Day 12: Lyon to Paris

We are not going to attempt to add photos tonight. We have too many that we haven't even looked through yet, with our shutters clicking all day. It is midnight and we just got in to the hotel after a long afternoon and evening of walking the streets of Paris. Touring all morning tomorrow! We will try to add photos later!

Summary: We left Lyon just before 7:30 for a long morning of driving to Paris, making a stop after two in the quaint wine village of in Beaune in the morning, and another stop for lunch two hours after that. We were back on the road for two and a half more hours, and then sights of the Eiffel tower and the River Seine welcomed us into Paris.

The stop in Beaunne, where we walked the streets in the early morning´s rays of sun.

Paris' Statue of Liberty, gifted by Americans living in Paris just before Paris hosted its first World´s Fair.
She is 1/10 of the size of Lady Liberty in New York.

Bonjour, Paris!

Awesome moment: we toured the Louvre for hours this afternoon, fought the crowds to see the Mona Lisa and other age-old art and artifacts. Then we walked the streets of Paris all evening and into the night, photographing the grand gothic cathedral of Notre Dame, the Lock Bridge, listening to musicians play in the dusk, and watching the lights of the city hall and other buildings come on as a sliver of the moon rose over the Seine, tour boats and yachts drifting under the many bridges.

In the Louvre!

Yeah, that´s really her. Small painting!

And THAT´S how many people, plus cues out the door and down the hall,
were there--pushing and shoving their way in--to see Mona Lisa!

Wandering the streets of Paris with our new Canadian friends, Emily and Kathleen.

Cathedral Notre Dame, with a lovely orange sunset in the background,
and the locks on the bridge in the foreground.

Bloopers:
Lara's: after a few days in Italy, Lara had a tough time adjusting to being in France and not being able to use her Spanish skills anymore to understand and speak rough Italian. French is not as similar, and does not share many of the linguistic connections of how Italian and Spanish are related. This morning we struggled to communicate when buying postcards and the correct postage from a little old lady in a convenience mart in Beaune. She spoke no English, and Lara's keywords and little dictionary were not sufficient to explain where we intended on mailing the postcards, in order to purchase the correct postage rate. The only words we recognized out of the lady's mouth were "New York" ("Yes! ! Yes! We want to mail them there," Lara said excitedly.) The other employee in the store was able to confirm, in English, that these postage stamps would indeed get our notes to the US or other international destinations. The 20 on the stamps stood for grams. Not cents. They were worth 80cents each.

Susan's: this blunder occurred on our underground ride, 2 stops down the pink line from Notre Dame, a line change, and 17 stops later... NOT 18 stops! Susan saw the sign for the stop that read, "Boulogne Jean Jaurès" which shares the same word as the following stop where we were supposed to exit the train, "Boulogne Pont de St-Cloud." (Susan likes to call the stops "bologna," as in the sandwich meat.) Well, Susan was the only one of the four of us who got off the train when we got to the first Boulogne, as Lara and our friend Emily were consulting the map to verify the station's name before getting off. All the while, the door was closing, and these heavy metro doors were not stopping like the NYC or London subway doors do when something obstructs the doorway. The sliding doors slammed shut, and through the door and open car window, Emily, Kathleen, and Lara were all mouthing, "get on the next train; we will wait at the end line for you, etc." Thankfully, Susan did show up 8 minutes later on the next train. It was all bologna to her! She even made a local friend on the last train!

Boulogne Jean Juares stop where the blooper took place.

Cheapest Pleasure: €1.60 sugar and egg white meringue-ish pastry and a cup of coffee in Beaune during our mid morning stop and free time around the town.

French coffee and a sugary fluff pastry!