatted with them for a bit and then walked with them to the restaurant their concierge recommended but politely left them to their dinner! And then I walked around!

Aix is SO lovely! So so so very lovely. The twists and turns in the streets, all the shopping (that had just closed because it was 7pm at that point), the little restaurants around each corner with live music…

C’est manifique!!

I walked around until I found a restaurant that spoke to me. I also took a bunch of photos of jewelry stores to come to the next day. I found this one and sat down with my book.

I had a glass of champagne and a lovely meal and just sat and listened to the live music.

I texted my Mom to come and meet me but she ended up getting lost and not understanding how to follow my pin on Find Friends. My Dad texted me where they were. I could only get these because Square had free wifi!

I gave up waiting for my Mom and wandered down to go say hi to my Dad and the family. Although, he texted me later that he saw my Mom dancing with some dancers in the street, which was hilarious.

Ooh, I got gelato! At that point, I was having gelato every single night. My stomach was basically okay so why not? Gelato and french fries!

I sat down for the end of Dad’s dinner. Sam had finally decided to venture out at that point so I was looking for her. I met up with her but her stomach was hurting HER so bad that she didn’t want anything to eat, just to walk around for a bit. Then we walked home and got some sleep.

The next morning we made plans to go look at the lavender fields but I heard the Square had the MOST amazing farmers market / craft faire thing every Saturday. I met up with Dad (and G decided to come with me because he wanted French toast!) and we had breakfast.

The street… faire? Was so amazing. I got a dress (or two!), the most comfortable shorts, two pairs of lounge pants… I kept sending Sam pictures of things I thought she would like and demanded she come out. While we were supposed to leave at (I can’t even remember) I made everyone come out (Sharon & JJ) and we all went shopping! It was totally worth it! So worth it that I had to go find an ATM for more money because most of them only took cash!

After we did all our shopping, we jumped in the car to go check out the Lavender fields! They were pretty amazing. We drove past the first one that had all the cars, and there were several fields after it. We got out and took some photos. We actually took a ton of photos but these crack me up. Sam and I were doing photoshoots and these were the funny ones – and I probably deleted like 20 of them.

The weather wasn’t great and it was SO windy. See how windy at lunch! But it was still a great time. We went over to Valensole (I think?) and all the lunch places were closed but the Grandparents sat down somewhere… we just hung out… G got a hot dog, I got gelato, and Sam got… nothing? I forget. I walked around a bit and then the kids got super bored. They were thrilled (see the windy video…)

We couldn’t (didn’t want!) to leave the Grandparents by themselves so I dragged the kids on a walk and we sat down at this bench and talked college, school, and random stuff.

Again, they were thrilled.

It was actually a good memory for me though, ha ha!

We went back home and the kids collapsed in their room! I went out and went SHOPPING! Except I don’t think I bought anything? But I did visit all the jewelry stores for about an hour searching for a ring. I got a really pretty black one but it wasn’t exactly what I wanted. I loved it though!

I then wandered around trying to find the perfect place to sit down and read. I went to the same area! It just spoke to me. I wore my new dress I bought that morning.

I made arrangements with JJ and Gregg to come meet me for dinner. I literally sat at the same spot for dinner but my dinner was completely different but it was fine. Just weird like, did they make it in a different kitchen? G decided to come out of his hotel room and meet us too! (Sam was still having stomach problems but not sick like J!)

We had fun gabbing. It was nice out. I think I walked back with G and had a nice time talking. We went up to the hotel room and I grabbed my stuff from my room and moved over to the kids room. J had a 101 temp and had coughed the whole night before so I wanted some sleep (and to not get sick!).

Maybe it was that night or the one before – but at some point I sat down in the lobby with Dad, Cindy and the kids just chatting. That was nice too!

The next morning J still had a fever. I was paranoid and feeling bad knowing we were all going to be in the same house and had heard comments about maybe J should stay in a hotel room for a night or two. We decided to take him to urgent car and since we had three cars (came in handy!) I had to figure out what to do!

Now that we had two days of driving in France, I felt a lot more comfortable with Sam driving. Plus, Ryan had been driving around a lot and we knew what to do (with the ticket booths!). Sort of… (the mistakes I made with the ticket booths in the upcoming week… ha ha!)

Long story short, we kept JJ driving all the Grandparents around and then I put Sam, G, and Ryan in the 3rd car… Dad and his group still had his two cars.

Was I a little worried that Sam, Ryan, and G would get lost? Not really. Ryan is incredibly capable and at that point, I had watched Sam navigate and made decisions so I felt good about it. Plus, apparently Dad was the one who made the wrong turn and the kids were following him so… haha. We all make mistakes?

But this is Isabelle!

She was helping me get directions, keeping the keys, as my Mom was coming over, and basically helping me out. She ended up not charging the 2nd room to my credit card but charged it to Sam and Sam lost her mind a little about that ($800 off her personal card, she bugged me at least 8 times to transfer the money back to her!) but it was all fine.

They took FOREVER to leave, I have no idea why. But they all went to Toulon, to have lunch by the beach – which was my plan – LOL but at least they got to enjoy it. Although they did run into the problem of lunch closing at 2pm and nothing being open after that! But they survived.

I had to take a picture of Urgencemed.

Urgent care in France… similar to our Urgent Care in Cabo San Lucas a few years back… J and traveling outside the country doesn’t seem to mix too well!

Long story short, “it looks like covid” which we scoffed at! He feels totally different than the last time he had covid!

But we went to the pharmacy, got all the things, grabbed a covid test too, and then headed over to Sainte Maxime.

The GPS took us in a wild direction (it tried to take me that way another time later in the week too but I got smarter!). But seriously, it tried to take me over a waterway with no bridge and then I had to wander around and the path got SO WEIRD that I just had to take a picture and laugh.

In our tiny little rental car.

I don’t think I will elaborate dropping off J at his little hotel but I took this picture… at some point. And I don’t think I will forget all the details of that day so I don’t feel bad typing it all out. But I think I cried a little after.

But in the end, he did test and he actually did have Covid so I felt like making him stay in a hotel room was actually for the best anyway.

And then I wandered off to find our house. I got there, and Dad arrived RIGHT after me and it was SO CONFUSING to figure out WHAT house was our address. There were 6 different houses with the same address!

But we did figure it out, and we got settled, and had a nice dinner.

But more on that later…