1) You have been diligently reading all my posts on my Pyrenees drive and has reached here
2) You happen to google on Pyrenees and this is what you got.
For either reasons, you have reached to the summary of my 16-day holiday in Pyrenees. In my previous 30 posts, I have broken down my itinerary into each place with some descriptions. I am not very good in illustrating places and hence has posted a lot of photos for you to decide if the place is worth a visit.
The Route
Here, I present to you the map of our drive. From Stockholm to Pyrenees and back to Stockholm again. In total, this took up 7,125km spanned across 16 days. Google Map puts it 5,976km but I suppose we have used longer routes because we avoided the toll road as much as possible. I started the trip from Stockholm because I travelled with my penpal of 16 years, who is from Sweden. It is amazing how we can still keep in touch over all these years.
From Day 1 to Day 5, we drove from Stockholm to Biarritz, the entry into Pyrenees. My posts are broken down into below:
Day 1 - Stockholm to Germany
Day 2 - Germany to France
Day 3 - Spending 1 day in Paris (Camp at Bois de Boulogne, Cathedral of Notre Dame, Eiffel Tower)
Day 4 - Orleans, Blois (visit Chateau de Chambord)
Day 5 - Bordeaux, Dune du Pilat
From Day 6 to Day 13, we drove along the Pyrenees route from Biarritz to Perpignan. We took 6 days to cover half of Pyrenees. My posts are broken down into below:
Day 6 - Biarritz, Espelette, Saint Jean Pied de Port, Random stop to walk in Pyrenees
Day 7 - Larrau (visit Passerelle d'Holzarte), Gorges de Kakuetta, Pau
Day 8 - Grottes de Betharram, Lourdes
Day 9 - Fabreges (take the Cable to Petit d'Artoutse, Yellow Train Ride, trek from Lake Artoutse to Fabreges)
Day 10 - Cirque de Gavarnie
Day 11 - Pic du Midi de Bigorre
We took 2 days to cover the remaining half of Pyrenees. We had limited days for the road trip and had to select the places to visit. It was a tough choice.
Day 12 - Chateau de Peyrepertuse, Fort Liberia and Andorra
Day 13 - Perpignan and Celles
On Day 14, we were on our way back to Stockholm and reached Stockholm on Day 17 at 4am.
Day 14 - Saint Porcain -- along the way, stop at Nevers (visit Espace Bernadette), Paris (visit Arc de Triomphe and Eiffel Tower) -- to Belgium
Day 15 - Belgium to Germany (visit Reeperbahn)
Day 16 - Germany -- Denmark (stop in Hans Christian Anderson House) -- Stockholm
The Expenses
I have listed down all my expenses in each post. But for total and different category of expenses, I will sum it here. Prof Sweet Tooth agrees on my anal behaviour to record every expenses.
1) Petrol - EUR521.62 (shared cost). We stopped for petrol filling 11 times. The more persons in the trip, this cost per person will be cheaper.
2) Food - EUR231.87 (my expenses). Most of the time we shared food but we did have our own portions too but the cost does not differ much.
3) Toll / Train tickets - EUR112.40 per person (highway toll is a shared cost. Train tickets are individual costs)
4) Entrance fees - EUR108 per person
5) Accommodation - EUR78.40 per person. We stayed in 3 different places and the rest of the nights were in the car.
6) Miscellaneous (such as personal items) - EUR55.93 (my expenses)
7) Souvenirs - EUR156.84 (my expenses)
Total Cost for me = EUR1,004.25 = RM4,167.63 (exchange rate of RM4.15:EUR1 when I purchased the currency). The highest expenses for me are petrol and food.
Total Cost for him = EUR1,230.41 (he bought lots of souvenirs). His highest expenses is souvenirs!
Inclusive of my flight tickets, my total expense for Pyrenees = Flight ticket RM2,394 + RM4,167 = RM6,561
Was the holiday tiring? 'Definitely'.
Was the holiday expensive? 'Not really if I don't convert. But I work hard and I deserve a holiday.'
Will I enjoy it if I don't like nature? 'Sure. There are so many different things to see and experience - Architecture, Religion, Food, Shopping.'
Will I go back again? 'Most definitely but on the Spanish side of Pyrenees.'
Will I recommend this place to visit? 'Each time anyone asked me how is my trip, I tell them that you have to go to see it for yourself. The Pyrenees is magnificent.'
Actually, this is not a holiday. This is a road trip. I needed a holiday after this road trip!
2 comments:
Ha ha, I almost agree that one would need a holiday after such holiday as this. But it was really a dream come true doing this. I guess we got a lot of road to taste, and as this was our first trip in 16 years, we wanted to cover so many different places as possible. For people who travel together more often than every 16th year, it could be a good idea to do more focus on one area. But we needed to see something in Belgium, and who can drive through Paris without seeing the Eiffel Tower (well, I did it in 2000, and my friends still can't believe I didn't bother to look for it). And we saw Paris twice this trip! :-)
I Think we just had a taste of the Pyrenees. It is a lot more to explore there. And it is wonderful to know that there are still things to see, just there waiting for the next opportunity. Hopefully we can dwell deeper into the nature next time.
Thanks for making this trip so fantastic for me! :-) *high five*
I am glad all went well. Lets plan for the next!
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