8/9/24

 

GO USA 

French runner. Have no idea who he is lol

You must squat when you pee

Massive painting 

escargot

OMG I can't believe we are in France and going to the Paris Olympics. It was so much fun. Hearing people to the right and left, front and back of you cheering for their country was thrilling. Of Course you could hear me and Austin shouting GO USA!!!!! We got tickets for the Mens and Womens track and field events. We saw the 4x4 relay, the long jump, men's 4x4 relay, the javelin throw and the hurdles. USA women's team did extremely well. One of the men lost his shoe while running and still kept on going. We enjoyed every min of it and were very disappointed that we did not buy more tickets to more events. Oh well we still can say we went to the 2024 Paris Olympics. After our events were over, we walked back to town and found this Thai restaurant that smelled pretty good. We had some of the best Thai food I've had. The other restaurant we wanted to go to was extremely busy. So far our trip has been play it by ear except for the Olympics. So after eating we decided to take a train to the Louvre Museum. Thank God they weren't sold out. We arrived and boy was it Massive. We went straight for the Mona Lisa. But in the process discovered so many wonderful paintings. I took a picture of one with a lady in front for size reference. So impressive. The painting was huge. Then you come upon the Mona Lisa and its a tiny painting in comparison. Every room we went into was a AWWW/OH WOW MOMENT. We didn't even scratch the surface of the artwork inside. The sculptures were magnificent. I could go on and on, but we were tired, hungry and our feet were hurting. So we asked for recommendations for a good French restaurant and someone said Chartier. There was a long line to get into it, but it was worth the wait just to say we experienced going to a French restaurant. Austin made me try Escargot. It wasn't as bad as oysters, but the thought of these things crawling across the ground grossed me out. But I tried it. Someone recommended we go see the church on the hill, but after eating and a very long day of walking around, we called it a night. Such a fun and exciting day. 

8/8/24

                                     

Got up and met up with Austin. No getting lost today. lol His friend from work was headed somewhere else, so we left him and we continued to our destination. We took the bullet to Paris. It took about 3 hrs. Gave us time to nap since we got up so early. When we got there, we decided to buy a Navigo card instead of tapping the whole time. This is the card we will use to ride all the rails for the next couple of days. We walked to where we thought our airbnb was, but we were having a hard time finding it. I was texting with the owner to figure it out. It was behind a metal door that we must have passed 4 different times. Once we got our stuff situated, we went out to explore and see how far the stadium for tomorrow's' Olympics would be held. We came across this beautiful church, but first we ate lunch. It was across from the Basilica St.Denis of Paris. We had some "French" Bread. lol a charcuterie board and some pasta and a burger. We shared it. The weather is pretty hot. Not Vegas hot, but pretty close. No one has AC here and it sucks. Once we finished lunch I talked Austin into going into the church and checking it out. It was so stunning and beautiful. The stained glass, the intricate woodwork. That is what I love looking at. Give me all the old architecture versus modern day cookie cutter shit. We added our names to a prayer cloak. I wonder how long it will be up there before they take them down for more names to go up. We walked and found the stadium which is maybe a 30 min walk from the place we are staying. So tomorrow will be easy peasy. We went back to the airbnb and rested up. Then we decided to go to into Paris and check out the Eiffel Tower. It was magnificent in person. People back home were saying I could have saved money and just went to the one in Vegas. It doesn't even compare. Toilet situation isn't great here. You have to hover over the toilet if you can even find a public one. So if you want a decent one you have to go into a place and buy something. So we did. We got this amazingly tasty croissant with strawberries and chocolate. It was so good. Water is also a little hard to come by. So stock up. At this point, I think I was so dehydrated that I was nearly peeing brown. My kidneys hurt so bad, but I wasn't going to let that stop us from having a great time. Austin kept saying we can go to the hospital. I said I can't afford it, he said its free. Nothing in life is free. So I just worked thru it. After our little break, we took a sunset cruise down the Seine river. I got to see the rebuilding of Notre Dame. So many ancient buildings. I saw places I seen in the Opening ceremonies. It was all so cool. We took the rail back to St. Denis and found a Turkish restaurant that was soo good. We ate and then went back to sleep. Since we didn't have any AC we left the windows open. Big mistake. We got eaten up by mosquitos.