First Day at School

....but only for the littlest one! Katy started at Jardin de Ville Elementaire!

Mid morning Wednesday, I'd realised that I'd forgotten to turn off the do not disturb mode. As I picked up my phone, I realised I'd missed a phone call. Dang - a French number which probably related to the school enrolment. I noticed a voicemail had been left and on accessing it realised it was in French!! Turning to my computer and best friend google translate, I tried to use the listen mode but was unsuccessful as it would only grab small parts of the message.

It was when I was doing this that I also realised that my email wasn't working so I restarted that one to discover an email containing le certificat d'inscription scolaire (School registration certificate) for Katy!

Next I texted Andy and we arranged via a Skype link for one of his colleagues to listen to the message. We had that sinking feeling that there was an issue with Ella's enrolment. Andy's work colleague translating the message indicated that there was an issue with age she needed to go to college (rather than primary school) and that we need to contact someone else.

Andy met the girls and I at the flying fox. We needed to discuss how we were going to approach this situation. Our first port of call was back to the Mairie. It was a different lady than previously. We'd written a message via google translate stating our preference for Ella to attend primary school rather than high school and also let her listen to the voicemail. She indicated that we needed to call a different department. She also reinforced that we needed to call the principal of Jardin de Ville to book an appointment.

We tried both numbers without any success. Our next move was to send an email back to the person who had issued the school registration certificate and explain our situation - we were only in Grenoble till April, Ella can't really speak French and is still in primary school back home. On our way home we dropped by the school to try to organise the interview without any luck - the school was closed (the children don't go to school on Wednesday afternoons!) We weren't having much luck!

Thursday morning arrived. We called the school, scheduling a meeting at 11am where we met with the principal, filled out various forms and agreed that Katy would start the following morning! We briefly raised the issue with Ella - and the principal stated that according to Ella's birthday that she would need to go to college (middle school). It seems that Ella is on the wrong side of the cut off! Just like in Australia, a year level can contain different ages - in France some children in CM2 (or the last year of primary school) are 10 or 11 years old.

The rest of the day we shopped for the required items on the school stationary list only after translating them at the coffee shop!

Despite the excitement of shopping for new things, Katy was extremely nervous for the rest of the day and had difficulty falling asleep. Friday dawned. Andy and I took her to school together discussing her fears and strategies to cope. We met the principal again who introduced us to Katy's teacher. He seemed lovely and spoke English (phew!) There was no tour of the school or classroom as we'd expected rather we left Katy who's chin was down, fighting back tears with her teacher at the front door of the school. Oh how my heart was breaking for her.

Returning back to the apartment, Ella and I had a few errands to complete in time to pick Katy up for lunch at 11.45am! We arrived back at the school 10 mins early and shivered in the cold breeze. Katy eventually emerged with a big grin from ear to ear. We were all so relieved that her morning had gone fantastically! We wandered back home and over lunch talked about her morning's experience.

Meanwhile an email arrived regarding Ella's predicament - the lady had referred the matter to her manager who then had referred it on to the next level! More waiting for her...

Arvo Run

It might have been one of the slowest afternoon runs  thanks to the climb but that didn't matter as the sunshine and views were breathtaking!

Wheels!

Andy has secured himself a bike for the next 3 months! Initial attempts to hire a metrovelo (yellow bike) failed at the request of having a 200€ bank cheque as a deposit. Unable at provide that as we don't have a French bank account, he sadly dismissed his idea of riding to work. However several days late while talking over lunch, one of his French colleagues suggested that he come and talk to the Metrovelo people as perhaps there had been a misunderstanding. But no there wasn't. Surprisingly Andy's work colleague turned to him and said just use my bank details! And so Andy became the proud owner of a yellow bike # 866 kitted out with bikes locks and lights but no helmet....

Parcours - Porte de France

Still no word on school, so we headed back to Jardin de Dauphin after finding a permanent orienteering course on the web - Parcours 'Porte de France.' The girls needed a bit of convincing but chose the orienteering course over a 3km run along the river.

Lots of climb involved in the first half of the course. Spirits we slightly dampened when we couldn't find the first control point. Thankfully the second one (and the remaining 7 were all intact). Our loop saw us skirt below the wall of the Bastille admiring views across to the Vercors on a sunny morning.

