The trip to Mollans gets both harder and easier with each visit--kind of a best of times, worst of times sort of thing. Finding tickets that won't leave me totally broke gets to be more and more of challenge and, as my friends and family, will attest, I'm quite good at finding the best deals for travel. It's just that the deals aren't really deals anymore and, when the price is slightly cheaper, the journey itself gets longer.

This May was no exception. I started several months ago, checking web sites that had worked before. Orbitz dealt out some deals last year, especially a one way ticket to get me home after arriving in France by ship, but it just wasn't working for me in 2008. A couple of years ago, airgorilla coughed up a decent fare or two but hasn't delivered since. I'm okay with flying into Paris and taking the TGV but prefer, if Hallie, my fellow homeowner and friend, is around, to fly into Marseille. That way the airline deals with my baggage until Hallie pulls up in our faithful Peugeot and we head back to Mollans on the autoroute. Checking prices, flying into Marseille was not going to be an option.

Finally I found an airfare, using Booking Buddy's multiple referral sites, for just under $1000.00. It's scary to think that constitutes a bargain. Of course, I had to leave on a 7 a.m. flight for Atlanta, sit around in Atlanta for four hours waiting for my connextion, fly for eight plus hours, and then go through the customs zoo at Charles de Gaulle airport. No lines but rather a giant crowd jockeying for position in a badly marked area before freedom and luggage. Of course, the luggage arrived on the carrousel posted as Orlando but with Atlanta in tiny letters beneath it, just the kind of thing your brain is going to process really well after being en route for seemingly forever. But, what do you expect for $1000.00?

From there, things went smoothly, the easier rather than harder part of the journey. The first time you try to sort out the train terminal at the airport, it's all very confusing but, after you've done it a few times, the whole thing is very simple. The track for each train is posted about 20 minutes before departure and, once alongside the track, there's a helpful sign indicating the appoximate area where your car will stop. All lovely and easy. On the train, you just need to stay alert enough to get off at your stop. This trip. I was fine with staying awake as my seat companion, a widow traveling from Britanny to a rest home vacation along the Mediterranean, insisted on carriying on a one-sided conversation for most of the way. Kind of like listening to a French Miss Marple with Alzheimers . About three hours later, I manhandled my luggage off the train at Avignon and searched out Hallie. From there, it takes about an hour through the vineyards and into the hills that surround Mollans. Mount Ventoux, with its white, bald top that always reminds me of a bald eagle, sparkled in the Tuesday sun and, right around 24 hours from leaving home, I was home again.

It's all worth it.

Next: The first week