Briancon to Aosta

We leave Briancon after the TomTom sync session, heading into the Alps.

 
Our first major Col is the Col d'Isere, the peak for all the ski runs for Val d'Isere, where Jean Claude Killy made his name in the Olympics in the late '60s.

It is a long way down  to Val d'Isere and all around are more of those picturesque Alpine passes.

Even kids in the back of vans are fascinated by a Wing with a trailer behind.

Another Alpine pass and another blue lake below. The animals on the rocks are marmots, probably an Alpine rodent, but more popular than most rodents.

 
We have crossed over from France into Italy and TomTom takes us on a short-cut through a small town with streets barely wide enough to pass and cobblestones in some places.

 
The kids have never seen Wings and trailers, either. They love the Beach Boys music Rob blasts out for them.

 
TomTom has done it to us again. The girl on the balcony tells us we can't get there from here, so we have to go back down through the tiny streets until TomTom recalculates.

Now we are on the way again with some slightly larger roads and lots of tunnels and what they call gallerias (not quite tunnels because they are not enclosed fully.)

We come into Aosta, with castles on the hills again. Aosta is a schizophrenic town that doesn't know if it is Italian or French, so all the signs are in both languages. Petra scores us a 4 star hotel, a Holiday Inn, but it has air conditioning and we need it.

 
We go into the Old Town for dinner so Petra can window shop. She is suffering withdrawal. She bought her last shoes in Barcelona.

It's another outside dinner with Italian food and wine...

and then a walk back to the hotel, laughing while Franz tries to talk to Annie on the cell phone.

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