tbaroundtheworld

We decided to avoid another taxi rip-off and hired a car through the agency that rented us the apartment. The driver was on time, spoke English, had classic jazz on the radio and sneezed and coughed all the way to the airport. I suppose in a sense we were lucky that we were already sick, otherwise we would have been set up for a nice bout of disease once we were back home. I always find it interesting how uninspiring the outskirts of major European cities are. Between industrial parks, chemical plants and blocks of dismal apartments, you tend to forget just how attractive the old city centers are. It's almost as though you've visited two completely different places, which in a sense I suppose you have. The place where everyone lives versus the one supported by tourism and government offices. We rolled on marveling at the traffic heading into town. I can't say a lot of good things about Charles de Gaulle Airport. It seems to have been designed more with architecture in m...

Or last day in the City of Light. The weather was not wonderful and neither was our collective so we decided to minimize the beat down and visit Sainte-Chapelle, one of the last fine churches we'd not seen. It was founded in 1248 by King Louis IX, ostensibly to house his collection of holy relics, including the Crown of Thorns and a piece of the One True Cross. At the time, there was a big market among the royal and wealthy so many of these genuine articles were in fact sold to many kings of Christendom. In any event, what's special about this particular church is that its soaring walls are almost entirely comprised of stained glass.  To avoid that one last walk, we took the subway although sometimes I wonder if the amount of stairs involved in switching lines doesn't equal the number of steps it would take to just walk there. We jumped on at Vaneau, across the street from our house and jumped off at Cité, across the street from the chapel. The station at this end was int...

Another sort of half day of recovery. We went out with the intention of visiting the Institute du Monde Arabe, and excellent Islamic art museum, got about half way there, stopped for coffee (where I said "dui bu qi" for cutting in front of a Chinese student which made her jump and respond "Thank-you in English,) spent some time assessing our health and decided to head back inside out of the cold. Instead of walking all the way back down Blvd. Saint-Germain though, we caught the Métro at Odeon station and rode it back. What a fun adventure, it was easy, the ticket machine made decent sense and you didn't need to retain the pass to get out of the station. Far better than Shanghai or Beijing albeit not nearly so shiny and new. One interesting thing - the trains are far smaller in terms of length and car size than what I've ridden elsewhere.  MLW was really worn so I dropped her at the apartment with the daily edition of the International New York Times (no more He...

I'm beginning to think that being sick in any place other than your home is cruel and unusual punishment. It's just far worse than it would be if you were lying at home on your couch watching TV and eating soup. Having an apartment makes it a hair easier, but it's still tough. Not only do you have the pressure of the money you've spent, and the thing you're not seeing, but when you're feeling down it's simply nice to be surrounded by your own stuff.  Today we bucked it up and went and met Dermot and Hui on the Pont des Arts, a little pedestrian bridge from the  Rive Gauche to the Île de la Cité known as the place where the enamored place padlocks as a symbol of their commitment to amour . While it would be romantic to think of the practice as venerated and the bridge antique, both are untrue. The original early 19th century bridge was knocked down and replaced in 1984 and the lock tradition would seem to be somewhat less than 30 years old. But alas, if you...

The weather was agreeable but we're both still suffering a bit in the health area so we took it easy. I went out for a walk through part of Montparnasse during the afternoon, it turned out to be the first time I've actually been warm since I've been here. There was some sort of demonstration being organized, lots of families carrying white, blue and pink flags with drawings of children on them. Not sure what the cause was but it was attended and strictly controlled by police on the ground and helicopters circling overhead. None of the attendees looked particularly frightening so I imagine the crowd control was simply standard for this size of an event. Our street was blocked off about 2 doors down with all the traffic being shunted onto a narrow side street. Of course the the smart thing to do would have been to block it off at the last major intersection, mais non , we'll let the traffic back up for no apparent reason. Sunday has a different feel to it here. The chap...

Today was dedicated to rest. I picked up some sort of head cold bug either on the way over or just before I left. Not much in the way of symptoms, in my case just a painful tightness in the chest that turned into an ugly cough. I felt pretty crappy on the Cluny Musée day but soldiered through it and yesterday I was quite a bit better. Last night it grabbed MLW and so today was her down day. We spent it hanging out, reading and napping. By late afternoon though it was time to get some air and so we took a walk down to Bon Marché to collect some dinner.  What a difference a day makes. Friday night was busy, Saturday night was mobbed. We had a short list of staples and decided on another interesting quiche for dinner. While we were heading to the checkout, I saw the juice aisle and had a memory - last night while I was lying in bed trying to fall asleep, I thought about Blood Orange juice. Blutorange was the name of the German product I used to buy at Metro in Dalian and it was one ...

We've been having a bit of struggle here with jet lag, both of us seem to be unable to get on the right clock. It's a first, we've never had that problem before especially with the modest 8 hour change to Europe. What it has meant is sleeping later in the night and getting up later in the morning and getting out and about around noon instead of our normal "the day begins at 7" routine down on the ranch. Friday though it paid off because by the time we did get rolling, the sun was out. The actual sun! And it was glorious, a bright blue sky and wonderful light on all the streets and buildings. I'll admit, I was struggling a bit with the City of Light these past few days. It was comparing unfavorably to the sun-kissed wonder of Madrid or Valencia. On this day though, it took its place among sights for the eyes. Our plan was to walk east for the length of Blvd. Saint-Germain from where it intersects with our street (Rue de Sévres) to its end at the Seine, then c...