Europe 2013: Out of Toulon

September 12, 2013

I didn't get very far out of Toulon, just 200 km, before it was closing-time for the campground offices (ie, 8 pm), and I had to find one quickly. I ended up at a Municipal, which is actually quite a decent campground, with free showers, and free wifi (the free wifi in particular is totally unexpected).

The day started in the apartment in Toulon where Marian, Nicola's mother, was staying. I got the couch, which ended up being a surprisingly comfortable place to sleep. The sole bathroom in the place had no door, and opened on to the master bedroom, so the only way to use the bathroom was to take posession of the whole master bedroom temporarily. Not really an ideal situation.

The apartment was really extravagantly furnished, mostly with heavily carved wooden furniure and accessories that all looked like they came from some variety of small island nation in the south Pacific. Except, of course, the furniture that clearly came from Ikea, making a marked and somewhat jarring stylistic contrast.

We had breakfast, and I prepared to leave. As Marian made clear, her life would be much simpler if I could simply vacate the apartment in the morning: no explaining yet more strange men to the owners should they arrive, Gils would have space for himself, etc. All totally understandable, but it still meant I was out on the street before ten, and had a bunch of time to kill until visiting ours started at 1.

I had pulled every last strap off the bike last night, in a bout of mild paranoia: if any one of the straps went missing, my trip would come to an immediate halt until I could replace it. The straps running over the back seat, which form the foundation of the packing system, would be particularly troublesome to replace. This all meant that I had to take extra time to get the bike back into touring form, although that wasn't particularly a bad thing in light of the three hours I had to while away somehow.

Once packed, I thought I might drive down, and check out the shore. However, it only took a minute sitting in dead-stopped traffic to change my mind. There followed nearly 20 minutes of sitting in traffic to make up the two minutes of travel I'd done in the direction away from the hospital. But I got back there, where the parking is free, and the parking garage seemed like a much more secure place to leave a bunch of stuff strapped to a motorcycle than randomly on the street.

I wandered away from the hospital, taking pictures as I went. The hillsides backing the town were absolutely marvelous in the broad, bright late-morning light. Toulon is a city of palm trees and tropical ferns, and feels very appropriate to its Mediterranean location.

I ended up spending most of the morning reading in the park. Pretty as it was, I wasn't really in the mood to be sight-seeing. I wanted to get in and see Nicola, hang out for a few hours, and slip away to continue my trip. Marian had gone over the correct procedures with me: don't talk about anything upsetting, including the accident or the fact that her brother Jarther had to fly back to Australia. The best time to leave is when she's asleep, without saying goodbye or making the slightest deal out of it.

I wandered back in the direction of the hospital around noon, thinking I'd try to find the cafe that inevitably existed somewhere in the building. On the way, I spotted a small sandwich shop on the road to the hospital entrance, and decided to try my luck there. It was a bit of a wait, but when my tuna, egg and veggie sandwich arrived, it was the very essence of Sandwich. On a good baguette, a perfect mix of ingredients, it was exactly what I wanted, and a delightful part of the day.

Finally, it was one, and I walked into Nicola's room to find her watching TV. The first thing she said was, "Oh, I forgot you were here!" Encouraging because she recognized me, and she was then able to remember the fact that I'd been there yesterday. I sat down and we started talking. Her mom hadn't arrived yet.

Nicola was noticeably more lucid today than when I saw her yesterday. I was also seeing her at midday instead of the end of the day, and her mom wasn't around, which may change how she acts. Still, it was nice to see her a bit more alive than just half a day ago.

The conversation was still pretty odd. I started telling her about my trip again, and she interrupted asking if we couldn't make some of this extraneous stuff (indicating the bandages and casts and various bits of medical fol-de-rol) into candles. She was very insistent about making candles that didn't work any more into some kind of art. At one point she asked me to go out and ask the person doing the dishes (there was someone clanking around in the hallway, and it did sound a bit like dishes being washed) if they wanted a new project, to come in and help made candles.

I did go out, and ascertained that the person making the clanking noises was a maintenance guy of some flavor, and reported that he already had a project, and couldn't help us with candles.

I feel very odd about effectively lying to Nicola about these kinds of things. She asked if I would be around later, and I said yes, even though I knew I was planning to leave in half an hour. To have said no would have been a breach of the "no upsetting discussion" rule, which I understand and agree with. It's just so against my nature to deceive anyone that it's hard to do even when there's a really good reason for it.

