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Did we just pay 40 Euros to drive through this tunnel?

Torino-Geneva-Dijon(ish)

After sadly realizing we simply do not have the time or the fluids in our body to do the French Riviera we had to once again edit our route.  Luckily I had not yet highlighted the map. It’s been far too hot the last few days to even fathom the idea of sitting in Milo in the heat for a few more.  Time to head North.


Consulting the map and the all holy Lonely Planet Jonathan found some things of interest, the CERN center outside Geneva and the Maginot Line.  Were they of interest to me?  Absolutely not, but he’s been a good sport about the food I’ve made him eat and markets I’ve made him enter, so we’ll call it evens. 


After consulting the bank balances we realized we needed to budget a bit better, we set ourselves a strict budget for the rest of the trip which we would shortly shatter because we spent over a hundred Euros on tolls today, seriously. 


We went north from Turino without actually entering the center, figuring I’ll be spending enough time there soon enough as my tiny little town is surely not going to entertain me on the weekends after five years in Shanghai.  I shudder to think I’ll soon be living in a town actually smaller than the one I grew up in, terrifying stuff.  But it is in Italy, it is in Italy, my new mantra.  No, I was pleased with the school, and I’m happy I’ll be able to throw myself into the Italian without the reprieve I would have in a big city, it’s why I never properly learned Chinese. 


We went through the Alps, each country (Italy, France and Switzerland) charging us a hefty toll for all those tunnels they built decades ago and entered Geneva.  I think we’ve just done big cities at this point, Geneva was very pretty and the lake was lovely, but meh, we couldn’t get excited about it, and after all those tolls we certainly couldn’t do anything in it, it’s one of the most expensive cities in the world. We pressed on to CERN.


What is CERN?  It’s the European Organization for Nuclear Research, the name apparently makes sense in French.  Unfortunately in another Hair-ian lack of planning we failed to realize you had to book a tour MONTHS in advance, but there was still a visitor center that the Lonely Planet promised us was riveting, it was not. You would think the preeminent research center in Europe would be running a more advance operating system than MSDOS, but they were not. They clearly had not updated the center since the early 80s and I do not understand what they’re doing in there any better now than before I entered.  The center mostly explained things I learned in 8th grade science class, surely they could do better?


Spirits unbroken by disappointment we entered France, home of the baguette, the beret, brie and the only place the little girl in me ever wanted to visit.

Day 37

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