Eiffel Tower

Impressions... brown, not black.  Impressive – tall, timeless monument, monumental.  The snaking lines of eager tourists are way too long to go to the top, at least at midday.  Plus it costs d'argent, sweet money for other things.  There is an elevator on the side - with even longer lines, and more money to spend...  Nice park - Parc Du Champ de Mars.  Good place for lunch.  Maybe we will go back and pay to scale the monster.  It is a magnificent sight up close and from the skyline.  You can see it well off, although it has been both appreciated and ridiculed.  The touters hawking the miniature towers give you a sense of this, but still...

With this trip we also learned how to ride the bus in Paris, that was kind of an adventure in and of itself.  We walked to the Place de la Concorde, which will be described in another entry.  Jacob threw raging fits after we got there because he was tired.  Some Italian tourists thought he was cute.  Fools.  After a second they realized that he wasn't to be trifled with.  Soon after that it started to rain.  A light rain, but what do you expect in Paris in March.  So we had a couple umbrellas.  No big deal.  Anyway after walking there - we took a cab home.  The subway was nearby, but the map looked like a labyrinth - which I could have detangled, but why bother?  Plus the young one was seething...  So we elected for a cab.  20 Euros.  Ouch.  This time, the bus, which isn't cheap for 6 either - just under 10.  Still, well worth it for a chance to say ooh...

Also this time, the young one was as cool as they come... as you can see below.

Out & About

Paris Street Mid-afternoon

Out and about. I have to admit that we were lost for a second when we took this one. Well we weren’t lost exactly, we just had to find our bus stop home. Taking the bus was an adventure all by itself.  The bus written on the street was for another bus, for the record.

The buses are pretty simple to navigate once you get the hang of it, but you really need a map to get going.  Since we need reduced fair tickets for the young ones we usually buy them in the subway via the automatic terminal.  You can buy ten and you get a decent discount.

You can buy a booklet or carnet of ten tickets which work for Metro (subway), Bus or Tram at 1,70€ for normal price or 12,75€ for 10 tickets.  The reduced ticket price for the young ones brings the price even lower to 10 tickets for 6,35€.

You can purchase two sets of the tickets at one time.  The machine is also quickly configurable to display English, although the process is not impossible to understand in French as well.  With tickets in hand, using the bus is a piece of cake.  You slide a ticket into the fair box and you can use one ticket twice, within an hour, to connect via bus.  If your ticket expires there is a loud buzz.  The process is relatively painless, however, the buses tend to be crowded, even if one passes right after another.  I never have waited for more than two or three minutes for a bus and each bus has been crowded.  People coming and people going.  I guess it is because the city is so large in such a small area.  But still it isn't impossible to get around and the transit system runs smoothly.

Resources:

Paris By Train

Metro Guide (about.com)

Deux cappuccino, s'il vous plaît

Cafe L'ermitage - 20e

This post is dedicated LARGELY to Corey, since she inspired me to go ahead and try a local cappuccino.  The cafe / bar is just that, both a bar, where people often have beer and wine at night, but coffee in the early hours.  Since our first days consisted mostly of sleeping really late due to extreme jet lag, we only usually saw them catering to the night crowd.  However, after a few days we settled in, settled down and walked into the neighborhood cafe.  We both ordered cappuccinos, well actually, I ordered two cappuccinos and the results were more than satisfactory.

Compared to Starbucks, who do have a few branches around town, there is no comparison.  I will stop in the local Starbucks to see if they do their thing any differently, but if it is the same as stateside then lets just say, they really know how to make a hell of a drink here.  Although, I think the cappuccino is viewed as a bit of a flowery drink locally, but hell, with chocolate, dark roasted beans and foam for days, who could complain.   So Corey, this cappuccino is for you.

A wonderful cup of Cappuccino

As an aside, this is a wonderful article about cafes locally and Starbucks attempt to break into the market here.  I think they might want to focus on making better drinks for a start, because after visiting locally, they are even more watered down with milk here than stateside...

Starbucks tailors its experience to fit to european tastes

I think it sums up Starbucks in Paris.  A commenter suggested that they would be limited to Americanophiles in Paris and American tourists, he is probably right.

A Bit of a Preface

This time around I wasn’t to keen on doing a blog, I thought it might be interesting, but it was a bit of a difference. I was interested in Egypt because it was Egypt, with the pyramids and the enormous historical and cultural significance not only to our people, but to people all over the world.  Egypt, of importance to the fathers of our nation, while lost on many people of the present. So that was Egypt.

Travelling in and around Europe and Northern Africa, then maybe onward might not be as much of a trip gathering that type of information - but more of a personal journey, at least the first time around. So most of this blog will be dedicated to family and friends more interested in keeping up with our progress and what is going on with us and less about any cultural artifacts, except their impact on me or us. This time, Candice has agreed to do half of the writing, which is really important, since she came up with the idea of the blog to begin with, let’s see if she keeps up on that one. Other than that I will be sharing plenty of photos and tips about the places we visit and first up outside of America is Paris, France. Bonjour.

Panama City Beach 

February 2012