Zurich Day One!

Left Paris for a train ride to Zurich Switzerland. The country side was nice and I slept a little while. Zurich itself is the biggest city in Switzerland. The hotel was very nice and we haven't had too much difficulty with language issues since the Swiss speak many languages already. The weather was beautiful and cool.

For Dinner we went to are recommended restaurant, fondue is a traditional Swiss dinner. The cow was above our restaurant. The dinner was good, has some beer with my dad and cheese fondue with bread. It was very different kind of cheese then expected and personally didn't care for the white wine that was cooked in the cheese.

On the way to dinner I met a very interesting froline, he was celebrating his bachelor party. Apparently it is a tradition of some sort to dress up for your bachelor and bachelorette parties. I saw another guy in the train station that was dressed as a prisoner and his friends as cops. We also ran into girls. They dress up to a theme and they sell stuff such as bottle water to passing people to raise money for the party. I gave him two franc for picture and they took a picture of us together too. The poor guy was getting his wegs waxed by passing strangers for money as well haha.

Bonne Nuit Des Paires

Currently this is our last night in Paris. As you see I uploaded a lot more pictures and even a video! Today was a busy day, though not starting out as planned since none of us woke up till 12 pm. Housekeeping I am sure was upset by this since they kept calling and knocking to see when we be out.

After we got ready we jumped into a cap and zipped over to Musee D' Orsay. The paintings and sculptures, including the clock are all from this magnificant museem. This was such a good choice. Trust me if you love impressionists and don't want to spend days at the Louve this is the place to go. We saw monet and renior, plus countless others. These were some of my favorite many very famous. The two men traveling together are st. John and st. Peter, I love Peter's face so full of expression. There is also Jesus carrying the cross to calvary. A secne of war of battle finish but up in the clouds the dead soldiers ride on. Then, also, the Knight of flowers, very colorful and beautiful with flower nymphs. There is a sence which my dad said looked like a frat house of "Decicant Rome". My favorite of course was of the sculpture of the killing of the gator. Even french artist dislike the Gators haha.

Before Musee D' Orsay we ate at a cafe/restuarant called La Frigate. Note to future Paris travelors always eat outside and ask for quick lunch if you are eating at a cafe for lunch. Otherwise they will give you a more expensive menue. Beautiful cafe, the inside we said looks like disney modeled their cafe at epcot after this style. The other building in this group of photos is of the Louve. We did not go there since it was told to us by a taxi driver yesturday to really see the Louve you need three whole days. I don't doubt it the building is massive.

Next, we walked to Notre Dame for 6 o'clock mass. This of course was said in French which we only stood a handful of since they spoke so fast. Thank goodness for the handful of latin they threw in there that I knew and that Catholic mass is celebrated the exact same around the globe. It was all set up for the ordination of new priests for this weekend. There was a protest of some kind out in the square infront of Notre Dame, I believe for Iran. Fun fact: there is a medallion in front of Notre Dame that is the center of the entire city of Paris.

After Mass, we took a cap to the Le Tour de Eiffel. As you can see and preivously mentioned I took video of this massive landmark. It is very beautiful and as far as you get away from it never seems to get smaller. It was packed with people and watched the polic chase out vendors from the area several times. There were also armed military patroling. From here we walked to
Chez Francias for dinner. This is a great place for a meal and sight of le tour de eiffel. Recommended by my Aunt Linda we sat outside to watch the tour de eiffel be lit up at sun down. This is a beautiful sight to see.

What an amazing city Paris is, beautiful, full of art and history. I see why so many fall in love with the city. Tomorrow it is off to Switzerland! Au Revoir!

Always
Kristin

Bonjour From Paris !

Hello from Paris, I hope the pictures you are able to see alright. They are from Notre Dame, french country side (those are windmills), and the Arc de Triomphe. This is from the first day in Paris and the train ride from the chunnel there.

We woke up at 4 am to take a cabby to the train station to wait and catch our train for Paris from London at 7:45. The trains I believe literally sit there for 15 mins so trying to get all our baggage off the platform was a feat in itself and I must say probably looked silly to our other passangers since most were not carrying but one small bag. We tossed the last bag on and I jumped on as the annoucement was made that the train was departing. We soon disappeared into the chunnel under the water. Most of the ride was through the country side of Paris, they have the giant windmills. We went over 100 miles per hour to make it to paris in about 2 hours and 15 mins.

