Day 2 Annecy- Charm can often trump the glitz.

Many people believe that the best way to travel is 5 star. Most bus tours promote the fact that their tour guarantees the hotel standard to be at least 4 or 5 star. When we travel our preference is for a good hostel with a double room. On Quad Tour de France hostels have been hard to come by, so this time we are going up market in 2 and 3 star hotels (and yes the occasional 1 star). However Hotel Alexandra in Annecy proves that sometimes a 2 star hotel is really the best place in town to stay.

At two stars you don’t get parking, but that’s okay because we came by train. At two stars you don’t get luxuries like lifts. However you do get a stone staircase with a wooden banister that must be hundreds of years old, plus 60 steps. At 2 stars you don’t get a free breakfast but with our trusty travel kettle and a fresh baguette you can organise breakfast for less than 1 euro. At 2 stars you don’t get a very big room but frankly you come all this way to see the place and not sit in your room. At 2 stars you do get a TV but all the shows are in French but again that is fine because we have not come to France to watch TV. 

What you do get in this Hotel is

·      A magnificent building hundreds of years old which was once a fort.

·      A view of the canal showing why many consider Annecy to be France’s little Venice.

·      The sounds of the city including the old church bells that rang at the exact moment our computer announced that it  was six o’clock.

·      A panoramic view to the mountains.

·      A location right in the centre of the old town close to the beautiful mountain ringed lake. 

·      Sun pouring in the window in the late afternoon

·      A tariff cheaper than an average motel on the north coast of NSW.

Charm can often trump the glitz.