I was taking a nap, but the guy who's renting this apartment and was supposed to be in Hong Kong missed his flight and was quite surprised to find someone sleeping on his couch when he walked in. He knew we were coming, but thought it was next weekend. Anyway it was good to meet him and listen to his insight on what to do while we're here.
The flight from Boise to Houston was uneventful except for the fact that I was the only person to be met at the gate by my daughter (kind of like in the old days when people could actually greet you coming off the plane). Rachel had arrived about an hour earlier. We took the first of many trains today to the international terminal and boarded our flight to Paris. (Time is so mixed up and my brain is so fuzzy, it seems like ages ago, not less than 24 hours.)
The flight was long, but not arduous. We played video games and watched “Walk the Line” on the little screens on the back of the seats in front of us; ate, read, slept and before you can say Ooh La La! we were getting off the plane and beginning our Parisian adventure.
Thanks to really great directions from Rachel's coworker and our host, Tom, we were able to not only buy train/metro tickets to get from the airport to the Gare de Nord (train station), but also actually got on the right train to get us there. I was enthralled with the quaint homes, creative graffiti, and array of trash along the route.
We arrived at the train station, located our metro line, and went off to buy our train tickets for our Tuesday trip to Amsterdam. We asked the information person where to go, but not being sure we were understood, and if we understood what we were told, it was a little adventure to the Thalys ticket counter. So with train tickets to Amsterdam in hand we easily made the metro connections to the neighborhood where we'll be residing for the next week. As we emerged from the metro to the street level we where we needed to be, but weren't sure which direction to go next. The street signs we saw had nothing to do with the ones on our sheet of directions. Conveniently a large map of the area was on the street corner and we were confused no more. We learned that the names of the streets are on plaques on the sides of the buildings and walked directly to our apartment building, just past the monastery.
We entered the security code, the gate opened, we took the elevator up to the 1st floor, went to the door with the Hollywood doormat, and our residence in Paris began.
The apartment is European coolness - very small and extremely efficient. Beautiful hardwood floors, a tiny kitchen with a tiny stove, oven, frig and a washing/drying machine. But the coolest thing ever is the window blinds that operate by remote control!
After a little bit of settling in and assessing our needs, we walked about six blocks back to the metro stop to the Monoprix (grocery store). We purchased what we hoped were sheets, some cheese, chocolate and crackers. We went across the street to a little restaurant called Planet Food. The proprietor was happy to help us decide on pizza for Rachel and a pannini for me. Both very yummy.
We checked out several of the shops on our way back to the apartment - desserts, breads, ice cream, flowers, cigars, restaurants. . . all very cool.
After watching a little French home improvement TV we both settled in for a jet lag induced nap.
More tomorrow!