[PRCo] Another Vacation

[Fred W. Schneider III]

Because some of you lurking out there in the shrubbery have expressed an
interest in my wanderings in the past, here comes the commentary on the
March 12 - April 2 trip to Europe.

Because not everyone has the ability to open a Word file, I'm send it as
one long e-mail plain text message.  DELETE NOW IF YOU ARE NOT
INTERESTED.

MY REACTION TO CHANGES IN COSTS OVER FOUR DECADES.

  I first savored Europe at the expense of the American taxpayers in
1959-1961, living in what the Army considered prime accommodations in
Germany.  At the risk of offending Harold Geissenheimer, I'll
acknowledge
that I never appreciated life in the army, but I did enjoy where they
put me!  And I've been going back ever since.  

  In the late 1950s, a gentleman published a book describing how
servicemen could get around Europe economically, including free military
air lifts for those willing to wait for days to get there free.  About
1960 he was discharged and from that point on Arthur Frommer began a
career on the fringes of the travel industry.  His second book, EUROPE
ON FIVE DOLLARS A DAY became a Bible for college kids and others willing
to suffer the indignities of economical touring.  It was possible in the
early 1960s to, on average of big cities and smaller towns, cover hotel,
food, museum, and local bus and tram and subway fares for $5.00.  Hotels
went for $2.00 except in the largest cities.  (I once spent $3 for a
suburb place in Milano.)  Of course, long distance train fares were
additional.  Because the cheapest air fare from the US was Icelandic
Airlines service in piston driven planes, many younger people took this
slower route that cost only about $300.  Savvy travelers four decades
ago stayed as long as they could once they had paid the air fare ...
remember $5 a day there and $300 for the air fare ... that was 60 days
in Europe for the same price as just getting there.

   What has happened to costs since then?  In 2002 you get about 2 days
in Europe in budget hotels for the same amount of money as the air fare
in the off season and four days in the peak season!  This time, owing to
fearful fliers, I only paid $198 in fare plus $90 in taxes on the ticket
for a British Airways flight from Philadelphia to London, AND BACK
HOME.  That represents an 85 percent reduction in the cost of air travel
over forty years after adjusting for inflation. 

   And the cost of day-to-day life ... hotels, meals, museum admissions,
city transport?  Those costs have gone up at least 20 times over four
decades while the US inflation rate has only gone up six fold. 
Obviously European inflation rates have been steeper than in the US and
the value that investors place on different currencies has not helped us
either.  

   Hotel costs ...I paid a rock bottom $65 a night this March on a
winter rate in a small hotel in Kensington, London, for a single that
featured the hotel-wide sound of a growling elevator (lift if you're
British) motor bearing, a bare wire in my room that gave me a 220
volt 50 Hz jolt, a cooked breakfast at a $6 surcharge available only on
one day when the cook appeared, pealing paint, and a bathroom door
partly covered with formica (and partly ripped off).  I'm not
recommending the Kensington Edwardian Hotel but the price was, I'm sure,
one-third to one-half of what the Holiday Inn two blocks away was
charging.  In Paris, the Mercur charged $104 a night. I had breakfast in
any local bakery shop for less than $2 because the hotel wanted $11 for
a roll and coffee.  The Mercur in Reims, France extracted a paltry $48 a
night from me ... clearly a small city rate in the off season. The
Novatel in Saarbrucken, Germany wanted $55 on a weekend rate for a
rather decadent room by my standards. Frau Koenig (Mrs. King) in
Odelshofen, Germany charged about $42 for a single in one of those
typically ancient (1830) ten-room and restaurant German hotels.  (An
aside to Ed Lybarger: Susanne Koenig immediately recognized me, and
remarked that I had been there two years before with a fellow from
Pittsburgh, and that we came to see the new trolley cars in
Strasbourg.)  And my long time friend Bubbles had lowest rate of all for
several nights in her cottage home (on the property once owned by
Florence Nightingale) near Crich, England.  

  I dropped some hotel names that are all operated under the banner of
Accor Hotels, a French corporation, that boast 3500 hotels in 90
countries on all continents except Antarctica. Some of their more common
brand names include: Sofitel, Novotel, Mercure, Ibis, Etap, Formula 1,
Suitehotel, Thalassa International, Motel 6, and Red Roof Inns.  The
first six hotel names are common in Europe, and cover a range from
sub-budget to luxury. 

