A Moveable Feast

For those unaware, Ernest Hemingway wrote a book called A Moveable Feast about his time living in Paris in the 1920's.  We have been reading the book and enjoying it tremendously and we recommend it.  It is fascinating to jump into his life and hear little vignettes about how he viewed life and the interesting characters in his life.  It is also a wonderful introduction to and preparation for enjoying Paris.

Ah, Paris, what a wonderful weekend it was.  The drive down was again, very nice, until we hit Paris proper.  I believe the phrase D used was "bone crushing traffic."  We moved maybe 2-3 blocks in 30 minutes.  Interestingly, we both felt as if we were in NYC several times: the traffic, the insane drivers, the pedestrians walking out in front of you at any moment, the eccentric people (unicycle rider) etc.  The big difference would be that the buildings were so much prettier and smaller - no skyscrapers.

So, after a long day's work and a nice if not longish drive (it seemed shorter this time, until we hit Paris that is) we were ready for a good dinner.  We stayed at the Hotel de La Place du Louvre, which as the name suggests, was across the street from the Louvre.  It was not only a perfect location, but the front desk staff was tremendously helpful in finalizing dinner plans.  They suggested L'Espadon Bleu (which translates to The Blue Swordfish) which was walking distance from the hotel, just across the Pont Neuf.  It specialized in fish.  [Interestingly enough, upon looking them up on our return to Belgium, this restaurant was closed from July 26-August 27, which means we went in its first week of reopening.  I know that most Europeans, and especially Parisians, take the month of August off, but I was surprised to see that even a restaurant would do that.  Again, something different than from the States.]

We ate in true Parisian style, meaning our reservation was at 9pm.  We were both favorably impressed by the meal and atmosphere.  There weren't many people in the restaurant, which was perfect for us.  We chose a nice smoked salmon and mussels for appetizers.  The salmon was light and buttery with just a hint of smoke.  D thoroughly enjoyed his mussels, thanks to some good advise from a friend before we left (thanks Todd), who told him that the best way to eat mussels (popular in this region) was to use the shells from the first one you eat as tongs to eat the rest.  The butter soup that they were served in provided for a rich yummy appetizer.

The entrées were equally lovely.  I went with a grilled sea bass and D had the special, Swordfish with Ratatouille - he just couldn't resist! (Pixar has educated us all on the joy of Ratatouille.) CORRECTION: {I was reminded that not ALL Americans have experienced the lovely movie that is Ratatouille.  There was a couple behind us that was clearly American (we felt mildly superior in that we were trying to use our limited French when they clearly had none) and a little loud.  The leopard print dress with gold chain straps was too much for me - it IS Paris.  Anyway, they asked about the Ratatouille, what it was, asking multiple times how to pronounce it, and we were just mortified. But back to our story...}  It was delicious and we had just enough room for a dessert to split before we headed home for a good night sleep.  The waiter recommended the chocolate cake that had a liquid chocolate filling, and we both agreed that it was the best chocolate cake we had ever had.  

Grateful for the walk home to help digest before we hit the hay (it was 11:30), we savored the view of the Eiffel Tower lighting up the sky with thousands if not millions of lights. Quite a sight, and the pictures do not do it justice.  We went home and fell into bed, eager to take advantage of our limited time and what promised to be beautiful weather.

Tanks in Town 2008

After returning from Paris on Sunday afternoon, we spent the evening at the annual Tanks in Town festival in Mons where dozens of vintage World War II tanks, jeeps and trucks parade through the city in a two-day event commemorating the liberation of Mons.

The crowd packed the streets as the ground shook with the aging behemoths piloted by Europeans in period dress, complete with handmade American flag patches on the uniforms.

The main square in the center of town was filled with vehicles and onlookers as an American-style big band played period pieces from the 40's and 50's.

The cafés along the square were packed, as were the balconies of upper-floor apartments which overlooked the square.  The views of these vehicles against the old European town buildings was eerie, as I imagined a very similar sight over 60 years ago.

Man-pri Sightings

Some have questioned the authenticity of our claims to witnessing the European phenomenon of "man-pris" (males wearing capri pants): for those who doubt the existence of such fashion, we present the following from our recent trip to the world's fashion hub:

Me slyly capturing a photo of the prey, under the pretense of a photo of my lovely wife in front of an intriguing derelict doorway.  And now, the pièce de résistance:

I almost missed crossing the street to catch this one in the wild, but it was well worth the effort.  

Come to think of it, my calves have been feeling warm the last few days.  Perhaps better ventilation...