Once in Paris we had to wait in a very long taxi line outside the station. We met another couple from Tampa behind us in line. Their son went to UF and became a tennis pro. They went to see him warm up with his partner on the courts for Wimbledon but since his partner was sick they didnt get to see him play so they were off to paris for the day instead. What a small world it is. From there we got to our hotel which is outside the heart of Paris, more residential are from the looks of it very beautiful.

From the hotel we had lunch, which wasn't great and then dashed over to Notre Dame for a noon english tour. That place is amazing such history and art. It now holds the crown of thorns, shown the first friday of every month. I don't see why anyone would have let that place start to fall to ruins, thank you Victor Hugo for writting the novel to inspire Parisians to maintian such a beautiful church. How the designer of such a project made sure that the whole structure told stories to the people of Paris. I could go on forever but I wont haha.

From Norte Dame we stopped at the Esmeralda Cafe across the street for crepes and watched a small show of musicians on a bridge to the Ile de la Cite. From there we walked up a side street with a lot of tourist vendors and bought some sweets at a bakery. We walked back to the Notre Dame to find a taxi line. We caught the taxie to the Avenue des Champs - Elysees, went around the Arc de Triomphe and too the Public Drugstore. This sounds wow american and cheap, quite the opposite. This was a very nice restuarant attached to a store with lots of items and food also downstairs was the wine and cigars were sold. None of this was inexpensive of course not for the Champs-Elysees, which our cabby warned up about, how nice of him. After a quick look around because we were told by family we could get good French wine cheap there (not true) we headed back out and caught another cab to the hotel. We had room service for dinner and again was not that great.

Interesting tidbit, I don't know if it is because of americans traveling, but every restuarant and cafe we have been to serves many dishes with french fries. Yes they are even called french fries.
It hasn't been too difficult to find someone that speak English here a little bit gets you a ways. Most speak a little English. "Bon jour, parle vous anglais? umm Notre Dame s'il vous plait, merci"

The buildings are so beautiful here, several times we have said we see Dc has influenced off London and a lot of Paris in architecture. The views are amazing and I see why people fall for this city. Though once again driving is a mad house. much worse than London. Might be on the right side of the road but the lines on the road are vaque suggestions. instead of 4 lanes there are twelve and scooters zipping in and out of all of them that you feel you might see your life flash in front of you many times before reaching your destination. If you thought nascar was dangerous spend 15 mins in a taxi in Paris.


Always,
Kristin

Planes, Trains, and Automobiles !

We left about half an hour late from Orlando International because of a storm. Once we were up in the air it was smooth flying. We all watched a couple of movies, they had a decent selection. I personally watched "He's just not that into you" and "Shopaholic", both which were cute. We didn't get much sleep on the plane so crashed when we got to our hotel around 9 am which is 4 am Eastern time. We slept a few hours, got refreshed and took the Gatwick Express (a train) to the heart of London.

While in London we had an excellent cabby that took us past Big Ben, the house of lords and commons, Westminster Abby, and other famous sights. We stopped at the place that will be my future residence later on in the trip. We decided to walk around to find a place to eat. We decided on a small but nicely done Italian place. I liked my dinner. You know for being in England, it isn't always easy to find someone who speaks English haha. After dinner we decided to walk some more before taking another cabby back to the station. Still pretty tired from the flight. One of the most humorous things today was while on the trains another train would go speeding by about 6 inches from ours and we would all jump from the loud swoosh that came unexpectantly.

I have some pictures and will upload them very soon hopefully. I am running off of wireless in the hotel lobby currently. Tomorrow around 6 am we head to another train station about 45 mins away to take the chunnel to Paris. One final note about London before I log off, we all agreed to that there is a large section of the city that reminds us a lot of DC, so if you haven't been to London kinda picture old detailed buildings mostly the same height with stores and pubs all along the bottom.

Cheers,

Kristin

Ps. I don't think I could ever drive here!