Paris

Paris
see all photos »

Marseille was just the R&R that we needed, and though we could have probably stuck around and explored Province for another week we decided to save that for another time. I mean, now that we know people there, we have no choice but to go back in the future to see our new friends.

So, we caught a high-speed train from Marseille to Paris and were treated to an absolutely gorgeous trip through the French countryside. We arrived in Paris in a cold rain, where told by all the taxi drivers at the train station that they would not take us anywhere (who the hell knows what their deal was, we really hate taxi drivers...), but used the underground to arrive at our apartment without a problem. Our expectation for the apartment we rented online was not good. So, to our amazement we ended up getting a really nice place that looked just like the photos they had posted...what a nice surprise. The other shoe dropped, of course, that evening when we discovered that our place was right in the middle of a huge party neighborhood, and, oh yeah, the rugby world cup was going on. Needless to say, sleep was interrupted by people singing "olay, olay olay olay" ALL night long. Not to have our sleep interrupted, however, we just adapted and decided to sleep until about noon each day.

everything was so well manicured that they would have made a coiffed french puddle jelious

IMG_7706.JPG
see all photos »

Most of our time in Paris was spent doing what you do in Paris...walking. We of course saw the huge sights, the Louver, Arch de Triumph, Eiffel Tower, and our personal favorite: The Musee d'Orsay. But most of the time was just spent walking around, drinking cappuccinos, and making some great dinners with all of the delicious fresh bread, and other food around us.

As the week progresses the weather went from terrible to tolerable, and then on the day before we left it turned to beautiful. Fortunately for us this was the day that we had scheduled to go to the palace of Versailles. About a twenty-minute train ride out of Paris is the cute little village of Versailles. The palace and it's infamous grounds are, as most people know, where the stomping ground of the French royalty for a few centuries before the peasants finally had enough with the excessive living and decided to behead King Louis and Marie Antoinette. Anyway, enough about history.

Yeah, the Eiffel Tower Rocks
see all photos »

The grounds where amazing! The trees, shrubs, flowers, and basically everything was so well manicured that they would have made a coiffed French puddle jealous. To add to the whole ambiance, they also turned on all of the fountains on the grounds (all with original plumbing) and played classical music through large hidden speakers for over an hour and a half shortly after we arrived. What a treat!

We ended up running out of time to actually tour the palace, but it didn't matter much (to me at least), the gardens where so amazing that we were perfectly content to just head home and get ready to head to Amsterdam in the morning. So that's what we did.

Paris
see all photos »

We're looking forward to Amsterdam. We really have no idea what to expect, with of course the obvious worldwide knowledge that it is a pretty liberal place. We'll let you know what we find. Take care.