Sunday, February 23, 1992
After church we decided we had better put together our income tax information since our French taxes must be prepared by March 2. What an afternoon!
Thursday, February 27, 1992
Early train to Zurich, Switzerland. We arrive at the Paris train station and David’s ticket out of the Metro station would not work?? David turns to go to the ticket window and a nice, French gentleman came back thru and put his ticket in the machine for David to go thru. We board the train early and are approached by a man asking if we speak English.
He has a good story, entertaining, and we listen. “He was with Texas Instruments in Nice, France, for 29 years, lost his briefcase in Paris yesterday and had to sleep on the steps of some building.???” By this time we knew what he was leading up to. “He had been at the police station getting new paperwork so he could return to Nice but needed 35FF for photos??” (In France, you need photos of yourself for everything and photo booths are everywhere). He was smart to go after Americans who could understand the bureaucracy he was going thru and could sympathize with him (if his story was true).
So, David says sure we can spare 35FF ($7 USD) and we are free of this character. Soliciting on the trains and subways is very prevalent. We departed Paris at 8AM, arriving Zurich at 1:30PM. David dashes to this 2PM meeting and I put our luggage in the train station lockers and proceeded to explore the city.
Evening dinner overlooking Lake Zurich consisting of excellent grilled steaks. 7:30PM train to Innsbruck, Austria – an absolutely beautiful train ride thru the snow covered Alps (especially the city of St. Antone, covered with snow). We arrive Innsbruck at 11:20PM, transfer to the next platform, leave at 11:25PM exhausted and most ready for the sleeper train to Vienna, Austria.
