Hello All!
Well I’m back to reality and in the swing of things
again. I returned to Belfast from
France last Friday evening and I must say it feels good to be home! It was a wonderful 8 days away and I
really enjoyed my time with “the trio” (as mom, Katie and Janine came to be
known) and Miss Taylor Payne.
Interesting fact—as I write this, the trio are on their way home! Probably somewhere over the Atlantic…
Anyway, I will try and recap a bit. I flew into Paris on Thursday the 4th,
making my way through the city to the trio’s apartment with some well-written
directions from Taylor on which trains and metros to take. As I walked through the courtyard of
their apartment complex and up the first flight of stairs, my heart was
fluttering! I was so excited to
see everyone. I could hear the
trio talking from outside their door before I even took a step inside. :) Taylor was looking after her wee French
kids when I arrived, so she met up with all of us later that evening.
The next few days in Paris flew by. Taylor showed us some of the many
sights, my mom, Katie and I went to Versailles, and we all got a kick out of
renting bikes and riding along the river Seine. In between all the tourist attractions, we enjoyed simply
meandering through streets crowded with cafes and full of people sitting
outside sipping espressos. You
could sit and people watch for hours!
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| Flying into Charles de Gaulle airport |
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| Janine was our France expert! |
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| No explanation needed! Katie got us to try out this weird spinning thing. |
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| Apparently lovers put their lock on and then throw the key into the river! |
The next few photos are from the day that my mom, Katie and I took a train to see the Chateau de Versailles... we were a bit bummed because it ended up being a rainy day so we didn't have as much time as we would have liked to explore the gardens (SO massive, you could have walked around for hours!)... but oh well. It was still amazing! So impressive to think that we were able to walk around in the place where Kings of France once called home.
And a few more from Paris...
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| You could see the Eiffel Tower from the street we stayed on! |
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Opera House
|
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| Sacre Coeur |
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| Trying roasted chestnuts |
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| Janine took a photo about every 2.5 seconds, so she was always playing catch up! |
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| Our last night in Paris, mom and I got locked out of our apartment! Long story. |
On Monday, I left with the trio for the Southwest of
France. We took the TGV from Paris
to Bordeaux. The train ride was
over three hours, so we all had some time to catch up on postcard writing and
enjoy the scenery. I was surprised
at how quickly we went from being in the middle of a huge city to being
surrounded by the green countryside, with little houses and towns scattered
here and there. Even though we
hadn’t booked anything ahead of time, we were able to find a nice little place
to stay in Bordeaux with a kitchen and all! We rented a car in Bordeaux and from there we saw some
amazing little villages—I was so impressed. I had never been to France so I didn’t know what to expect,
but I totally loved it! There were
times when we all felt like we were in a fairytale. Our first day we went to Saint Emilion, a world heritage site with history going back to prehistoric times!
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| Leaving Bordeaux |
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| THE TRIO |
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| Katie's find-- fresh figs |
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| Some local wine and planning for the next day. Mom makes a great lamp holder :) |
Ok, these photos are taking forever to upload and I feel like I need to wrap this up. I know when I started this post the girls were in a plane somewhere over the Atlantic, but by now they're probably somewhere over the U.S.! Here's one more bunch of photos from our last couple of days. More amazing villages, and then I headed back up to Paris on my own to spend one more night with Taylor before I flew home to Belfast Friday evening.
great recap, erin...those pics of you and taylor are so dear...we had a great trip! miss you already...
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