I had only been there about 20 minutes when some nurses came in and explained that they had to take her down to get X-rays taken, so I excused myself to the hallway, and they wheeled her enormous bed out into the hallway and away. About 20 minutes after that, Marian and Gils arrived. I said hello, and said one of my prepared speeches in French: Je suis desolee, mais je ne parle pas Francais. He said I had a good beginning, indicating that my accent was decent, at least.

We sat chatting variously in English and French (French: Ian sat listening without speaking; English: Gils sat listening without speaking) until Nicola was wheeled back about half an hour later. I returned to her room to find a hunky orthopedic doctor putting on a new cast: it seems she had actually pulled off the previous cast last night. It had only covered her forearm, and somehow she managed to tug it off. The new one covered her bent elbow as well. No tugging that one off. I was fascinated to see the process for making a cast now: there's a gooped-up gauze that comes in a sealed package, and when it's rolled out and sprayed with a bit of water, it hardens. Very interesting.

Now finally was my opportunity to take pictures. Marian had asked me to take photos to provide to the insurance agency, in case they wanted to quibble about Nicola's state. She repeatedly berated herself for not taking pictures when Nicola was in "reanimation" as she called it (I think the US equivalent would be Intensive Care). It sounds like Nicola was just a mass of tubes and considerably less healed up than she is now. It must have been a hell of a sight. I think I'm glad I missed that part. Just seeing Nicola as she is now was pretty moving.

After the cast-making party was over, Gils had to go, I think to stock up on food for the apartment (he's helping with a lot of the day-to-day logistics of life, I think, which is a huge help to Marian). Marian and I were there with Nicola, and around three, she declared she was tired and closed her eyes. That was my planned exit time in any case, so I took the opportunity and headed out.

I felt, I must say, extremely conflicted to be leaving. I still feel conflicted about it. Marian made it clear that I had helped a great deal by being there, and seeing Nicola, giving her something to exercise her brain on, both long-term memory, and medium-term with my incipient visit. On the other hand, she also seemed pretty firmly of the opinion that I should be moving on. It was the politest possible way, but she gave me the feeling that my welcome was finished, and I'd done what good I could. It felt pretty odd to be pushed out like that.

But, away I went, suddenly possessed with the desire to get the hell out of town. If I couldn't stay there and be helpful, I wanted to get away from this overcrowded town, the too-much-sun, the shiny happy palm trees and tropical plants. I certainly wasn't happy at that moment. I was just short of crying as I rode away from Toulon, a huge lump in my throat, trying not to think all the thoughts that were crowding around in my head.

There followed some of the most miserable traffic I've dealt with so far. I'm sure that objectively viewed, it was no worse than a couple other times traffic has gotten bad, but in the mental state I was in, it was just about the most annoying thing ever, and only increased my desire to get away from everything.

I do have to pause for a moment and say that Marseilles is the most rabidly scooter-obsessed town I've ever seen. There were scooters everywhere, filtering through traffic, parked anywhere there was space. I must have gone up scooter row, because I passed about a kilometer where there were nothing but scooter shops, as far as I could tell.

I was tempted to stop to see about getting a new faceshield for my helmet, since I'd gouged it pretty spectacuarly on the cement staircase railing as I'd left the apartment. But I was more excited about leaving the crowds behind than solving what ended up being a minor annoyance, once I got used to it.

Finally, I did get away from it all, and into some landscape that looked exactly like southern California. It was uncanny. Even the architecture was the same to my untutored eye.

One thing I definitely did not appreciate about the ride away from Toulon was the wind. It was a sort of gusting, quartering crosswind some of the time, and the best simile I came up with for it was that it was like having my head stuck in the middle of a telekenesis contest between two second-year Hogwarts students. No damage done, no actual blows landed, but my head was randomly tugged around as the wind changed. Most annoying, and tiring.

It became clear that I wasn't going to make it to my selected campground, so I picked a closer one, and arrived to find the office locked (half an hour before the stated closing time), and no one in evidence. I found another one close by, but they were full. Finally I found this Municipal, and they had lots of spaces, nicely separated with shrubs, and the aforementioned free wifi.

I'm not really sure what my plan for tomorrow is, other than "head north-northwest" generally speaking. I have four days until I have to be on the boat, and the only real goal I have is to visit Mace, which was the setting for much of ee cummings' _The Enormous Room_. I think Mace is west of Paris, and a bit north. We'll find out, when I get there. For now, I think sleep is in order.

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Created by Ian Johnston. Questions? Please mail me at reaper at obairlann dot net.