   Food costs ... figure 50 percent more than you would pay in the
United States for the same level of service, presentation, quantity,
quality, and city size.  The price of London and Paris restaurants
should be compared to those in New York and San Francisco and not to
Pittsburgh or Des Moines.  

   Travel costs ... These vary all over the place according to local
subsidies.  The lowest I found this trip was a carnet of ten tickets
good on the subways and buses in Paris, at 81 cents a ride (the one trip
cash fare is about $1.00).  In London a two-zone ride is about $1.75
while a 9:30 a.m. to 5:00 a.m. LT pass (good on the buses, underground,
and railroads in the same zone) runs around $6.40 for 1-2 zones or
closer to $7.00 for up to four zones. I punched a ticket machine to
explore the interurban fare from Baden Baden (Bath Bath) to Heilbronne,
Germany, about 50 miles, and I vaguely recall a fare of about $13.00
each way. 

   Ah yes, then there is the London - Paris fare through the Channel
Tunnel.  If you need ask how much, you should consider swimming.  The
one-way fare for 449 kilometers (281 miles) is $255 for a second class
ticket with no advance purchase (first class should be about $382). Ah,
but the round-trip (return) fares are less than the one-way tickets. 
They range from as little as $150 with a month's advance purchase, to a
no advance purchase tourist ticket at $180 (no changes permitted), or a
regular tourist ticket at $240.  I got stuck for the latter ... remember
I only paid $290 to get there from the states.  They are competing with
the air lines, and with a 30 minute check in at Gare de l'Est, Paris or
Waterloo, London, the total trip is 3 hours 30 minutes.  And with a two
hour check in at Heathrow Airport or Charles de Gaul, a one hour flight,
and a one hour commute into town at each end, the air trip consumes five
hours.  Eurostar can well afford to charge premium fares for a service
that is faster than the air lines.   (In 1960 I rode the "Night Ferry"
northbound from Paris to London, and returned through New Haven and
Dieppe ... both were either all night or all day trips.  Now you check
out of your hotel in Paris, and arrive in London before the rooms are
cleaned for you to check in!)  For what it is worth ... the French track
is the smoothest over which I've every ridden and the 160 miles from the
tunnel to Paris are put behind you in about 75 minutes with mile after
mile of 190 mph running.  The British track is so-so, mostly 60 mph
track with some 50 and 40 mph junctions and curves.  

   Automobile costs?  There is no sense trying to even make sense of
rental car rates because there is considerable variation depending on
season, length of rental, time of the week, size of car, and worst of
all the optional insurance coverage (deductible collision insurance,
100% collision damage waiver, personal liability above the legal
minimums, liability for passengers, personal accident insurance, and
finally, coverage of the owner's lost profits if you wreck the car). 
The optional insurance programs can easily exceed twice the basic rental
rates!  Tolls?  Most expressways in Europe are free but France extorts a
very high price ... I have over $18 worth of Visa charge slips for tolls
in one afternoon between Paris and Strasbourg at about four times the
rate charged on the Pennsylvania Turnpike.  Fuel costs?  Americans think
they have the right to the lowest priced gasoline in the world.  I'm
looking right now at one very typical charge slip for gasoline in
Germany at $4.62 a gallon of lowest octane unleaded.

WHO LIVES IN EUROPE THESE DAYS?  

   Easily, the answer is anyone from anywhere.  Remember, no one
including your own ancestors moved to a strange country because they
were contented, fat, and sassy.  We are all Americans because people in
our background were either hungry or tired of fighting someone else's
war(s). The same rules apply today.  In the last 40 years the United
State has been a magnet to people in the Middle East, Mexico, Chile,
Puerto Rico (I hesitate to add it because it is part of the US),
Columbia,  South Viet Nam, and Hong Kong. Western Europe has welcomed or
accepted or tolerated people from Hong Kong, North Viet Nam, India,
Africa, Turkey, Kuwait, Lebanon, and other Middle Eastern nations. I was
impressed that my hotel in London hired its staff from the Tower of
Babel ... wonderful people but it took time to get used to how people
from a half dozen different countries (including myself) butcher
English.  

