Bon Jour!

It wasn’t until tonight that I realized food in London was terrible. Heck, food in the US, Mexico, Canada and Australia is terrible for that matter! On a daily basis, you’d never know this. But once you sit down to your first truly French meal, it becomes all to clear that they know something here that the rest of the world doesn’t. Kevin and I just finished a truly amazing dinner…but I will get to that in a bit.

We’re in Paris! We arrived this afternoon after only 2 hours and 15 minutes on the Eurostar train. That puppy moves! I never thought I’d say this, but I think I prefer airplanes to trains. I had never really ridden a train and I wasn’t fully prepared for what was to come. Our seats faced backwards which instantly made me sick. I’m not sure why, but my body just has issues with being in motion, and being in motion in the totally wrong direction, not good! I took some motion-sick pills before our journey, so this helped to keep it to a mild nausea instead of a full blown case of the sickies, so crisis averted there. The ride, which was smooth in comparison to what I think a normal train must be like, was rocky and I felt like I was constantly sloshing about. Ick. There was no food control of any sort so people were eating smelly sammiches all around us which only contributed to the vomit factor. That plus the screaming children 2 rows back had me wondering if I’d really be uttering the words “I wish we had just flown!”. But, I bit my tongue. I don’t think I’ll ever utter those words, however, the thought DID enter my mind.

Vomit train aside, the view was beautiful coming into Paris, well, more specifically, seeing where our train had just been since we were looking backwards. But you get the point. The departure was easy, the train pulled into the station and we were off of it with our bags in about 2 minutes. We knew which metro line we were looking for, a little bit of research goes a long way. We purchased our tickets, hopped on the metro and 14 exits later we were at our hotel.

Our hotel is quaint and adorable and is right in the middle of an authentic looking french neighborhood. There are restaurants, bars, a grocery store, shopping and a cinema all on our block! This is the hotel where our tour group will be staying beginning Monday so we figured we might as well make it home a few days sooner. Good choice Rick Steves! Though, I am thankful that we have been on a few cruises because by doing that I can appreciate that this room is NOT the smallest room in the world. Close, but not quite.

We unpacked our bags and decided to do what most people probably do when they arrive in Paris, go see Le Tour de Eiffel! We are a few kilometers from the tower, but we figured if we just started walking, we’d get there eventually. We figured right! We popped into a grocery store on the way (I could have spent hours there just browsing the products, everything looked delicious!) and bought a block of cheese, a baguette and  a tub of green grapes. Yum! We worked our way down to the lawn beneath the tower and ate our lunch. The cheese was creamy and flavorful, the bread was crispy and soft and the grapes were like no other we have ever had. They tasted like Riesling wine…amazing!

And what better a place to enjoy lunch than under the Eiffel Tower. It really is amazing. When we were walking towards it we both questioned if it was in fact taller than the London Eye or not. It just didn’t look that big, not from a distance at least. But as we kept walking, and walking, and walking, we realized that it was in fact HUGE. And just as breathtaking as I had hoped. As we sat there we just kept saying how unreal it was that we were finally there, looking at the tower. It hadn’t sunk in for either of us, not yet at least.

One thing I was surprised by was how many people are in this crazy town! The lawn was packed full of Parisians, tourists, and everything in between. Everybody was just sitting or standing around, talking, eating, drinking and just enjoying their time there. I loved it! Paris is definitely not the quaint town that I had pictured all this time. It is huge and seems to be filled with more people than San Francisco and London combined, there are tons of crazies, the metro is gratified everywhere, everyone smokes and you have to constantly watch out for pick-pockets and scam artists…but you know what…I LOVE IT! Sure, I’d like it if no one smoked, everyone spoke english, and everything was clean and calm and normal, but then it wouldn’t be Paris, would it?

We had a great afternoon under the tower, even bought a soft serve waffle cone that was scrumptious. Once the sun had almost set we deicded to head back to the room and devise a plan for dinner. We found the nearest metro, hopped on, and were completely entertained the entire way back to our hotel. The train was packed, wall to wall, standing room only, yet a guy still managed to squeeze his way on with his giant boom box blaring to put on a show for all of us. Apparently to him playing loud music and yelling at us is entertainment and deserving of a donation!

We were intimidated, to say the least, by the menus we had seen while walking back to our room. The cafes look friendly and inviting from a distance, but once you get close and realize that those menus aren’t in English and you haven’t got a clue what they say, not so friendly and inviting! We sat on our bed, read our translator book and our Rick Steve’s Best of Europe book, worked up the nerve, and headed to a cafe just around the corner. How did we pick it? It smelled amazing! We stood out front and the waiter asked us if we were “deux?”. We replied “wi” and there you go, we have a table! We asked if he spoke english, he said he did, a little, and away we went! We were able to order dinner and we were mighty proud of ourselves. I even ordered vegetarian entrees with the waiters help! We sat with great anticipation wondering what our food would be like? Big? Small? Tasty? Icky? The wrong order all together?

The moment I saw my “vegetable plate” and Kevin his “smoked salmon with toast” we knew we were in for a treat. The veggie plate was superb! Greens topped with par-boiled green beans and potatoes with fresh chives and an amaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaazing dressing of some sort surrounded by tomatoes. Crap it was good! And Kevin’s salmon was a yellowish color, not like the orange stuff you get back home, and it melted in your mouth like butter! Then there were the main courses, pasta with mushrooms for me and beef burgundy for Kevin. They were simply amazing. The pasta was handmade and fresh, the mushrooms were cooked to perfection and Kevin’s beef, which I even sampled, was flavorful, tender and just perfect! He even ate some mushrooms that came with his beef! I have never in my life eaten pasta without Parmesan cheese on it, but tonight I didn’t even consider it! The food was so amazing the way it was I couldn’t risk changing it in any way. Mmmmmmmmmm.

We had a few beers with dinner, then topped the evening off with crem brule and two hot chocolates. These hot chocolates were the real thing. Real chocolate with real milk and sugar on the side if you want it sweeter. Yum! What a dinner, what a night! We were stuffed and exhausted and asked for the check. We were shocked when we saw that our beers were 10 euros each! Who knew that it would be so much!? Jeeze! Now we know why everyone had a bottle of wine on their table instead, and thinking back I recall Rick Steves saying that wine is like water here, cheap and plentiful. Looks like tomorrow nigth we will be drinking wine instead.

Our first day in Paris was great and we’re looking forward to 4 more! Goodnight for now.

To see a billion photos of the Eiffel Tower, and a few other things, click here!