What a fabulous past two days I have had. Traveling alone is fun and a good experience, but it is nothing compared to traveling with girlfriends. Victoria arrived at 10 am Saturday, and after a little miscommunication as where to meet, we found each other with lots of hugs and squeaks. We spent the morning up on the grass in front of the Sacre Coeur Basilica where we had crepes and caught each other up on the last year quite quickly. Its great when you are reunited with friends that you haven't seen in ages but the second you see each other, it is as if nothing has changed. Victoria is as beautiful as ever and speaks fluent Italian as well now after spending all summer with high class lawyers in Rome.
After a brief catchup, we lugged our bags to the second hotel, Hotel l’Annexe which I thought was much closer than it actually was. And since Vic and I are better at getting lost than we are at getting found, we naturally got lost on our way in tiny cobblestone streets with massive suitcases, a bit of deja vu for us...
The second hotel was much nicer than the one I was in alone, and in a good location, close to a metro and a busy street. So we went to the Monoprix and bought ourselves some bread, cheese, dried salami and rillette (kind of like canned tuna, but pork, sounds odd but Victoria assured me it was delicious, I was skeptical) and of course du vin. So we had ourselves a lovely picnic on the grass in front of l’Hotel des Invalides. We literally sat on the grass eating and drinking wine from the bottle surrounded by cars, buses, picnickers, kids playing soccer, and tourists for at least 3 hours laughing and talking. It was the perfect way to catch up and remember how good of friends we are. 
We also had do dodge a gypsy who kept coming over trying to steal our grapes... and some bold young boys who actually came and grabbed a piece of salami before running away. These people have guts, and are very annoying albeit sad.
After our lovely picnic we ventured over to the Quartier Latin and visited the Sorbonne. We had a beer outside and pondered the idea of listening to Voltaire teach while sitting on haystacks outside the window of a classroom. It is very humbling going to the places that I have studied and crammed my brain with dates and names of people who walked the very streets that I was. I thank my academic life for teaching me the history of these exquisite old places. I love proving to myself that I really am a nerd.
Dinner that night was lovely. We fell in love with the Latin District when we came three years ago and so had to eat dinner there again. We found a typical french cuisine cafe with a set menu and I had une salade de chevre chaud for my entree, canard confit pour diner, and mousse au chocolate all washed down with a couple glasses of the house made vin rouge.
We laughed with the concierge (who spoke 10 languages and was very good at convincing people to sit at his restaurant as opposed to the one across the street that didnt speak Russian or Portuguese....) I really love France.
Apres diner we made our way to Gare de Lyon to pick up our surprise guest, Anja Wittels!!! On a whim Anja had bought a ticket up from Lyon to stay with us for the day. It was so special and we were so excited to see her. She arrived perfectly and we snuck her into our hotel room where we fell asleep promptly.
This was Anja’s first ever trip to Paris and she was so excited. She only had one day so we were ready to go everywhere. We left the hotel early, and since it was Sunday, were instantly greeted by an outdoor antique market. It wasnt much different from any outdoor garage sale or street fair in the US, but of course everything we saw was cuter and so french! Burning man has ruined me and I cant help but keep an eye out for burner-worthy clothing at these little markets. The furs!!! Im calling it now that fur is coming back into mainstream style, the Galleries Lafayette were full of fur jackets and vests that cost an arm and a leg. The street market was full of furs from the 70s that were mink and rabbit and fox for 40 Euros!!!!! It took a lot of reminding the size of my bag and length of my stay for me to not buy the most incredible vest I have ever seen. Its okay, I have a long time left to find furry amazingness in other places. Mum you would have died..... vintage furs ahhhhh. Ok, we all ended up buying a little trinket, Vic bought some matching rings for 3 E, Anja bough a 1950s swiss gold plated red band tiny watch that was beautiful for 15 E and I bought a French navy little whistle like a train whistle that I can put on a chain around my neck for 5 E. We were very pleased with ourselves.
We walked all the way down the Champs Elysees and had to stop in the most famous boulangerie in Paris, Laduree. Laduree is known for its macarons francaise. They are the little colorful macarons with cream and jelly in the middle. We caved and bought 6 for 10 E and then bought some sandwiches and a salad and went and had another picnic underneath the Eiffel Tower. It was catch up again as we wandered around the Tour Eiffel and over to Trocadero where we sat on the grass in front of the fountain in the same place that Vic and I were 3 years ago. We walked in the fountain and took photos and talked and laughed for hours. It was such a great afternoon and it had only just begun.
The big cities in France have an excellent invention called the Velib’ which are literally just bikes that you can pick up and drop off and any of their thousands of Velib’ stations around the city. We had seen them all over but were slightly intimidated about riding on the streets that share cars in a city we werent that familiar with. We quickly got over that fear the second we started riding. It was so hot and lovely out and the sun was just starting to go down as we rode our way along the Seine in the late afternoon bliss. Paris is such a bike friendly city and the most beautiful way to see it is by bike. It was the best decision we could have made and were so ecstatic the whole time. It made getting around sooo easy and the temperature and lighting were simply perfect.
We rode over to the lIe de la Cite to see Notre Dame and the 4th and 5th arrondissements. All of Paris is amazing but the Latin District and the Marais are the most amazing. The Marais (meaning marsh) is the one part of Paris the Baron Haussmann didnt get to. It is the only bit of Paris remaining that looks similar to what it looked like in the 17th and 18th centuries. Paris’ wide boulevards and long streets are beautiful, but the Marais looks like a city in itself. The streets are super narrow and cobblestone with tall stone buildings either side with a cafe at every corner. We were there just at 7ish and the people and cafes were buzzing. It is a bit more pricey but looks like it is out of a storybook and absolutely amazing. We had to force ourselves to leave and find a cafe that would fit our budget. That wasnt hard to do in the Latin district where we had escargot, carpaccio, raclette, canard confit, ribstec et béarnaise, crepes, and more all for 15 E a person.
After our long and lovely dinner we hopped back on the Velib’ and continued our night tour of Paris. We rode completely around the Luxembourg Gardens and passed the Sorbonne (I didnt get your email until this morning dad :( ). We went down any street we wanted and delighted ourselves in not knowing where we were going and just ending up at the most incredible places. We went back to the louvre which is so much better at night when the crowds are gone but the lights make it even more beautiful. We rode into the Tuileries to get a glimpse of the Eiffel Tower at night. Then all the way back to our hotel.
Paris by night is a sight that everyone should see and the bikes were absolutely perfect. It was so warm and beautiful and perfectly amazing. We could not get over how happy we were at how much we saw and ate and experienced in such a short time. I am so blessed to have the friends that I do and am able to have these amazing times with people I love so much. The whole day could not have gone any better :)
And now here I am, on a train wizzing southward through France, passing tiny town with stone buildings most likely built centuries ago, past farms with baby goats and gardens that are so green. Victoria left this morning at 10 and Anja and I had breakfast outside Gare de Lyon and slightly lost track of time. We ended up running through the station and I jumped on my train seconds before the doors closed, blowing a kiss to Anja in goodbye. What is a good trip without a little mayhem?? I arrive in Aix in an hour or so. Now I am just going to look out the window and ponder how happy and lucky I am to be here in this amazing place, with nothing holding me back. Au revoir!!
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