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The Trip from Paris to Biel/Bienne
There is no direct train from Paris to Biel - we had to change over at a French town called Frasne, then again at Neuchatel, Switzerland. Our first train was at 8 AM and were really tired because of the prior late night. However, I had the best scrambled eggs ever at the breakfast buffet at the Novotel Paris Gare de Lyon Hotel. Just in general, the French know how to make super delicious food. Even something as simple as scrambled eggs. I wish I knew how.
We tried to sleep on the train but guess what? There was a screaming toddler behind us a row. And the train until Frasne was packed, so it was a bit uncomfortable. Once we got to Frasne, we had to switch trains to go to Neuchatel. Initially I was worried about the 6 minute time to get to the next train, but it was literally just taking a tunnel to the next platform. Then at Neuchatel, we switched trains again to Biel/Bienne.
There was snow at Neuchatel and Rose was so happy. She even touched it.
When we got to Biel, we checked into our hotel, then had lunch at a wonderful pizzeria called Al Capone’s.
Al Capone's Pizzeria
This restaurant is run by a family of Italians who pride themselves on the most beautiful premises and wonderful food. They greeted many customers with hugs and cheery hellos and you could tell the customers just loved coming there.
The following desert was presented SO beautifully and was delicious too!
Escape Rooms and the Concert
We next did 2 escape rooms at MasterMind Escape Games - even though 3 were planned, we were so tired, we decided to go to the hotel and take a nap.
One funny story about the Escape room. Because Rose worked at MasterMind in Atlanta, I decided to bring shirts from her place and gave them to the employees here. They didn't have shirts to buy, so I couldn't return any.
We got up in time to get to the concert in time for door opening time, but found out our VIP ticket really wasn’t a “real” VIP ticket. Apparently, this was an event called the Christmas Sessions hosted by a concert marketing group called HENA:
It was a small venue (500 to 700 people perhaps who all knew each other and there were tables in front of the stage:
It started really late, 8:15 and we got there at 7, and there was first a Swiss German singer opener whom I couldn’t understand though she did have a nice voice.
Finally Nena turned up and even though I love her music:
- The venue’s acoustics sucked
- Nena at 59, shouldn’t sing Live because her voice seems to be cracking and tired though she exuded huge amounts of energy
- The seats were terrible, just some plastic chairs
- Everybody started standing up and without height (we expected to be 1st row balcony, not on the actual floor level in the back), it was impossible to see the stage.
Here’s what it looked like before everyone stood up and masses crowded the front:
We left after a few songs and headed back to the hotel (not even waiting for 99 Luftballoons.)
Though we were disappointed and ALMOST had a bad end to the day, we found some sweet things to cheer us up.
