Paris: Days 1 & 2

Arriving in Paris was like waking up on the right side of the bed. After Spain, for everything good that it did have, being in France was the change we needed and had been counting on.

We had been scheduled to spend the week at a friend of Amy's neighbor's, but with our crappy phones and a gap in the internet universe, no emails or phone calls had reached her and she had scheduled a trip to Rome that overlapped with our arrival. Amy's neighbor (with her French hospitality) offered up her mother-in-law and simply told us, "she'll meet your train and either take you to her house or Laurianne's (the friend)." With just that bit of information, we arrived by train in the morning and almost immediatly spied an older woman with a sign that read "Emy Chapman. " I could have cried with relief. So much of me was desperate for things to work out in Paris. I really did not want this city to be less than perfect for us because of all that it has to offer and with the amount that I had been looking forward to it, seeing something go right for us was almost overwhelming.

Mary Madeleine, the mother-in-law, quickly gave us the double kiss on the cheeks and ushered us to the tube to go back to her house. We would be staying there for the night until we could move to LauriAnne's. I'm glad they had all talked, because at this point, we still had made no contact with her. After a crowded, Monday morning tube ride with our packs, we had coffee and toast at Mary Madeleine's and then set out for a whirlwind tour of Paris, led by a 60-plus-year-old woman.

First, we took the tube to a stop right outside the Champs-Élysées, with the Arc de Triomphe visible on the other end. We were there just for the view I think, because we essentially got on another bus to go straight to the Eiffel Tower.

For as many Parisians as there are that hate it, Amy and I loved it enough to make up difference. I remember seeing it as a kid with my parents, but I think the view hits you differently as an adult because it is so quintessentially "Paris." For us, the moment we realized we were within sight of it made our trip here real. For as much money as we have had to save and as much as we have left at home and as much as we miss everyone, being so close to something that some people only see in postcards really hit us and made us realize how lucky we were to be here.

After the Eiffel Tower, Mary Madeline walked us up to Rue de Passy, what turns out to be a rather well-to-do area of town (no wonder I liked the shops) for window shopping and lunch. We stopped at an outdoor table for a bite to eat and an espresso -- after so many tapas in Spain, a croque madame was amazing.

After lunch, the downtown area of Paris: The Opera, Sarkozy's formal residence ( just a walk by the outside), Palais Royal, and the stretches of streets with all the stores that no one normal can afford. We did spring for some English books, however, since we had finished the few that we brought with us and we're dying for more.

Exhausted, we returned to Mary Madeleine's, where she cooked us dinner and gave us a place to stay. It's a little odd feeling homeless and completely at the mercy of someone else, but we were truly lucky to have been given a bed and the offer to stay longer if need be. We also got in touch with LauriAnne and got the go ahead for lodging until Thursday, when she needed to go out of town again. Not the best news, since the plan had been for a Sunday departure, but we've learned to roll with things, so we decided to cross that bridge later in the week.

Tuesday morning: More coffee and toast and spoiling by the mother-in-law and a run down of her agenda -- Notre Dame and the Latin Quarter. We set off for the Isle de la Cite and toured the cathedral. It truly is remarkable. For as embellished and beuatiful as the outside is, it's actually one of the more tastefully done interiors as far as cathedrals go. For that reason, it falls just behind La Segrada Familia on my list of favorite churches.

After lunch in the Latin Quarter outside an entrance to La Sorbonne (Paris' Oxford), we walked to the Pantheon for a quick look. Not feeling like it was worthy of the admission price, it's as close as we got. I think it's at that point that Mary Madeleine realized she was exhausted from playing tour guide. We offered to pack it in and return to her apartment with the plan of packing up for LauriAnne's. It had been two packed days, so frankly, Amy and I were in need of a rest too -- she had tired us out as well.

So on to LauriAnne's. We saw practically all of the major sights in two days, which isn't half bad in the long run, because it meant that we could bum around Paris for the next 5 with clean consciouses. We hadn't had to miss a thing, but could thankfully get back to our own pace and spend time reading (for me) and drawing (for Amy) without guilt, some of our favorite pass times on this trip, just being in parks or people watching. The sights are lovely, but it's not the stuff that has made this trip memorable for us so far.

Mary Madeleine

Notre Dame, exterior

Notre Dame, exterior

La Sorbonne