Thursday, April 7, 2011

Paris!

I think this is the biggest break from blogging I have taken in a long time. I am beginning to feel like one of those bloggers that just kind of starts posting less and less and then before you know it they disappear completely to leave their blog looking kind of like this..

I am not ready to desert my blog. Not even for weeks at a time like I have been doing. So on that note. I have a lot of updates. ( well, for someone who usually has nothing new to say ).

We finally got to go to Paris, and it was fantastic. Never in my life did I think I would ever get to go.

 As every trip should, it started off with some last minute packing



 After leaving the bedroom a complete mess we began our little adventure which started off a bit rocky when we found out that our phone navigations stopped working once we crossed the boarder into France. Awesome. We had absolutely no maps, and not even an address to find our hotel. I can't find my way out of a paper bag, let alone find a hotel in Paris with absolutely no navigation. Eric could probably find his way out of a paper bag but this situation was more like trying to find your way out of a box surrounded by concrete 20,000 leagues under the sea. Our only hope was to find some wifi so that we could bring up the address on our phones with the internet. Luckily we spotted a McDonalds off of the autobahn. Normally I don't get anywhere near McDonalds, and blame them for the high percentage of heart disease and factory farming in America but that day...McDonalds saved our lives. I was able to pull up the map on my iphone and keep it open until we successfully reached our destination. So thanks Micky D's. I still won't eat your food but I will take your WiFi it was delicious.

We didn't make it to our hotel until about 5:30pm and being the old lady that I am I was famished and ready for dinner. But come to find out...French people don't eat dinner until around 9:00pm. At the usual dinner time for old ladies like me the French would be boozing it up in the cafe's and enjoy their meals of alcohol and cigarettes. I was starving but we couldn't find a place that was serving dinner. So we decided to walk around and kill some time.


We walked around the Eiffel tower and worked up an even bigger appetite avoiding annoying vendors with glow sticks trying to steal our money. I was so hungry I could of eaten Ratatouille- and I am not talking about the dish ratatouille.

Around 8:00pm we finally just ended up at the sketchy ass pizzeria restaurant next to our hotel. We were convinced that French people didn't get fat because they just didn't eat. About 50 dollars later for a horrible meal we went back to the hotel looking forward to what the next day had in store.

I woke up the next morning to hammering noises coming from outside. There was a farmer's market being set up right outside our hotel. Holy crap, they must of known I was coming. I am addicted to farmers markets. Even if I don't buy anything, I just like going to them and looking around. You really get a taste of culture by attending them. It is sort of like food anthropology. I ate my breakfast of Clif bars  while I watched them set up. Here is the result:





Their farmer's markets offer so much more than the ones in the states. They don't set up meat stations like this where I am from.


That's a lot of cheese.

more cheese


You will have to excuse the blurry pictures, I forgot the battery to my SLR at home so I got to deal with just a point and shoot..which led to point and blur.


I am not really sure what this is...but it smelled good.


Notice that big one in the middle's name is Colin. ( love you brother ).

Gotta have those sweets.

After the farmer's market we headed over to some common tourists attractions, here are a few pics I took before my camera battery died.


I was hoping to see Tom Hanks but...all I got was this lousy photo.
It is funny when I look at these pictures, I wonder how many other's photo's I will forever be creeping in.

We had a bit more restaurant success the next day. We had lunch at a little place across the river from here and was glad that it turned out exponentially better than the dinner we had the night before. We ended up eating at an Italian place for dinner because I just don't think I was meant to be French and eat at 9pm. Julia Child had it all wrong. Italian food is where it is at! I had one of the best pizza's I have had in a long time.

We went a few more places throughout the day but my camera died so this is all I got from the trip. Even though we had a stream of bad luck, the trip was still amazing and I feel so lucky to be able to say that I have gone to Paris!

More updates tomorrow...

What trips are you looking forward to this summer?

4 comments:

  1. Where did you stayed? Aww, had I known, I would have given you all my insider tips after being there 5x.

    Did you like Paris? Isn't it wonderful? A dream? I WANT TO KNOW MORE!!!

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  2. I still say when you go somewhere for the first time take one of those "tourist" tours to help you get your bearings and know what you want to go back to on your own. Nice blog...keep on writing!

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  3. I can't wait to be there! I live vicariously through you!

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  4. Amber, I am so excited about your trip... in one of our emails, I have to tell you about the time when my husband and I drove a car into Paris and our printed directions were completely screwed up.

    Thank God I had a map (and know how to read one ;)).

    So glad you had a great experience! And yes, now you can say: I've been to Paris!!!

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