The Happiest Place on Earth...Euro style

So we are a little behind on our weekend travel postings, sorry about that. Last Sunday (August 24) we went to Euro Disney, just outside of Paris. I have wanted to go to Disney World with D for awhile now, but one bad Animal Kingdom experience in August in Florida has been a roadblock for me (D is anti-humidity and FL is all about humidity, so you can see my dilemma.) Anyway, he suggested this Disney adventure, which as you can imagine, made me excited. We set out early-ish on Sunday and drove the 2+ hours south to just outside of Paris where Walt has set up camp. Incidentally, even though D did all the driving (I am intimidated by it and thankfully he is not) I am so impressed with the Garmin GPS we purchased right before the trip for such occasions as this. It already had European maps loaded on it and has done a beautiful job of getting us where we need and rerouting as necessary. It is such a champ - I can't imagine surviving here without it.

It took no time at all to get to open highway and we were instantly in farmland. The farms are much smaller and the crops seem to be more for feeding the livestock than people (just too small). Cows (or boeuf) were just everywhere, as well as les chevels (or horses...ah, funny the things that make you happy. Apparently knowing the words for beef and horses make me very happy).  Our Garmin friend took us through a small beautiful town called Ermenonville that has a castle in it (there are A LOT of castles all over here) that is the final place where Jean Jacques Rousseau lived, which really was stunning to see (it has been converted into a hotel/restaurant, which gets mixed reviews). We enjoyed the drive (me a bit more than D since I got to nap a little too).


We got to the park around 10:30am, so just after opening and were surprised by the crowd. I had anticipated a virtually empty park, so was trying to adjust expectations for longer waits (more like FL or CA Disney). The castle is always pretty and it is especially so now in that they are celebrating their 15th anniversary here. That means that there are additional ornaments of Buzz Lightyear and others on the castle, and Lumiere is the center of the 15th anniversary Logo.


We started at "DiscoveryLand" and remembering the stories we have heard of Uncle Fast Pass, we quickly familiarized ourselves with the joy that is the Disney fast pass. (For the uninitiated, this is like a legal cut in line.  You put your park ticket into a machine by the ride and, voilá, it spits out a time stamped ticket that tells you when you get to cut the line.  Beautiful.)  We worked it like champs and felt so proud of ourselves. 

We prioritized what we wanted to see most - knowing that we only had this one day, that we would get tired and that we had to drive home again that night. I was most interested in the Peter Pan ride and It's a Small World After All, and D wanted to hit the roller coasters.

Like I said, DiscoveryLand was closest to us when we first entered so we went on Space Mountain first. Not a long wait at all, but oh, I am beyond the age or disposition stage for roller coasters. We were in the very last car (meaning it was even worse from my perspective, better for D's) and my head was being banged around like a piñata. It started off exhilarating and ended nauseating. I felt seriously ill afterward and needed to "walk it off." After a trip to FantasyLand to look into Peter Pan fast passes, we return to DiscoveryLand to enjoy the Buzz Lightyear ride. 

For those of you that haven't done this ride yet, it is like you are inside a video game - they give you lasers to shoot the Zurg "Z's" on the walls throughout the ride. I started well and was beating D severely, but then all the years of video game training kicked in and he ended with a much higher score than I.  We rounded out our experience with Star Tours (in French, which was a little weird because the other rides were all in English....) 


A somewhat frazzled Jen after surviving Space Mountain 2
Next, we booked it over to AdventureLand to enjoy the Indiana Jones and the Temple of Peril ride. It was another roller coaster, which made me very nervous, more so when D exclaimed, "Oh good we will go upside down on this one, I didn't think we would." I then said I didn't want to go upside down but we were already strapped in and moving, so I put on my bravest face and prayed not to get sick. D was sweet and held my hand - probably more like a claw at that time since I was holding on for dear life. It wasn't too bad, not nearly as violent as Space Mountain (I will NEVER go on that ride again.) It was a little disappointing since there was nothing of Indiana Jones in/with the ride aside from the name. We did, however, feel like bandits in that we maybe waited 5-10 minutes total thanks to the fast pass. Thank you Avilla clan for teaching us well on the joy of these...it seriously enhanced the joy we had.

We then took in Pirates of the Caribbean which did not have a fast pass, which was a bummer. It was probably our longest line, but it moved very well - we were probably in line 30 minutes. We looked for the Captain Jack Sparrow changes here that we knew had taken place in the FL park (thanks Davis') but didn't see it. Either the Pirates of the Caribbean movies weren't as popular here or they just don't see the benefit of changing the ride.


Next was FantasyLand, which we had mostly avoided throughout the day because of the crush of people - this is where all the young kids rides are. But, I wanted to relive childhood memories of It's a Small World After All (which was awesome and totally worth it) and Peter Pan. Peter Pan had a fast pass, which was great because it had broken down earlier in the day and the line for it was horrific. As it was the fast pass time was normally 30 minutes from when we picked it up, this one was 2+ hours. So, grateful for the pass, which cut us to the front of the line, we enjoyed my favorite ride in the park.

