Luxolive.
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Tripping!
Dude. Quickly then: The Beginning Leave Boston. Gawk at A's overpack. Underpack to compensate so we can still just take two bags. End up glaring at his unworn sweatpants, sweater, and sweatshirt repeatedly while washing my shirts in the sink so I can have vaguely unsmelly clothes. Keep it all on the inside, though.
Arrive in Paris very early. Speak bad French, ride striking and therefore free (!) trains. Wander around Montmarte because it's where we stayed:
We did the Rick Steve's walking tours from his book, and they were actually great. He's not really my bag, but I loved his books. We did the Montmartre tour which brought us to Sacre Coeur, all the famous artists homes (Van Gogh, Renoir, Monet) and old hangouts, plus old street plans and adorable cafes and buildings. We drank coffee and ate crepes and A ordered something which turned out to be multiple hot dogs with melted cheese and he was like, 'The French understand me!"
Then we went to the hotel and napped, because we'd been up for 35 hours. Then we got up and I think we walked down the Seine and then went and slept more. We went to the Eiffel Tower and went all the way to the top (almost no crowds!) and I almost passed out. Super Scary Ascent. Holy Crapsticks. The top is open air, too. Just flimsy wire bars. Hold me.
We wandered around all over the place. We went to Notre Dame, which was incredible. My favorite part was the ground in front where the original streets are marked on the open plaza, and you can see how the medieval city was set up. Awesome. When you think how old it is and how long it took to build, and how few people there were to support the effort at the time, it's incredible. The people who built it never saw it completed, and they knew they wouldn't. That's sad to me, but also amazing. Can you imagine a cathedral being your legacy?
Also, I had no idea that Notre Dame was on an island? Okay then.
Then we went to Saint Chapelle which was amazing. I was looking at French children's books, thinking I might find something for Kate, and when asked if I needed help I tried to explain for my friend's child and ended up saying ma petite chien. So I gave up on that and moved on.
Saint Chapelle was awesome because of the windows. None of the pictures I can find capture it at all. We were right near Pigalle, the area that my father was really concerned about delicate flower me witnessing. I was fine, but I couldn't believe how many dirty old men Paris must have to support that many peep shows. Ha, Peep Show.
We skipped the Louvre. Whoops? We really wanted to go to the Pompidou Center, so we did that instead when we ran out of time. My parents will mock. That place was hilarious and awesome. The installation rooms, which included this whole set up about a guy who built a catapult to try to put himself in orbit, were so cool and wonked. I love thinking about the people who create this stuff. The building itself was awesome to look at. All the pipes live on the outside and they're color coded by function.
Er. We walked on the Left Bank and I pretended to be Briget Bardot. We did a Seine cruise and both almost fell asleep in the sun. We walked on the Rue Cler and put together a picnic from local shops (baguettes, goat cheese, fresh strawberries and cherries and apricots, blood orange juice) and then ate it in the park. I ate Salade de Chevre Chaud pretty much every time I saw it offered. Why I haven't been grilling chevre on a regular basis is beyond me entirely.
Then we got up really early, ate these amazing warm almond croissants (droooool) and got on the train to Saint Malo. Saint Malo
We took a train there all through the north of France. It was really fun to look out the window while random Francophone cows rushed by.
Saint Malo is this little resort town in Brittany. Brittany is where crepes are from. So, thank you, Brittany. Crepes RULE.
We found one crepe place right after getting there and then ate there 3 times in 24 hours. Whoops? It was amazing. The crepes were buckwheat and really thin and I had: bacon, egg, creme fraiche and mushroom; smoked salmon, creme fraiche and lemon; banana and chocolate; and butter and sugar. Oh and also my god. We also drank a ton of this cider which I guess traditionally accompanies the crepes. We killed a few bottles each time and then wandered around drunk. Guernsey
Guernsey seems kind of picked out of a big hat, but it's where my great grandmother came over to the States from. It's one of the Channel Islands, which means it's British, but not part of the UK. It's a tax haven and has a ton of banks and random suits shuttling around, but it's also really gorgeous and peaceful.
