Ahhhhhhh Paris!

We arrived here safe and sound. After yesterday’s fiasco with the closed train line I made Jim leave our hotel by 7:30 AM so we would make sure we made the 10:00 AM Eurostar. Our plan was flawless! The trains were virtually empty, our suitcases fit nicely, we got off one train, took the elevator up, then the escalator down and around to the next train, and finally found our way to the famous Waterloo Station-a hub-bub of people going and coming!!!

The Chunnel to Paris is really very nice. Security is totally different than airport (I don’t know why, one could blow up a train as easily as a plane and have in the past) and the ride went very nicely. We crossed under the English Channel around noon and that took only 20 minutes. The rest of the time was spent zooming through the English and French countryside’s.

Upon leaving the train Jim treated me to a CAB ride to our apartment!!!! He couldn’t have done a kinder thing. I was so dreading riding the metro as we haven’t figured it out yet, and we just got in the taxi line, and a nice man brought us right to our apartment. And it only cost 15 Euros! Quite the bargain compared to London and probably the same distance!

The lady was here to meet us and showed us around. It is a lovely apartment in the heart of the Left Bank and right down the street from all the important tourist sites. A very old Cathedral is a few doors away and we have much to see and LOTS to learn.

Our first problem is the washing machine. The lady went through the instructions and it seemed easy enough but for the life of us we cannot figure out the dry cycle (it’s one of those all in one units). Yes we even have the booklet and it is written in French. I got online to see if I could pull up English instructions, but no! So we have been using the computer word for word trying to figure it out. You would think that something so simple wouldn’t be so hard, but it really is.

The telephone doesn’t work either. Well I am sure it does, but we can’t figure it out yet either. And we can't figure out the cable station. It shows a choice of English news channels but finding them is another story! The internet is up and running and the toilet flushes and the fridge is cold. The grocery store is closed so we had to find a bite to eat. We happened onto TEX-MEX! We had some delicious guacamole and chicken dishes of some kind. We’ll hit the patisseries and crepes tomorrow.

We feel kind of lost, not knowing the language or the area. We know that eventually we will figure out the routine but right now I am happy in my 3rd story apartment, doors double locked, looking out over the streets and trying to decipher the simple machines that we usually take for granted.

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