9.13.22-9.14.22

After a flight cancellation from London to Paris five days before our trip, we were booked on an earlier flight now from Charlotte to New York, with an overnight flight to Paris, now landing at 6:55 am. 

When we landed in JFK, Nick found a restaurant that gave us a $28 per person discount through our Priority Pass. Nick enjoyed the Jack Daniels burger while I had a turkey club, both were too much but were delicious and we shared a piece of New York style cheesecake. With our bill totaling eight dollars for our entire meal we were ready to set off for our adventure.

Neither of us were able to sleep on our flight, which was 6 1/2 hours so we landed in Paris very groggy. We were unable to check into our Airbnb until 3 PM, so Nick rented a locker near the train station to store our bags and we set off for a day in the city with absolutely no plans. 

Since we were close by to our Airbnb we walked over to find out where it was and quickly grabbed our first of what was likely to be many Parisian pastries. 

Nick had wanted to visit the Arab Institute for its architecture, so we headed that way and then made our way to Notre Dame de Paris. Since the fire, not the most beautiful site right now as it’s surrounded by temporary walls with barb wire, shipping containers and scaffolding. They say they will be done with the construction in 2024 before they host the Olympics but that seems unlikely. 

On our walk to Notre Dame we walked along the river Siene watching the river boats go by. It was such a lovely day and again with no plans we decided to take one of the tours. We chose the one hour tour that started at 12:00 pm, with fifteen minutes til it’s start we hurried that way, purchasing our tickets online at the door to get the extra discounted rate, I’m not sure the girl at the ticket counter was amused by me. 

The tour was nice although I could not understand an English word the French tour guide was saying – it was all French to me. We floated past some of Paris’ biggest attractions, Notre Dame de Paris, Musee de’Orsay, the Eiffel Tour. We were both exhausted I think we might have each dozed off at one point. After the tour we headed back to the Airbnb to check in, we were greeted by the housekeeper that spoke no English and apparently had been smoking in there prior to our arrival. With a lot of head nods and Merci’s from us she departed and we opened the windows. Thankfully the smell quickly went away.

Our bags were still at the locker, so we made our way to retrieve those, thankfully being able to take the train back and forth – one day I’ll learn to pack lighter. Against all our advise we laid down to take a much needed nap, as we were running for 30 hours now with no sleep.

After quick naps and showers, we felt like new people and made our way to an area one block from our Airbnb along the St Martin canal, we grab drinks at a little café before our 7 PM dinner reservations which were right around the corner. Nick had originally canceled these because we didn’t think we’d make it till 7 PM but then last minute rebooked them and I’m so glad we did. 

Our whole entire experience was amazing,  from the waitress who originally was from the Congo, Nick’s snails and cassoulet, my risotto and finally the caramel soufflé, it was a birthday to remember.

Stuffed and a little tipsy, we headed back to the Airbnb to get what would be a much needed and really good nights sleep as we had a full day planned the next day!