My greatgrandmother went to school in Vale, according to the 1901 census that I found her on. Victor Hugo lived in Guernsey, and wrote Les Miserables there. It's a beautiful place, and there are flowers EVERYWHERE. Really, about 90% of my photos will be of the amazing flowers and landscape here.
I spent about half a day in the family research library and discovered that most of my family history from that branch actually happened on Jersey, which is a different island. There's this weird rivalry between the islands, which cracks me up. Anyway, I traced the family back to about 1851 and from that point I would have had to have gone to Jersey and I just didn't feel like spending one of my days in transit, so I decided to just bring what I got home and google away. I discovered some maiden names and lots of great great aunts and uncles' names, like Eva and Clara. Nice names to recycle! All we have from my dad's side are Rita, Janet, and Azuba, so these are especially nice.
We did a cliff walk and A did 2 hilarious absentminded professor things. 1), he lost the really detailed and necessary map the landlady nicely lent us and 2), he eyeballed the route rather than actually measuring it. We ended up taking a 10 mile hike instead of the planned 3 miles, and we got lost three times. The landlady was upset in a reserved British way when we confessed that the map was lost. We tried to buy her another copy, but couldn't find anything nearly as good. He needs to tattoo stuff to himself a la Memento, I swear to God. Here's a big bit of our ten mile walk. It's possible that I'm exaggerating. Slightly. (9 miles.)
We stayed in St. Peter Port, the capital.
We stayed up near that tower. We walked around a lot, drank in beer gardens, and read trashy British magazines. "I caught my husband interfering with a frozen chicken (with photo re-enactment)!" Chat magazine rules.
We stayed here for a few days and it was so relaxing and warm and sunny and ahhh. I miss it. We did a lot of nothing and eating big salads and random selections of fruit from the market. And beer drinking.
Then we flew to London. 8 pound flight! God Bless the internet. London We walked around and looked at Big Ben, Parliament, Westminster Abbey, etc. We rode on a double decker bus, A took a picture of me in a red phone booth. We went to see the changing of the guard and it was some duke's 88th birthday. Since he wasn't a Duke of Hazzard, I wasn't really that interested. I would like to see Tom Wopat at Buckingham Palace. I continued to read British tabloids. I started to care about Posh and Beckham. I enjoyed gratuitous photo spreads of Madonna falling off a bike like it was news. I ate Flake bars and looked for Prince William so I could pimp my friend who is clearly his soulmate. I sang "London Calling" in my head. I saw a bag of poop in a phone booth. We went to the British Museum and saw the Rosetta Stone and overheard a sullen teenager call the Elgin Marbles "Stupid." Awesome. I finally met an internet friend of mine! She is lovely. I drank a lot of wine and possibly scared her friends, dropkicked aforementioned wine glass and nearly killed her boyfriend by knocking over the running BBQ. I took artistic black and white photos of her neighbor's scary and earnest garden gnomes. We played Patti Rothberg's CD and cracked up and everyone else thought we were insane.
The next day A and I got up. I writhed around in imagined tampon abandonment mortification slash hangover. I had drunkenly removed a tampon and vaguely remembered being distracted by shiny objects (specifically British beauty products) but couldn't specifically remember throwing the tampon away. I played this scenario over and over in my head for an hour or so while nauseous and hangovery. My husband, bless him, packed. We checked our bags and schlepped around the West End. I drooled at shoes. We went to Covent Garden and watched weirdos. Then we went to the airport and hung out in the sweet Admiral's Club like jackasses. I ate and drank everything because it was free. Then we watched Old School and The Ring on the flight, and then came home to reality. We now have less than 3$ in our bank account and our house smells weird, possibly like shut in cat. Molly and Chewy were happy to see us, so we played with them and then went to sleep. Now I'm at work. Gross.
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