The state of France was this: The government has been making plans in a common-sense direction. The retirement age has been set at 62, but they are changing it to 64. Of course this is unpopular with the union workers. And what does that mean for us? A nationwide rail strike of course. And we are mostly traveling by rail.

In the evening, last Tuesday, we headed toward the French border. We were cautiously optimistic that we might find a train to Paris somehow. We talked about a few options. In the end though, we ended up in a suburb of Strasbourg, France, on the Germany side of the border. Walking several miles across the border (ok, maybe 2) we found our night accommodations, a modernly decorated hostel with quite a lot happening. We had our own 4-person room here, no sharing with others thankfully.

Strategizing a bit, Johannes and Titus hatched a brilliant plan. Head to Naples for now, plan to take a ferry from Rome to Barcelona, and hopefully make it into France in the last leg of the trip.

We spent Wednesday in Strasbourg. A beautiful cathedral, the Notre Dame de Strasbourg, which I’m sure was the scourge of our Mennonite ancestors, looks out on the town. Or at least we got a good lookout on the town from there. Beautiful view is an understatement. This cathedral has flying buttresses in the architecture, similar to Notre Dame de Paris, albeit much smaller I think. We sampled the French fare a couple places, macarons with gelato filling, madeleines, and various other things.

We’re pulling into Rome station. Watch for part III