The Rest (and the Best) of our Trip

After Geneva, we spent a full week in Paris. We slept on Brian and Mary-Jane's floor in a crowded pups' nest.

First we ran Katie around the city to all the major monuments. We walked everywhere - I had a pedometer with me and we clocked 78 miles on this trip. Katie wasn't used to all the walking and she got a bunch of blisters - the bottoms of her feet looked like she cooked them in a waffle iron. Here are the sites we visited:

La Tour Eiffel

Notre Dame

Place de la Concorde

L'Arc de Triomphe

L'Hotel des Invalides

Le Musée du Louvre

 

L'Opéra Garnier

Sacré Coeur

Les Jardins de Luxembourg

Then we spent a day at Versailles.

Racing around and seeing all the sites took about four days, and we still had three more to engage in all sorts of merriment, relaxation and tomfoolery, such as...

What a delightful trip. We had the best time. Thanks again Brian and Mary-Jane for having us.

Let's Start With Geneva

We had the best time in Geneva, Switzerland, where we spent the first three days of our trip. It was beautiful and exciting and expensive. The weather was unbelievable. We saw the Jet d'Eau (Europe's tallest geyser at 98 feet high), walked around the Vieille Ville (the old hillside part with St. Peter's Cathedral and lots of cobblestone streets), spent fifty dollars on a meal at McDonald's, went on a boat cruise around Lake Geneva, and even happened upon a nude beach. 

Made It

So happy to report that after seemingly endless layovers in weird cities, two separate occasions of emptying the contents of my stomach, a few totally sleepless nights, and a quick jaunt over to Geneva...

We made it to Paris.

I took all these pictures from MJ, my beautiful sister-in-law. She and Brian have been perfectly kind and hospitable to us. Their apartment has windows overlooking the Seine.

It's Katie's first trip to Paris, and it's fun to look over and count the times her breath catches in her throat as she takes in this magical city for the first time.

The weather has been incroyable. I can't believe our good fortune. I also can't believe that all I packed was long pants and sweaters.

I am unbelievably happy. It's been such a long time since we've taken a vacation as extravagant as this (usually our outings are just a drive through the Alpine Loop). This city is extraordinary. I'm soaking in every moment like a sponge and trying not to think about leaving next week.

Trying to take in as much as I can and lock it away so six months from now, on a bitter and cold day in Midvale, Utah, on a particularly hard day with my students where I feel drained of life and happiness, I can recall these moments here with precision - the way Paris looks and feels and smells - and feel grateful that I was lucky enough to go, lucky enough to be enriched by this city, even for just a little while.

Some days...

When my allergies flare up...

And my students push me to my breaking point...

And I hear lots and lots of sad news everywhere...

And I start feeling like my life is stupid and mundane...

And all day long I have a lump in my throat and tears stinging my eyes...

And my Paris trip still feels like forever away...

I look at pictures of Corgi dogs and I am instantly reassured of the goodness in the world.