Turbulence

The plane ride to Paris from Copenhagen started off with an hour delay because of the snow we had here last night. They had to de-ice the plane. I slept through the whole thing but the flight didn't leave until 8am. It only took and hour and a half for it to arrive in Paris which was a pleasant surprise. It was supposed to be two hours.

I really want to call home but it's not even 5am in Montreal. It's already a long day as we've been to the tax refund counter where the rudest person in the world works. Then you have to take the paper to the Amex counter to get actual money (so strange). Our four hour lay over was reduced to three due to the delay and now we've spent an hour trying to get some euros back... what a pain.

I've somehow managed to find free wifi here in the airport and am writing this as quickly as I can while waiting for Pat to get his euros. Each person is a fifteen minute ordeal! You should see the line up too ... ouch. Still, I can't possibly be happier that I'm heading home. One more flight to go.

Things that don't work

Unfortunately we had a room here at the Copenhagen Plaza that did not have very good heating. We opted to change rooms and sure enough, to my surprise, the wireless internet I thought we had was not the hotel's. I had been bumming it off some neighbour. The room we've been moved to has zero wireless internet connections. So my emails and blog came to an abrupt end.

Now it's friday night and I'm completely exhausted. We're to get up at 4:30am tomorrow to get to the airport in time for our 7:05 flight. It'll be flight AF344 arriving in Montreal at 3:05pm. I'm very much looking forward to seeing my wife and kids. It's been very long trip although it seems to have gone quite well ... except for one small exception. Not to get into details here, but not all customers are the same. Let's put it that way.

I'm in the lobby of the hotel where they have this internet access. I was hoping to book our tickets and print them out however I need our passport numbers. I didn't bring them so it's back up to the 4th floor for me.

I miss everyone and can't wait to be on Canada time and get some much needed sleep. I'll see if this thing is still free when I get back. I look forward to seeing you tomorrow however I'll be one tired sales guy.

Friendly Danes

What a difference in attitude a two hour flight makes. The people here in Denmark are very friendly and helpful. Having gotten off the plane from Paris it's like night and day. Spacious rooms and polite service. Everyone speaks english too!

I went to see my customer in Jyllinge who had asked that we go for supper. We of course obliged because having time to stop for food has become a luxury. I had a fantastic "roast beef" which was more like a steak. Some fantastic gravy and a side of potato wedges that were just great. We're having a hard time calculating how much everything is because we have to use Danish Krone here. Traded in all our Euros at the airport with an exchange booth run by an Italian woman. That was an odd first experience in Denmark.

It's now pushing 10pm and we're beat. Only a couple more days before I can get home and have a real coffee.

Arrival into Denmark

Up early again ... this time we had a good ride to the airport and then an easy two hour flight from Paris to Copenhagen. I can't say I'm particularly going to miss Paris. It was ok, but Denmark seems a little more spacious and a little more friendly.

We're at our hotel right now and it's really cold. It's about 5 degrees out there. I'm going to try and snap some pictures of our hotel but I'm also starving. All this traveling is wearysome. At least here in Denmark we've rented a car. A very fancy pants SAAB. I'll have to get a picture of that too ... how do I do that without looking silly?

Sleeping everywhere but in bed

Up at 5am sharp this morning in order to get ourselves to the train station fo our 6:50am departure. It's so dark here in Paris at that time. Today it was an extra treat as we headed outside to face the rain. It's been gray and dark since friday but today it poured. Bad timing. We were planning on walking to the train station. So we figure to get a cab. Not possible from at that hour. The cabs are all booked as it's the busiest time of the day (?) and since it was raining it was extra impossible to get a ride. We waited about 10 minutes for the tom foolery of the reception desk here until we decided that the rain had given up enough to walk. We got a little wet but it was more important to get to our train than wait for a cab that ain't coming.

Our train ride was about an hour and forty-five minutes to Poitiers. Needless to say it was very hard to stay awake in that comfy train chair. That was followed by a forty-five minute cab ride to the customer. Thankfully it went really well there. The same cab driver (crazy as a loon) picked us up and brought us back to the station. He suggested a Boulangerie accross the street so we went and got a sandwich (or sangwitch... depends who you are) to go. It was quite good ...

From there it was another train ride further south to Pessac just five minutes south of Bordeaux.

That ended our tour of the west coast of France. We took a direct train from Bordeaux to Paris. Slept most of the way. It's surprisingly hard to stay awake in those trains. Now it's 11pm and I'm ready for bed. Only one thing left to do. Make sure a cab shows up tomorrow morning at 6:30am to bring us to the airport.

Grateful

Thanks for all your comments. Glad to see you're finding time to read my little attempt at blogging.

Me and Eiffel

Here I am ! Can't wait to show my girls the effort I went through to get them an Eiffel Tower.