Finally, we finished this park in FrontierLand and took in the Phantom Manor. I remember enjoying this one in the past, but I didn't particularly like it here. It was ok, but that's all. Again, having the scripts in French didn't help. We are trying to learn French and are making progress, but not that fast. D took pity on me and did not have us go on Big Thunder Mountain, for which I was thankful. I am roller coastered out for at least 2008, if not longer.

As we were winding the day down, we decided we had to go to the Walt Disney Studio Park and do something, because we had a pass that let us and we felt we had accomplished what we wanted, so everything from here out was gravy. We got there in time for the High School Musical street performance, but after waiting around for 10 minutes they canceled it due to rain. D had wanted to know what his co-worker John had been talking about - his kids were all agog about it. Oh well, on to the Armageddon Special Effects show. Lines are not really all that well done in Europe to begin with, but at Disney Land, they force you into appropriate queues and we appreciated it - apparently, they did not have the same attention to detail at the Studio. We were in a holding pen for 30 minutes and then crushed into another holding pen. Not my favorite event. The effects were cool, but the jockeying for position before hand was not fun.

Finally, we finished the day with the trolley ride around the Studio, which had a couple of cool special effects displays set up. One was where they "exploded" an 18 wheeler and then had a river of water come rushing in to put it out. The heat from the flames felt great after a day of wet raininess. Overall, a fun ride, but we were tired and ready to head home.

We definitely felt the advantage of only trying to satisfy two adults who could dodge and weave in traffic over the poor families with multiple children under the age of 5, especially when the weather became less perfect. The day was beautiful and rainy, several times as a matter of fact. We both had lightweight umbrellas and weatherproof-ish jackets, so we were set. Disney made A LOT of money on ponchos, and apparently they are not of the best quality because by the end of the day we saw people still trying to use them but they were in tatters.  We left feeling somewhat amazed at what we were able to accomplish, neither of us thinking that we would be able to see all that we wanted, and then some, and still get to leave around 4-4:30ish.  We feel like we worked the system as best as we could and came out winners.  Ah, a good feeling.

Hopefully we will post pictures of our Disney adventure soon, but we are in the process of trying to recover them. UPDATE: as is probably obvious, the photos were recovered after the software developer in the family inadvertently deleted them...

A Weekend in Paris

Just photos for the moment.  Notes to come.

We started by walking from the Louvre down to the Arc de Triomphe.  The view from the top was spectacular.
From the Arc to the Eiffel Tower, a Parisian street.
And the Tower.
At night, with European Union colors on the Tower.
A view of the Seine, while walking to Notre Dame on Sunday morning.

And the cathedral.

Driving (Me) Crazy

A few notes from the road: cars carrying only one passenger are very rare. Typically at least two, but often four or more people will be packed into a three-door hatchback smaller than a VW Golf.  And on weekends, the freeways are occupied by cars jammed full of vacation luggage and four, five and even six people (two in front, three in the back, with one of the passengers holding a child--actually saw this) in a tiny economy car, barreling down the road at over 130km/hour (>80mph).

It makes sense when considering the cost of fuel: sure, most cars are diesel and commonly get 40+MPG, but doing the math, diesel is €1.22/liter (or €4.61/gallon) which, with one Euro equating to approximately $1.50, that gallon of diesel costs $6.92 per gallon. I guess I'd be packing my car full too.

Aside from the contents of the cars, the speeds regularly observed are unlike anything I have seen stateside.  On a 130km/hour road, I would regularly be passed by BMWs traveling at warp speed.  Seeing headlights rapidly approach from behind when traveling over 80MPH is a bit disconcerting.  

One last odd observation: since most Europeans do not own large cars, when vacationing they rent trailers to haul luggage.  Which I suppose is why I saw a Mercedes CLK pulling what appeared to be a UHAUL-style trailer down the freeway.  I don't think people in McLean have trailer hitches on their Benzes... 

More Giant Entertainment

A few other photos were too good not to share. One of the other characters in the marriage parade of Goliath is a "wild man" who somehow defends the wedding party. The wild man is covered entirely in natural ivy leaves.

Then there was the man in the horse-and-rider getup who graciously stopped marching for a quick photo.

And last but not least: the puppeteer climbing out of the Mrs. Goliath puppet. Great stuff.

One last thing: the French soldiers pause at various places along the parade route and discharge their weapons (blanks, of course) within close proximity of the crowd, and then hand the blank cartridges to the nearest child as a hot souvenir.  Definitely won't be seeing that in the States.