At Home, part 22

At last it was time for us to take our big Semana Santa (Holy Week) vacation. This was spring vacation time for most European schools, Easter week, and we had done lots of planning to put the trip together. My English-speaking travel agent had not been quick to find inexpensive hotels for us—he was really happier dealing with luxury itineraries, though he wouldn’t come out and say so—so I had followed Amy Levine’s cheap hotel advice.

“I just use Fodor’s Europe on $50 a Day,” she said. “They have plenty of good, inexpensive places.”

I got the book and made lists of my top choices in each of the cities we’d be going to. The trip would start with a flight to Luxembourg. We’d rent a car and drive to Strasbourg, France, then to Bruges, in Belgium, and on to Holland, where Lisa had a kindergarten friend to visit. Then we’d go to Brussels and back to Luxembourg to catch our return flight. We thought it might be a good idea to spend Easter week in predominantly Protestant areas, since the Catholic Easter celebrations often drew huge numbers, and I was not a fan of crowds.

I made a reservation at a very cheap place in Luxembourg, where we’d spend only one night. I found a canal house for us to stay in in Amsterdam. But when it came time to book the French and Belgian hotels I couldn’t remember how to speak French. I had been reasonably fluent just a year before, during our vacation in Martinique, but it was all gone now. If I tried to think of words like “room” or “double bed,” the words that came out were habitación and cama grande—Spanish words, not French.

I called Amy, whose French was still terrific. “Can you sort of prime the pump for me?” I asked. “I need to be reminded how to ask for a room in French.”

“Je voudrais une chambre . . .” she began.

“That’s fine,” I said, feeling more cheerful as the language came back to me. “I can take it from here.” I got the other hotels nailed down easily.

Our Luxair flight left Madrid on a Friday night and stopped in Barcelona on the way to Luxembourg City. We didn’t arrive at our hotel till 12:30 a.m., and we were tired when we got there. I had reserved one room with four single beds for us—we didn’t normally share a room, but I knew we’d be coming in late and staying just one night, so it seemed like a reasonable economy.

We all jumped into our pajamas quickly in the chilly room, and the four of us got into bed. Mike turned off the light. “Good night! Sleep well!” he said.

It was quiet for about two minutes. Then Lisa’s voice: “Mom? My foot’s sticking out.”

There was a momentary silence. “Well, stick it back in!” I answered, and suddenly all four of us were laughing hysterically, a little tired and punchy.

In the morning we set out to see the city, which was basically a huge fortress. Many rings of fortifications had been built around the town over the centuries, and we explored some of them. There were lovely stone buildings and picturesque squares, and it was market day, so we did a little shopping for souvenirs. We had to buy scarves and gloves, too, since it was colder than we had expected.

We went back to the airport in the afternoon to pick up our rental car, a little blue Opel, and drove to Strasbourg through forests and hills. We found our hotel without trouble, because we knew it was near the huge train station, and that was easy to locate. We walked over to Petite France, the old (and touristy) part of town, situated on a group of small islands in the Ill river. The half-timbered houses were pretty and lent the area a medieval atmosphere, even though there were restaurants and shops everywhere. We chose a restaurant based on kid food needs—“Pizza!” Julie had shouted when she saw it on the menu in the window—no French cooking that night.

But when the main course was over, I started to wax enthusiastic about the grandeur of French desserts. “You should definitely order something here,” I told the girls. “The French are the best at this kind of thing. Get a pastry or something.”

“I really only want some ice cream,” Julie said.

“Well, that’s okay!” I said, smiling. “French ice creams are wonderful, too.” I peered at the menu. “Ooh, they have regular vanilla and chocolate, but they have coconut, too, and lemon sorbet. And these won’t be like those pre-made frozen things that come in the coconut shell or the lemon rind! These will be really elegant!”

Excited now, Julie ordered the coconut, which was her favorite, and Lisa asked for a lemon sorbet. And when they arrived looking just like the mass-produced ones we always got in Spain, I got another good ribbing from the kids.

“Ooh, Mom, really elegant,” Julie said, laughing.

“Yeah,” said Lisa, “this is so much better than what we get in Madrid!”