The course took us about 40mins and we emerged near the supermarket allowing us to pick up a few necessary items before heading home for lunch. A nice outing in the warmth of the day. There are a few more parcours around the Bastille area which I will save for another day.

Ella's Blog

Ella has begun her own blog!

Feel free to check it out and leave her a message

Photographic

Skiing Above the Clouds

A visit to the Grenoble tourist office during our first week we discovered a deal offered by the local bus company on day trips to the snow. Further investigations into these  result in us committing to booking tickets on the 8.15am bus to Chamrousse.

Chamrousse, a ski resort in the Belledonne range, 34km south east of Grenoble that has 90km of ski pistes spread over three linked resorts. We departed from the apartment in the dark at 7.30am, the earliest we'd been up for awhile. Dressed in our ski gear we lugging the ski bag and backpacks for 20min to the train station as the rising sun made a beautiful silhouette of the mountains.

Collecting our ski pass at the train / bus station, we patiently waited for our bus to arrive. It was quite busy with passengers and their ski gear all figuring out which bus headed to their respective ski resort. We boarded ours without fuss, found seats close to the front and were on our way. The bus made one stop to pick up more passengers near the University before continuing up the valley to Uriage les Bains, the halfway mark.

With 20km to go, we climbed 1200+m on a small windy road. Car or bus travel involving hairpin turns is not Ella strong point and sitting next to her I could see she was not enjoying this part of the trip. Then with about 3km and without any warning, Ella vomitted. Luckily we were in our mostly waterproof ski gear and she managed to direct her spew at the floor between our seats! I tried to catch some in the paper bag our croissants (which we had earlier consumed) had come in without much luck. Poor Ella - it was the first time she has actually been sick mostly she just gets nauseous.

Thankfully she managed to suppress any further spews by sipping water. As soon as the bus pulled up at our stop Chamrousse 1650, we were out of there apologising profusely to the driver for the mess we caused. As Andy retrieved our gear, Ella and I headed to the toilets to try to clean her up as best as we could. We emerged with Ella still feeling queasy to put on our boots and the rest of the ski stuff. Andy was busy trying to locate the public lockers so we could stow our bags and head off skiing. It was only when assisting the girls, I realised how cold it was... -5C!! With all the fussing we were all getting rather cold.

So the start to our morning hadn't gone to plan ... both girls were complaining of cold toes and hands and Ella was still recovering from her motion sickness. Luckily the first ride of the day was on a gondola straight to the top! We disembarked from the warm gondola to spectacular views. Andy and I were impressed, while the girls were still struggling to recover. From the top we could see Grenoble, the Chartreuse and Vercors mountain ranges and noticed a bank of cloud slowly creeping slowly down the Isere Valley.

Despite wanting to explore this wonderful place straight away, we were extremely conscious of trying to raise the girls spirits so we opted for an early coffee stop. This involved skiing one of the longest run finishing in Chamrousse 1750.

We retreated to the warmth of inside enjoying nutella and caramel waffles and coffee. As our toes and fingers thawed out, everyone's outlook became positive and we began to discuss potential routes and places to explore. It all began with a long magic carpet tunnel ride - just what Andy wanted!! This was followed by a long chairlift which deposited us 2/3 the way up the mountain. 

Skiing a new run we whizzed down past the chairlift to Chamrousse 1700 to catch a new chairlift. Perhaps our aim should be to try to catch all the lifts in the resorts.  On our way up, from the lofty heights of the chair, we spy an interesting route and decide to investigate.

The starting point between two foxes was called La Montagne de Teo but we nicknamed it to be Foxy Loxy. The run had numerous padded hands to bash, cow bells to ring, gongs to bash and chimes to sound testing ones control on skis! As you can see it was fun! We were back on track to having an excellent ski day!

All too soon it was lunch time although Andy was itching to continue so we let him do a run while we investigated lunch returning to our morning tea spot. Unfortunately it was packed and as an inside table was a necessity in this weather, we looked further afield. Not wanting to have a three course lunch, we spied an interesting spot which on first pass we thought it was a deli selling cheese and cold meats! We line up for a table and patiently wait. Minutes tick by but eventually were are ushered to a table just as Andy arrives! Perfect timing. 

