A Long Drive to Annemasse

We left Disneyland early afternoon and began our 5 hour drive South-East to Annemasse where we would be staying for the next 3 nights. The drive was an interesting one, but I ended up seeing my eye lids for a while! It's amazing how after doing 130km/h for a few hours it starts to not even feel that fast anymore! The drive was long, but I think most of us were pretty happy just to be sitting down for a while!! Mick did a great job driving on the other side, navigating and reading road signs in French. Our many toilet stops were a bit of an experience, as most of them seemed to be missing the toilet - expecting you to take a squat over a huge hole! But I guess they did have foot grips for you, so it's not like they hadn't gone to some effort to make you comfortable!

It was a beautiful day once again, quite hot actually and the further we went south the hotter it got. It was around 30˚C most days we were in France, sometimes it was a little too hot, especially sleeping, but mostly I just enjoyed it... especially sitting in the air-conditioned car!

{Corn in the fields}

{460km down only 100 to go!}

{Villages}

{Tunnels}

There were heaps of tunnels cutting straight through the bottom of the mountains, it's just amazing really. I loved going through them because when you come out it's like seeing the view again for the first time. None of our photos really capture how amazing the Western Alps are, but they are seriously the best thing I have ever seen. Maybe it's because we have been in the UK for too long, where mountains don't really exist - I don't know, but I just loved being there, driving through them wondering what they look like in winter covered with snow! (Hoping we'll get back there to see that one day!!) No man made site could ever top this in my opinion, just exquisite - I loved it.

The roads are just amazing, it's nearly like you are flying through some of these places!

{I think that most of these photos are actually the French Prealps - photos of the Alps next post}

I thought I did see snow on these mountains - right in the back, but Dad told me I was crazy thinking there would be snow out there in this heat, but sometimes you do see snow on the edges of the mountains during the Tour de France.... not this time though, as we got closer it was quite clear it wasn't snow and dad was right after all! (It was just white rock).

We arrived early evening into Annemasse to quickly find there's not really a whole lot to see here. It wasn't the nicest town but did it's job well - quick and easy access to Stage 17 of Le Tour de France and only a few minutes drive into Geneva. Annemasse lies on the border of Switzerland and is surrounded by Mont Saleve. It would have been really nice to stay in Geneva but it's pretty expensive there and also busy as a big city should be. Annecy is another beautiful town not far from here that would have been nice to stay in but it was all booked up due to the race having a time trial there in 2 days times. So Annemasse it was, which I didn't even end up spending a day in anyway... too busy watching Le Tour!