Our travel to Marseille was another triumph of logistics. Our Howth hosts arranged a taxi to pick us up early and take us to the airport. We had tickets on Ryanair, a discount airline that charges for every little thing but more importantly, has terrible check-in procedures (I had not checked-in online for lack of printer and wherewithal). It took standing in several lines plus eye-rolls and vague instructions from unfriendly staff, but we got our boarding passes and luggage checked, and through the massive security lines in plenty of time. The entire experience felt chaotic. I’m one who stresses out about travel logistics anyway so all I could think was that by the end of our day, we’d be happily ensconced in our Marseille apartment where I could chill out and relax for the rest of the week.
Have you guessed yet how that turned out?
I knew that Marseille is a big city, but I had somehow imagined it as quaint and thought that our apartment was located in a relatively peaceful enclave. But no, the chaos continued. Granted, we arrived at the close of a busy tourist weekend, but our surroundings were anything but peaceful. They were noisy, crowded, dirty, and a little bit scary. The gap between reality and the image I had built in my mind was enormous.
The apartment itself was as advertised and reviewed by others. Non lovely, which I knew, but with a kitchen, living room, bedroom, and laundry. And it did have a fantastic view of the Mediterranean. It was run down, however, and it was hard not to look around and conclude: l'orifice du merde. In the morning, we also discovered a deficit of hot water for showering.
The view
Before escaping, we
did spend time walking past all sorts of history and around the vieux port with
its wonderful display and variety of boats. A person could spend a lot of time sightseeing
in Marseille, but it just was not what I had in mind. My bad for sure.
Fishermen sell their fresh catch right there at the port
Upon arriving in Avignon, we walked half a block to our hotel where we were overjoyed to find a spacious room, separate seating area, mini fridge, modern bathroom, and rooftop pool. The stress reduction I had hoped for on Sunday night occurred in this moment. Now this is the relaxing interlude I imagined.
For those wondering about the mystery lockbox (see post from April 23):
Although I’d asked a few weeks ago, both AirBnB and our host had been silent as to how to access the lockbox containing the all-important apartment key. While waiting at our airline gate, however, I received a message from the host giving us the lockbox code. It turned out, ironically, that obtaining the key was the easiest part of the crazy apartment access instructions. After we got it, we spent a ridiculous amount of time trying to find our apartment building, which was right there, but NOT the one shown on google maps. (We had the same problem in Ireland – google maps often shows a building that is several down from the correct one). Anyway, we finally figured it out, applied the front door entry code, rode up the squalid elevator A, and unlocked the apartment door.
Squalid. I love that word 😅
ReplyDeleteSounds like an adventure. I'm so glad that you went to the hotel. Honestly, I didn't want to say it when you were still in the States, but your AirBnB experience was pretty much our experience more than once in Paris. The difference is that we were a group of five and it would mean two hotel rooms, so the AirBnB (when they worked) were significantly more economical, so we kept trying to rebook. But, if I were going to Europe today, I'd stick with hotels. Much more predictable. and less stressful.
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