So our adventure began Thursday evening. Our flight left at 5:35pm from Detroit. We booked our flight more than a month ago and picked our seats. This was a very large plane seating almost 300 passengers. It was fairly booked, however there were seats near the back that were 2 together in the middle. The plane narrowed towards the back allowing this. We were thrilled to have "Only" two seats together each of us. HOWEVER days prior a lovely friend of ours informed of us of a webiste.....seatguru.com. Here you can check your seat and it will tell you if it is good or not. So I thought ok, I'll check it out. Well to my surprise their seat diagram didn't match the one on the airline's website. So I figured the "third party" site was wrong. WRONG!! So we board the plane as I get close to my seat.....I realize we are in a row of three and who is sitting in the third seat? Why of course the largest Samoan on the planet. Literally at that moment I wanted to get off the plane. ME squished between my lovely husband (who is not small) and the largest Samoan on the planet for 7.5 hours! Kim could see the Panic in my face. She and Mark were very lucky and their seats were a set of two. What friends they are and offered us their seats, but really, how could I take her seats? So I sucked it up said, "no we'll be fine" and sat with my elbows touching for about 5 hours. The final two hours I made Greg switch with me. That was a sight!!
We landed in Amsterdam, Netherlands. We had a short layover, which was great because we had to enter through customs here. This is where we got our one and only European stamp. It isn't the way it used to be. Now because of the EU, going across borders it simple and doesn't require custom checks and the multiple "stamps" in your passport.
From Amsterdam it was a short flight to Paris. No large Samoans thank goodness!
So our plan was to sleep as much as possible on the plane so that we could hit the streets of Paris immediately. Paris is 6 hours ahead (Eastern time, 7 hours ahead Central) so we would arrive first thing in the morning. Well....
We get off the plane head directly for the 'metro'. This was to take us into one of the major train stations in Paris which happened to be blocks from our hotel. The first lovely sight we saw in Paris were armed guards, armed with AK47s. These huge rifles laid across their chests, very intimidating.
We grab our train and head into the city. Here is where we experienced our first native "Parisians". No one, NO ONE, spoke to us. I guess I should have figured that, the French hate Americans. On the way we saw rabbits on the side of the tracks. I told Greg that they look the same in France as they do in America. He piped in with a "what, no Beret and cigarette?" (with a French accent of course!). I found myself saying oh look their.....looks just like ours. I guess i didn't know what to expect!
We make it into the Gare de Lyon and out into the streets of Paris. What a sight. All of the cars are little teeny tiny cars. Nothing bigger than a Ford Focus. Many vespas and motor scooters too. It was odd to see.
Our first encounter with anyone was this little French woman and her baby carriage. Poor thing, we scared her to death. Picture Greg (6'3") Mark (6'6") with Kim and I (not short by any means) and then this little bitty French woman pushing her baby carriage. I think she almost had a heart attack. The exchange was pretty funny. Our English, her terrible broken Frenglish.
Once she realized we were harmless she got the attention of another local and together they pointed us into the direction of our hotel. Off we went to find out our rooms were ready. Here is where I have to say instead of sticking to our plans, we all took showers and collapsed for 2 hours. What a great idea that it was though. During these two hours while we recharged our batteries Paris had rain! Once awake from our naps we hit the streets.
We walked about 8 miles that afternoon. Seeing everything that we possibly could. We even took a night cruise down the Seine. What a wonderful first day in Europe!
Notre Dame
