Saturday July 26
We checked out of the hotel. (we should have changed rooms here
but didn’t) They put us in a handicapped room which had only a sink with no vanity.
(nowhere to put anything down in there) The biggest issue was again the shower
head. Since the entire bathroom was essentially the shower; water went
everywhere. The shower head wouldn’t stay where it was useful, so Greg used
some of the sticky sheets from the lint brush to tape it into place. Worked
like a charm! The hotel was well located from Wawell Hill and the Main Market Square both within walking distance or a short Uber.
When Wojtek picked us up on the first day, he said he’d be
our driver except for the last day as it was his birthday, and his girlfriend had
planned a surprise. However, he told us the day before that the timing of our flight
didn’t interfere with his plans and he’d be there. Yay! He was just so helpful,
and we were comfortable with him. We got home on Sunday and back to real life.
UGH!
It was a great trip with little to complain about. My health
however decided to make it interesting.... (don't read if you are squeamish)
At first after a day or two into Paris, I thought I was just
fighting a very minor cold, however, it became clear that it was probably a sinus
infection. Clear liquid just pouring out of my nose while bending over or not
and then sticky yellow gunk and some blood and I started blowing my nose like
crazy. Lovely smell of yeast or wet diaper in my nose. Yum! (that last part
didn’t develop until Poland towards the end of the trip)
The whole time we were in Paris it felt like I was walking with 2
broken big toes. (I attribute it to me forgetting to put in my regular
orthotics and a new brand I was trying out was left in there) I also had tons
of swelling in my legs (knees to feet) for a couple of weeks. (and I wear
compression socks) I got several blisters and have lost at least one toenail.
(I'm thinking the swelling had my shoes too tight) Same shoe and sock combo I
wore in Asia with NO issues, but that darned new brand of insoles. (they are
out now and the old brand in in preparation for the next trip)
The first week or more I was having “Prairie dogging”
constantly, so there were many stops for bathrooms which aren’t always easy to find in Europe
and almost never free. I contacted the PA at the gastro office to see if she
could make me an appt for when we return. She did but then canceled it since
she was sick and couldn’t reschedule me until Sept. Maybe the cyst or something
else was causing this.
Yeah, in addition to all of the above, while in Switzerland
I started growing a huge egg (cyst) in my peritoneal area. It got infected by the time
we got to Poland, and it started to drain blood and yellow gunk. OUCH! No way
to wipe either end comfortably. I got in the day after we got back and the GYN expressed
it and prescribed antibiotics, and I had to do cyst baths twice a day for 10
days. All better now! I’m allergic to sulfa but the doc really wanted me to take
Bactrim, and I said it’d been 40 years since I tried it and wasn’t sure if it
was just upset stomach or something else and agreed to take it. Well, I learned
it will stay on my “do not take” list as I developed a rash and itching. That
took weeks to get over.
However, my sinus infection is still being treated. He vacuumed
out a lot of gunk and prescribed a nasal lavage for twice a day containing
antibiotic, antifungal and a steroid for 28 days.
A couple of weeks ago I felt like I should have gone to the
ER. I was having tightness in my chest and shallow breathing with some rails
(rattles) with deep breaths. Greg said if you aren't better tomorrow you need
to go to the ER. Later that night, after I got worse, he said maybe we should
go tonight. I said let me see how I do, and I'll go tomorrow if I'm not better.
The next day I felt better but the day after I started coughing hard and couldn’t
stop. Still tightness in my chest and hard to breathe. So, we took off for the
ER.
I had a chair in the hall but everyone was so nice, and they
were attentive. The lady that took my blood and started my IV called me “her
travel bug). (since we travel so much) The guy who took my symptoms had to ask about
any recent travels and he asked how we liked it. I told him I underestimated
Switzerland as a country to visit and told him about the stunning scenery and
he said, "you mean the hills really WERE alive with the sound of
music?" That got him singing Do a deer a female deer and so on. He said
now he'd be singing that all day. I apologized for planting the earworm.
Anyway, they did a chest x-ray which prompted them to do a CAT scan with dye
which found a couple of nodules in my lungs. (not unusual as about 30% of people
find them and they are usually not an issue) They will have me repeat that in 3
to 6 months to make sure they aren't growing.