   Eating in European restaurants these days can be a delightful
experience or perhaps a notch or two lower on the gastronomic chart. 
You must be willing to experiment with your food.  To be sure, food in
France, England, or Germany need not be French, English, or German food
as we have come to understand it.  Three of the
best restaurants I experienced in London this trip were Indian, and I
would go back to any one of them.  On the other hand, I encountered a
"Mexican" restaurant called the Lone Star Sirloin that featured salsa
smothered in vinegar (because someone felt the English like acetic acid
in their food).  It was as far from reality as the Mexican restaurant I
found six months ago in Brighton, England, which served a burrito filled
with carrots and peas.  The microwaved Chinese meal of shrimp, noodles
and bean sprouts in Paris was sort of a low point but I wasn't in an
exploring mood and it was handy.  Then there was a kabob lunch in
Stuttgart, Germany.  And escargot chased with a wonderful beef dinner
with a great fresh salad and garlic potatoes in Paris ... and enough
wine to kill the pain in the hips.  Mrs. Koenig's Jaegerschnitzel is
still good.  Sidebar again: Fred Bruhn understands all this.  

THE EFFECT OF THE EUROPEAN COMMON MARKET

   We've all read about the introduction of the Euro as the currency in
some 13 EEC countries on January 1, 2002, but what has been the total
affect of the EEC?  More than I have the knowledge to describe.  But in
principal there are no duties on goods moved back and forth between EEC
countries.  A French Citroen or a German Volkswagen or a General Motors
Opal from Germany or a GM Vauxhall from England can be sold in any
country without duty.  The same applies to Portuguese wine, German tooth
paste, Italian noodles, German tram cars, well you get the idea.  Since
there is no duty, there is no longer any need for customs people at
border crossings.  Immigration people are encountered when you enter the
first EEC country. You will find immigration people going, for example,
from Poland into Germany or at any international airport but not at
borders between EEC member countries.  The French seem slower at tearing
down the disused buildings.  The Germans have not only torn down the
customs houses, but narrowed the roads back to two or four lanes, and
landscaped the  shoulders.  Drive across the Rhein in one direction and
I found a simple blue sign in the form of the EEC flag with the word
DEUTSCHLAND inside the circle of stars, and beyond it a sign reading
WELCOMMEN IM BADEN-WURTEMBURG. Going the other way, the French forgot to
identify the country but the administrative district of Bas Rhein put up
a welcome sign.  It's not a whole lot different from driving from
Pennsylvania into Maryland!

   There is one exception to the lack of immigration staff between
member countries.  Great Britain still checks everyone coming in.  Going
south on the train to Paris, no one checked me.  Coming north, Eurostar
staff made sure I had a passport before getting on the train, and at
Waterloo station, the process was no different than coming through
Heathrow or Gatwick Airports.  The architecture ... "immigration
universal".  Eurostar people are more offensive these days when it comes
to wanting to x-ray films than any of the airports through which I
passed.    

This year all the border currency exchanges were
closed; although the bank that had operated the one at the crossing
north of Strasbourg still maintained a cash machine even through there
was no longer any currency exchange staff.  I can only imagine that
thousands of bank and exchange staff lost jobs.  

   From the standpoint of the tourist, the unified currency is great.  I
spent Euros in Germany, France, and Belgium ... never cashed a travelers
check ... some purchases were charged on any one of the popular credit
cards ... the cash came from cash machines drawn directly from my two
principal checking accounts in Lancaster.  The travelers checks have
become obsolete.  Lest you think the Euro is good everywhere ... not
every EEC member opted into the EURO.  Britain still has its Pound. 
The Swiss Francs are still used.  The Scandinavian countries kept their
currencies.  And all the Eastern European countries are not part of the
EEC (except the Deutsche Demokratische Republik which became part of
Germany 12 years ago). The Euro is used in Greece, Italy, France,
Portugal, Spain, Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Austria, and
the Irish Free State ... I know I've missed two.  Chris can correct me. 

   From the perspective of the residents, Christoph Grimm explained that
not all merchants repriced their merchandise according to the legal
exchange rate between the local currency and the Euro.  There apparently
was some profiteering.  Christoph point out some examples where prices
doubled; he particularly noted shoes in southern Germany.

WHERE DO WE STAY?

