Hotel Paris Bastille

... t have to do it all the time! After that meeting we left for the Centre Pompidou, which has a ton of great modern art pieces. I love all the colors used in modern art. I saw some works done by Matisse, my favorite artist. Monsieur Peigne was once again our tour guide. After the Centre Pompidou, Emilia and I went on a journey for something other than paninis or crepes. We succeeded an found a Chinese restaurant. I got sweet and sour chicken and rice. YUM! That's all for now. A bientot!

... in the Tourist Information, ordering an overpriced cup of tea in one of the cafes and inventing less or more interesting reasons why my friend, who was supposed to pick me up and put me up for a few nights, would not arrive.

Anyway, she arrived on time and took me to the appartament where I dropped my luggage, and almost immediately we left to see the city. We started with the Quartier Latin: La Seine, Ile St-Louis, Notre Dame, Saint ...

... with good restaurants and an accessible metro. The hotel was very nice. It had carpeted stairs and with a book shelf on each landing. Our room was very bright and airy. We even had our own statue. The only minus was the 12 euro breakfast, way out of our price range. After getting settled we hopped on the metro and came up at the Pont Neuf, the oldest bridge on the Seine River. The weather was supposed to be rainy all weekend, but it was very nice, a little cold but very ...

... presentation Friday morning...That left me with the weekend to do cheesy things, like walking around Paris and checking out all the touristy scenes with all the Christmas lights! I have to say, as much as I dislike the holiday, I like the decorations! Within one weekend, I walked the Champs Elysees three times (and plan on going again tonight...), went up to La Defense, and plan on going to Sacre Coeur and Notre Dame again ...

... loudly about their shopping expedition, etc. We gave ourselves the late afternoon for the Louvre - about 2.5 hours before closing. Boy that was just not enough to see the museum in its glory. From the strange pyramidal entrance, we get the map, and realise...holy moly, there are 3 buildings worth of artefact's. The wings of the museum are 700 long, and there are 3 levels!! We cut our losses and tried to see the most popular things: Venus de Milo, Mona Lisa, and a few others ...

... allow myself a day or two off to rest before completing the trip. Up until then, it will be two weeks of non-stop work and travel. Leaving the Seychelles, I'll head back here to Paris, pick up a rental car and drive up to Belgium where I will spend a Sabbath and visit with some old friends before driving back to Paris and flying home. This trip will only be three weeks long, about a week shorter than usual when I go to Africa, but it will entail very concentrated activity.

... juice and coffee in a gorgeous café on the street overlooking the river. I was a little worried as we walked over to Notre Dame...we passed St. Michael's and it had a HUGE line of tourists standing outside the door. I started having flashbacks to Rome and the humongous line at the Vatican museums and got really worried. But when we got to Notre Dame, surprisingly there was just an itty bitty line, and it was moving along quite quickly. For being as old ...

... to do and see, the museums and architecture are so unique and extraordinary they are reason enough to make the lil jaunt, however what you will find when you are in the vibrant city is like no other. Never have I felt so alive, so vivacious and so appreciative, everything that is done in Paris is done with raw passion and genuine talent. Parisians take their time and do everything well, a definite cold shower to the quick american ways I am used to. Viva la Paris.      

... was at the base of the ski resort called 'Espace Killy'. To give you an idea of atitude, the chalet Saulire was at 1850metres and the highest "boardable" part of the mountain was at over 4,000m (or over 10,000feet)!!! When you reach the higher altitudes and glaciers, you have to walk up parts of the hills to get to the next run. Let's just say doing this at an altitude of of close to 10,000ft is tiring to say the least. Needless to say the boarding was F-A-B-O ...

We had a morning assignment which we quickly broke away from and saw a Jean Nouvell builing that had moving parts (pretty cool). After that we went to the Louvre for a while and saw the Mona Lisa, but then decided to head back and pack and sneak in a quick nap ...