I was there about 4 hours and in the room across the hall
just behind me a guy coded. His wife brought him in saying she thought he was
just overheated doing yardwork and drove him in instead of calling for an
ambulance. (they probably could have saved his life by starting treatment
sooner) First I heard them say "Can you hear me" twice and then they
yelled get the crash cart and called a Code Blue. There were at least 20 people
in the room with him. I heard them say "welcome back" and then they
were back doing compressions and shocking him. They worked on him for a long
time but lost him. His wife was probably in shock and was taking it pretty
well, but their daughter got there and was losing it. She was crying so hard
she was dry heaving and kept leaving the room. Her boyfriend kept telling her
she needed to be strong for her mother. They were still all in the room when I
left hours later.
Anyway, back to my saga. I tested negative for all the
viruses they test for, but I had some elevated bloodwork that suggested a clot
breaking up in my lungs. In the end they chalked it up to a virus that just
wasn't one they tested for. They sent me home with Tessalon Pearls to help with
the cough and to follow up with my PCP. She agreed with me that it’s possible
that my sinus drainage is causing it. I’m doing much better and almost “back to
normal”.
Other than physical issues the trip was great. We had a
mixed bag of weather from hot, cold, windy, sprinkles to torrential downpours. It
was great to have so many days in Paris but one more would have been perfect.
(mainly to see the things that the rain caused us to skip)
Viking river cruise was great, but we learned never to book that
type of cabin again. No issue with the French Balcony but the small size was
laughable. The people were really nice on this one (compared to a few on the one last year). We met one couple named Karen & Steve from California (we met a couple from CA with those names on the 2013 world cruise, so they were easy to remember). However, their personalities were like Rick & Janie another couple we met on the 2013 world cruise. So, nice table mates as well as the others that we sat with often.
While not Viking's fault, the day before we were to go to the
ship and go through the locks from Trier to Cochem, a ship ran into one of the doors to the
lock and it was unusable. All traffic was at a halt until they could get it
fixed. It honestly didn't affect us that much. We had 1.5 hours longer on the
bus from Paris to go straight to Cochem where the ship was waiting for us. We
bussed back to Trier for the Highlights tour the next day so we lost nothing
except the short distance we would have done on the ship. (though people acted
like it was the end of the world, including those on upcoming cruises that wanted
to cancel). After the cruise we got an email saying they were giving us $250
(maybe PP?) credit to use on our next voyage. You’d think people couldn’t complain
about that but of course people did. "What good is it if you never plan to
sail Viking ever again due to the issue." Stuff happens at home or while
traveling. We bought more onboard certificates as we definitely will sail
Viking again.
I totally underestimated Switzerland as a country to visit.
The Alps are stunning! Poland was interesting but no huge desire to go back.
(of course I would) In hindsight, we said we should have booked our own hotels
and could have used Viator for a small group tour for the two days we had
tours. However, GFP made it “easy”.
This is the first trip that I didn’t bring my camera and instead used my new iPhone. It overall was a good experience. There was a learning
curve of not nipping off the tops of things and getting the lighting adjusted
but I think I got better at it and will be more prepared for the next trip. (now shooting in a different scale)
Speaking of which we leave in a bit over a month for a trip
with the Krills for what we have dubbed “Epic Asia”. We’ll be gone 2 months and
will start in Chengdu, China to see pandas and receive our Tibet Permits. We’ll
spend time in Tibet including Base Camp at Mount Everest. From there we will
visit Nepal which will include a tiger safari in Chitwan National Park. After
that we will go to Bhutan where we will hike to the Tiger’s Nest Monastery.
After Bhutan we will spend about 3 weeks in Myanmar seeing Bagen Archeological
Site and the Fishermen at Inle Lake and a few other towns. Then, we spend a
week in Bangladesh which will include an overnight on a ferry and a few nights
on a houseboat on a tiger safari in the Sundarbans. At the end of that trip the
boat will take us to the border of India where we spend our last days in the Kolkata
area. I have been planning that one for a couple of years now. I used 4
different tour companies and managed to get it all to flow together. Fingers
crossed that it all works out as planned! As usual, I won’t blog on the trip
and will update the blog upon our return.
'Til next time.....
