Paris, France

After being in a country that was full of people who were cross and seemingly rude like Italy, it was refreshing to both of us to visit a place where people seemed patient, nice and helpful. And that little place was Paris, France. We took a 15 hour overnight train ride to Paris from Rome. We met some kids from Korea on the train, tried to sleep in the very uncomfortable beds, and tried to get over the feeling of our ears popping constantly as we sped through tunnel after tunnel. We got off the train and realized that Josh`s video camera was gone. We checked everywhere on the train, and we couldn`t find it. We thought back to the last place that we remembered having it and realized that it was probably left at the internet cafe that we last used to write our blog...IN ROME. Not only did we lose the video camera, we lost all the Italy footage, and the only roll of color film we had. Josh was pretty furious with himself. Therefore this made our first day in France very depressing. However, we agreed that the good that came out of it was a day of resting at a comfy house.

We got off the train and found Liz, a friend of a friend of a friend. (See Jonny who we stayed with in England has some friends Beki and Nathan who live in Paris. Jonny set it up with Beki that we could stay at her house for the weekend, while her and Nathan went away. They were already on their weekend vacation, so they could not give us the keys to their house, so Liz, Beki`s friend met us at the train station and gave us the keys, directions to the house, and two rolls of toilet paper, as Beki and Nathan just ran out that morning!)

We navigated the metro and found our way out of Paris to Maisons Lafitte to find their cute little apartment on the third floor of their building. Josh spent about two hours on the phone trying to get someone in Italy to help us find our camera, while I looked on the internet for the name of the internet cafe. I am sorry to say, but no one in Italy would help us, even when we offered them money to help and unfortunately we were not able to get the camera or our lost footage back. Ughh, how frustrating! So our first day in Paris we spent resting and watching movies.

The next day, we put a smile on our faces and headed into the city. The climate was fabulous! We were VERY excited to find out that almost every museum in Paris was free! They are free on the first Sunday of every month. We couldn`t have planned it any better. (We didn`t plan much of anything for Paris.) We visited the Louvre where we saw the Mona Lisa, Venus DiMilo, and a million other very famous paintings. Then we went to a museum that was dedicated to Picasso. It was very interesting. We tried to RUN to another museum, but it was closed. We decided to go home, make dinner, and watch some more movies. Beki and Nathan had a great collection of movies. They actually own a lot of things that we enjoy, so even though we didn`t get a chance to meet them, we know we would be great friends if we could.

The next morning we slept in again! We went to Paris, hoping to rent a scooter to drive around the city. (Renting a scooter was all that Josh wanted to do when we were in Europe. He thought about it in Italy, but the roads were absolutely CRAZY there, so he refrained.) We got off the metro at Notre Dame. It was raining and the line to get inside got short very quickly as a storm rolled in. We sat in awe looking at the beautiful statues, stained glass, and brilliant Gothic architechure. When we went back outside we decided to rent bicycles instead of a scooter. We started pedalling, came around a corner and there it was... the most incredible thing in Paris... the Eiffel Tower. It came out of nowhere. I decided that we would have to see it at night. We continued on our way and rode down Champs D`Elysse to the Arch D`Triomphe. We returned our bikes and had some fish and chips for dinner. We thought we ordered 1 fish and 2 chips, but when it came we got 2 fish and 1 chips. Oh well... that`s what you get when you don`t speak the language. We walked the streets for a long time and had some crepes for dessert (I know, we`re so French). We waited in a cafe for the sky to get dark enough to see the Eiffel Tower lit at night. It was fabulous! Then we took the metro home again.

In the morning we got up early, cleaned the house, packed, and got on the metro to go to the airport. We didn`t realize how far the airport was... we were almost late for our plane. Next issue: Where the Heck is our Phone?!

Keep checking the pics www.stockworldtour.shutterfly.com