   In 1960 and as recently as 1990, European travelers stayed in the
cities and towns.  Many of better hotels were within sight of the train
station.  During the 1990s hotel chains, particularly in France began to
build along the Autoroutes on the outskirts of towns.  By 2000 it became
possible to find a Holiday Inn or Holiday Inn Express (a British
Company), Accor, and other firms have built many suburban motels in
France and Germany.  For those of us who like driving across Europe (and
I do because the drivers are far more disciplined and educated than
those at home), this change has made avoiding the trains a whole lot
easier.  As we age, it is a whole lot nicer to park the car 100 feet
from the room instead of carrying 100 lbs. of cameras, luggage, and
medical equipment three blocks from a train station.  And I'm not alone
in wishing to drive. Christoph claims that German Railways only has 7
percent of the intercity business these days.   

GLOBALIZATION OF INDUSTRY:

   World wide business firms ... and you never recognize how many there
are until you travel around the world ... have changed the world wide
landscape.  Sony, IBM, General Motors, Ford, Daimler-Chrysler, the World
Wide Web, Safeway Stores, McDonalds, Burger King, Pizza Hut, Marriott
hotels, Kodak, Fuji, CIBA-Geigy, Bayer, Exxon-Mobil (ESSO in Europe),
Shell, British Petroleum (BP), DuPont, Wisconsin Central Railroad (EWS
in England), Michelin are simply a small handful of examples.  World
wide industries tend to make the entire world look alike.  The change
has been dramatic in the last decade or two.  The same logos and brand
names are everywhere.  But in spite of all the sameness, there are
differences.  Christoph Grimm and I were standing at an intersection in
a neighborhood business section in Stuttgart, when he remarked about how
German the view was.  Forty years earlier the statement wouldn't have
been needed.  Everything in Germany looked Germanic.  Now here was a
neighborhood that stood out because of the trolley cars, the people, the
stores, the continuous activity.  I partly agreed with Christoph ... it
looked German, or also Austrian or Swiss and perhaps Polish.  And fifty
years earlier it could have been Frankford, Philadelphia or East Liberty
in Pittsburgh, or 63rd St., Chicago.  We did have viable neighborhood
satellite shopping areas. Now we go abroad to refresh our memories.

THE HIGH SPEED DRIVING MYTH IN GERMANY:

Forget what you've heard about Germany having no speed limits and people
driving at 150 miles per hour.  The German drivers want a lack of
regulation, and some sections of the Autobahn network are still
unposted, when you place more than 80 million people in a country about
the size of Illinois, Indiana and Ohio, speeds become self regulating. 
There is a finite number of cars one can put on a highway lane before
everyone stops dead in their tracks.  (Christoph: Glad I left when I
did, the trip back took more than two hours.)  Example, on the afternoon
of the 28th I drove from Stuttgart back to Odelshofen (across the river
from Strasbourg, France).  The 120 kilometers (75 miles) took slightly
over 2 hours at an average speed of 36.5 miles an hour, and most of it
was expressway driving.  The entire distance from Stuttgart to Karlsruhe
is posted with a 120 km/h limit (73 miles an hour) but the actual
possible speeds ranged from 2 to 60 miles per hour.  South of Karlsruhe
the highway was intermittently posted, but even in the portions without
limits, most people drove between 65 and 75 miles per hour.  If you want
to see how fast your Porche will go in Germany these days, you first
need to find an unposted piece of Autobahn, then wait until 3 a.m. to
find space on the road!    

IN GENERAL, WHAT DID I SEE?

The Victoria and Albert Museum in London is one of the world's great
museums of art, architecture, china and pottery, statuary, and costume
arts.  I probably glanced at 10 percent of what was on display and had
time to look at .01 percent in detail.  I always felt that John
Constable was one of the world's great detail artists; his precision
with cloud formations is unsurpassed.  The V&A has a room full of
paintings of clouds on paper by Constable.  Outstanding. Maybe next time
I can see another .01 percent or take time to see the adjacent Science
Museum.

The London Transport Museum, originally supported by the named
organization, has expanded owing to an expanded oversight board.  It now
contains one old London taxi cab, and several stages coaches that were
absent a year ago.  There is totally insufficient room in the old
Convent Garden flower market for everything that is being jammed in.  