Emerging from lunch, it's very white, the clouds have descended, and so had my heart. It was 2pm we had another 3.5 hours before our bus arrived and I was wondering how on earth I would be able to ski in these conditions. We get on the nearest chair and huddle together. At about 1800m something magical happens - we break through the clouds! It's beautiful and sunny once again. Our mood changes in an instant! We lapped up the spectacular panoramas once again, although this time Grenoble could no longer be seen.

And so for the last few hours of the day, we would ski down in the sunshine before sinking below the clouds into a world of white! Another small break for crepes helped warm us up for one last run via the gondola. The view at the top was sensational with the sinking sun spreading a warm glow over the interesting formations of waves of cloud with the summits of a few hills poking though. We bid this magical scene goodbye making our final descent to the waiting bus below. Thankfully our bus trip home was much less dramatic than our arrival. We arrived home at 8pm tired but happy.

Patiently Waiting

School in Grenoble started on the 7th January after a two week break for Christmas. Having arrived in Grenoble on the 30th December we thought that we'd be able to sort school enrolments out in the intervening week, unfortunately with the public holidays this didn't happen.

Firstly we were required to submit several document at the local town hall to prove who we are and where we are staying. As proof of our residence, we asked Yves to write us a letter. The letter arrived on Friday so finally were able to we make the much anticipated trek to the town hall only to be directed to the Maison des habitants some 800m away.

After an animated and slightly awkward conversation -  us doing our best French and the lady doing her best English, we managed to submit the forms and understand that we should hear from someone within 7-10 days. More waiting. A visit to Lyon kept us busy on the weekend.

During the next week we explored Grenoble figuring where things were and how to get from A to B! Mostly our days were filled with a long sleep in (which is easy when it is so dark) combined with reading and eventually getting up around 9.30 am, followed by breakfast. Usually we made it out of the apartment by 11.30am to do a job followed by a visit to the flying fox and finally a detour past a bakery and supermarket before returning back to the apartment by 3.30 / 4pm. The rest of the afternoon we spent writing in journals, listening to podcasts, baking, playing xbox, knitting, reading or watching TV.

Notably we had a trip to Ikea to obtain a few items which involved negotiating a bus trip . A trip to the 'mall' (not as we would know it!) with a tad of shopping at H&M involved lots of walking - twice as we discovered they forgot to take off a security tag from the jumper Katy purchased! We explored the Jardin de Dauphins a few times.

Friday arrived and there was still no news on school. A trip to the snow kept us busy on Saturday (more on that trip later)  and thus requiring a quiet recovery day on Sunday. A trip to the local pool on  Sunday afternoon seemed like a great idea.

The nearest pool, Piscine Bulle d'O was a 20 min walk away. A search during the week showed the pool had restricted opening times and limited availability of lane space during these periods. Sunday though looked relatively free. As with our previous European pool excursion, shoes were removed prior to entering the change room. Once shoes were off, we entered a cubicle to change into our swimmers then exited on the other side to find a locker to stash our things. Next we showered, walked through a foot bath and entered the swimming area. The indoor pool has two parts - a 25m with 6 lanes which was busy with swimmers (probably 5 - 7 people per lane) and a 12m long 'free' swimming area containing a seated spa area.

Andy was happy to swim laps amongst the masses while us girls decided not to. Expecting a warm bath, we were slightly shocked to discover how cold the water was. I'm sure Katy's lips went instantly blue! We played around trying to warm up while Andy did his required minimum 1km swim! There are a few other pools in Grenoble but I'm not sure we'll be rushing out to test them. I think we may leave swimming off our European activity list!

On returning to the apartment we were surprised to find a letter in our mailbox! Opening it, we saw that the letter was related with the school application and had a large highlighted section. Of course it was all in French but Andy and I had the suspicion that there was a problem with our application. Thanks once again to google translate, we determined that we hadn't linked us to our place of residence well enough. We texted Yves to ask for his help. He was quick to reply and said he could call them tomorrow to clarify the situation.

Monday morning dawned. Andy had a plan to ask the secretary at work to re-issue his work contract with our French address on top. This was done quickly and Yves returned his call verifying what we had suspected. Another trip to the Maison des habitants to drop this additional document off and we were back to waiting again.