chapter 24: international incident

Our adventure soon became a quest for (1) food, (2) shelter, and (3) a good place to hike (funny how the necessities of life always creep in).

We found a grocery store (cheese + salami + pocket knife = happy campers; + chocolate = even happier campers), a cute little chalet of a hotel, and a place that looked kind of like a good hiking place.

We pulled in and asked a friendly-enough-looking guy (who had a really cute puppy). For better or for worse, Jonathan (the designated driver) was also our ambassador to the outside world. It went something like this:

Jonathan: [rolls down window] Excuse me -- do you speak English?

Friendly-Enough-Looking-Guy: I am English!

The FELG(wharcp) confirmed that we had indeed stumbled on a good hiking path and so we parked and went on our merry way.

Pretty soon we came upon an old broken-down building that had an interesting tunnel that led to an interesting cave that opened on a lake. Here we are at the mouth of the cave:

Then we went with our salami through a forest and up a grassy hill and ate lunch with a view of this:

and this:

And we were happy.

Then it was time to decide what to do next.

While eating lunch on the hill we had noticed that a bunch of cars, trucks, and other assorted vehicles were disappearing into the side of a mountain. Going through a tunnel in the side of a mountain sounded interesting, so after lunch we packed up and decided to go find it.

We did find it, and also found that it was actually the Mont Blanc tunnel that starts in France and ends in Italy. Better and better, right?

So we drove up to the little toll booth to pay and go through . . .

. . . when we saw that the toll was 38 Euro (!!!). Waaaay expensive to go through a tunnel. So Jonathan, our ambassador, ever the diplomat, commenced a conversation with the guy in the toll booth (who, being French, would feign admit to understanding an American tourist's English if his life depended on it). It went something like this:

Jonathan: That's a lot of money. What's over there, anyway?
French guard: [blank stare]
Jonathan: I mean, is there anything good over there?
French guard: [blank stare]
Jonathan: Is there anything to do over there? What do they have over there? Is it worth it?
French guard: [reaches for walkie-talkie]
Jonathan: Can we back out?
French guard: [half-nods, says something in walkie-talkie]

So we backed out, and like all good tourists, took a picture of the tunnel that we weren't able to go through. Here it is:

And I took the opportunity to say how impressed I was that we had actually had an international incident. I mean, here we are in France, trying to go through a French tunnel that comes out in Italy, driving a Swiss van.

Then we heard the siren.

People said the sirens reminded them of watching international crises on the BBC.

They always reminded me of the Jeopardy! theme song.

This may explain why I was unconcerned at first by the siren and flashing lights.

Like Donne's mankind, we needed not send to know for whom the siren tolled. It tolled for us.

We were duly pulled over. We duly handed in our passports. We duly submitted our van for a search. We duly answered questions. And we duly sat in the car while the driver was removed and patted down.

Whereupon the driver spoke again.

Jonathan: [to French police] Would it be okay if I took your picture?
French police: [blank stare]

(You know that stereotype of the American tourist? Yeah. Well, maybe it's not so off. I know of about a half dozen French police officers who swear by it . . .)