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Showing posts from July, 2016

Saturday July 30, 2016

So it's Saturday morning and I have to hustle to make it on two metro lines to get to the tour beginning point today.  I decided since we were going to be outdoors at both Versailles and at Monet's home/gardens in Giverny that I would wear the cool wide brimmed hat I found at Kohls. I grabbed the leftover baguette from the tasting yesterday and hoped I'd find someplace to grab a coffee and croissant once I got close, if I had time.  By the time I did arrive, and check in, I didn't have time to find a place, so I settled for a few pieces of stale baguette and figured I'd find something to eat at Versailles, somewhere.  I got a good seat with plenty of leg room and settled back for the ride.  We rode along Rue de Tivoli and the Champs de Lysee and I recognized both places from my visit 20 years ago.  I had spent maybe an hour or two in the Louvre and decided that was more than enough.  I went and got a soda in the Tuilleries Gardens and it was a hot day.  When I fin

Friday July 29, 2016

Be sure to click on the flickr photos link on the right side of my blog (on a pc or laptop anyway) and look for my camera roll if you haven't spotted the 3 million photos I've posted on facebook lol. Got up around 7:30am and got ready to face the day.  I had signed up for two 1/2 day tours through the tourism bureau for Saturday and they required that I print out the vouchers in order to get on the bus.  I found a place to do this, but got a little turned around and after 20 minutes I finally spotted it, just as it started raining.  Got on the metro, and off at Chatelet, but construction closed the train I needed to get on- in my direction.  Up the stairs and down others to take the train to Gare de Nord, then get out and up and over to St. Germaine.  When I came up the stairs, there were a few people standing inside under cover, it had started raining and they were trying to stay dry.  An older man chuckled as I continued up into the rainy morning; "It's good for yo

Day 2 Paris 7/28/16

Good Morning.  It was a bit overcast today, and I booked a trip to Giverny and Versailles on Saturday and needed to print out the voucher so I had to go to a Copy Top and have them do it for me.  It began to sprinkle as I walked over, and I got a little lost, but with the app I have on my phone with GPS I eventually found it.  It's called next stop paris, and you can figure out how to get just about anywhere in the city by metro and walking.  I realized as I walked there that the partner bank for Bank of America is right around the corner, so I could use the ATM without foreign transaction fees.  There is also a drug store if necessary.  I bought two umbrellas before I left the states, but decided to leave them at home.  It didn't rain enough to make it necessary today, just made it muggy.  I realized that I had left my earrings in my airbnb, so I thought I'd see if I could pick something up before lunch. I headed via the metro to Bastille area and had a quick breakfast

Day One Paris and the Journey

It's 4am on Tuesday, July 27, 2016.  My alarm just went off.  I quietly slipped into the bathroom for a refresher shower closing the door so the dogs would hopefully stay asleep in their crates.  Getting dressed I decided I needed to hug them, and let them pee since I would be walking right by their crates and I could see them watching me. I moved my luggage out to the garage last night, but I know my older pup Punkita (Pumpkyn) knows something is up.  I had brought it inside a month ago, for the same reason- to fool the dogs.  I managed to get everything into a carry on bag plus a pushing-the-size-limits "personal item. Luring the dogs back into their crates with a treat, I turned on the radio for them as I normally do when I am leaving the house, and closed the door into the house then opened the garage door to move outside and keep an eye out for the shuttle.  Great timing!  It was already coming up the street so we were on the road by 4:30 headed for Lindbergh field.

A Mid-week daycation in Tijuana

It's easy for me to blog when I am traveling, and I am going to try hard to update this every day, and to upload photos to flickr with links in the posts.  I just checked on my foreign currency order and oops it didn't go through on a major bank's website.  Scary that. I've had an interesting week.  On Wednesday I joined some people on a trip to Tijuana MX for a food and wine tour and a party at The Kitchen Project by Josue Castro celebrating Vinos Maga  and Chefs Dona Esthela and La Guerrerense Sabina Bandera. We met up at the Old Town transit center around 3:00pm and were picked up by Rogue TJ's own Fernando Gaxiola.  Four of us, and Fernando headed down the road to TJ, cracking open a bottle of white (I don't think any of us paid attention to what it was) wine for the transit across the border.  Kind of like christening a ship.  I joked "Maybe we should wait until we get through here before we open it up" and laughed along with everyone else.