I continue to have warm and fuzzy feelings about the National Tramway
Museum in Crich, England.  Last winter I donated 100 Pounds to the TSO,
a group within the museum that funds car restorations.  When I appeared
this year, the head of the TSO came up to me, remarked that he had heard
I was on the property, and offered to show me exactly where my money was
going.  This came after he had written a most personal thank you note
last winter.  Certainly, it got them another 100 Pounds.  Some people
know how to flatter in a discrete manner. 

After three prior visits to Paris, I finally found 90 minutes to visit
the Musee de la Louvre.  The crowds were overwhelming and it was only
March.  The summer tourist throngs weren't here yet.  I saw Leonardo de
Vinci's Mona Lisa over the heads of 50 people in front of me.  A very
small, very dark painting under dark glass to prevent damage from
ultraviolet rays.  This is a unique art museum ... they try to x-ray
everything coming into the museum (including your film) to make sure
nothing is damaging; they prohibit the use of tripods or any support
that will allow a good picture, and then they allow unlimited use of
flash guns for photography of paintings.  Go figure!  I was also told it
was illegal to photograph the sleeping guard.    

The view from the 59th floor (the roof) of the Montparnass Tower
provides the most stunning view of Paris (considering that I've never
been able to get to the third level of Gustav Eiffel's tower.  It was a
perfectly clear and sunny day.  The view of the the Basilica Sacre Coeur
in full sunlight with spring flowers on the slope of Montmartre was
something I'd never been fortunate enough to observe before.  I also
observed that the Montmartre bus service had to be temporarily abandoned
because of a motorist who illegally parked in an intersection in one of
the neighborhood's tight streets ... it has always been a Parisian's
belief that he or she could park anywhere and ignore the fines because
they would all be waived at the next election. I also encountered an
Arabic street market where just carrying a camera was considered
unappreciated.   

My room in the Mercur Hotel overlooked Gare de l'Est (Gare is station or
even a toll booth). On my last day in Paris I looked down and saw
smoke.  And then deeper smoke that could only come from a steam
locomotive with the blower on and someone bailing in the black diamonds.
It turned out to be a former German 2-10-0 assigned to duty on the
Orient Express.  I had last seen that station in the days of steam ... I
remember the inward morning commuter rush behind one steam engine after
another in 1960. I guess I had forgotten just how dirty steam engines
were and how much smoke just one engine could put out, let alone 20 at
the same time.  Several days earlier, in a rainy evening, a local film
company was making a movie in the station ... all sorts of  actors or
extras in Nazi uniforms, a live 2-6-0 in SNCF paint, technicians running
around with fog machines creating artificial steam where none would ever
be seen in reality.  All very interesting.  

The cathedral at Reims (pronounced sort of like Wranz) is a wonderful
example of Gothic ingenuity.  Reims is not the largest cathedral in
France but it was the site of the coronation of a long string of French
monarchs (most of whom were later buried at St. Denis Cathedral in north
suburban Paris).  

Going farther east in France one gets to war country.  Both World War I
and World War II.  This time I paid a call on the United States 1918
Meuse-Argonne cemetery, a memorial in a small down that the state of
Pennsylvania maintains, and the Maginot line (a great collection of used
concrete bunkers erected in the 1930s to fight the previous war). 

Germany?  I spent one day observing the interurban trolley line from
Baden Baden to Karlsruhe and Heilbronne, a distance of about 50 miles. 
The local Karlsruhe transport authority has been taking over the local
commuter service on the national railroad network using 700 volt DC /
high voltage AC cars that can run both on the railroad and over downtown
streets in Karlsruhe.  I could best describe my feelings as
disconcerting when I saw a 150 mph Intercity Express train being chased
by a 50 mph street car which was in turn followed by two freight trains
on the same tracks ... it seemed like a recipe for a good accident. 
Over in Stuttgart, the local transit undertaking has been systematically
converting it meter-gauge trolley car network to a standard-gauge (1435
mm) system allowing much wider cars.  Only two meter gauge routes are
left ... Christoph Grimm and I spent one afternoon taking pictures. I
also spent time just hunting pretty pictures in the Rheintal and the
Schwartzwald (the Rhine valley and the Black Forest) ... the fruit trees
were in blossom, the ladies were putting flowers on graves for Easter,
the boats were being locked on the Rhein (all very pretty).

This all sounds like a short list but the hips and back and legs were
aching.  Some year I'll learn not to eat.  I found that the 12 hour days
and 8 hour nights tended to be reversed.