Driving from the Mountains to Camp via the Twilight Zone

Everything started out normally enough... cloudy day as we left the Alps.

 Drove through Grenoble. We discovered that downtown Grenoble is very pretty. The last time we drove through Grenoble, we actually drove around the outskirts of town, which are very NOT pretty.

This should have been our first indication that we might be entering the Twilight Zone or some kind of space-time continuum warp. At the time, we didn't think much of it.

But then our roads started looking like this.
And this didn't seem like "the fastest way" (per GPS) to get to camp anymore.

Not exactly a highway.

A "col" is a mountain pass. As in, the kind of roads you see the cyclists take in the Tour de France.
And we took at least five of them, if not more. As we saw the "estimated arrival time" on the GPS grow later and later, we started wondering if we were even going forward anymore.

But at last, we made it! We dropped the boys at camp, said hello to some of the directors and other staff, met some counselors, and then took off for Lyon, after a quick circle around Mont Gerbier de Jonc, near the camp.

Speaking of the Twilight Zone, I was going for a valley view here.

There are farms at the top of the mountain. We don't know if they are self-sustaining, get things delivered by helicopter, or they're just really great mountain-pass drivers.

And... back to the Twilight Zone - this is the road to the gas station.

No, really.

But finally, our never-ending trip did finally end. We made it to Lyon, where we spent the night before heading home the next day. Whew!

If you ever want to visit the Middle of Nowhere, France, we can give you directions.