Paris, France
Monday, July 2, 2001
With just our backpacks that will be our households for the next six months, we leave Houston's Bush Intercontinental Airport and board Continental Airlines / Air France flight for Paris. Au revoir, America!

Tuesday July 2, 2001
We arrive in Paris at 10 am local time at the Charles de Gaulle Airport. We board the Metro (subway) and take it to Notre Dame Cathedral. Thrilled to finally be on our journey, we wander around with our big backpacks and get lost near the Hotel de Ville in Southeast Paris. We call Fabienne and she gives us directions to her apartment and tells us Bob will meet us and guide us home. We arrive at Fabienne's, kiss on both cheeks, then have wine and cheese and a long, blissful nap

Dinner is French Basque cuisine (yum!) We start with salade d'anchois (anchovy salad), followed by saucisse de toulousse avec pommes de terre et une bouteille de Madiran (that's sausage and potatoes with a bottle of wine). We also enjoy confit de canard and pomme de terre et champignones (that's duck with potatoes and mushrooms.) Chocolate and coffee follow dinner.

Wednesday, July 3, 2001
Leaving our backpacks at the apartment, we take off with a daypack for the Eiffel Tower. Because of the long lines for the elevators, we climb the stairs up to the 2nd level. What a beautiful aerial view of Paris! For lunch, we buy baguettes, cheese and the most delicious peaches and eat them ever so slowly as we stretch out for a picnic on the east lawn of the Eiffel tower. Around 3 pm we head back to the apartment for wine and crackers and siesta. Later, around 8 pm, we have dinner with Fabienne, Bob and their friends, Eric and Katya at a Moroccan restaurant, Au Petit Cahoua, in the 11th arrondisement. We enjoy a dish of cous-cous with grilled lamb shish-ka-bobs. Afterwards we go for tea and chocolate at Eric and Katya's apartment.

Thursday, July 4, 2001
After a morning stretch, we wander through the outdoor market where we buy a breakfast of baguettes and peaches. Then we take the Metro to the museum district. After cruising through the courthouse of the Louvre, we walk the three blocks to the Musee d' Orsay where we quickly find out it is closed because of a staff strike. So we decide to take a long walk along the Seine River past a stunning collection of 18th century palaces. Then it's on to the "Saint Chapelle Cathedral," a beautiful gothic church completed in 1248. The interior chapel glows brightly from the refraction of the stained glass windows… Some have described this chapel as the "gateway to heaven." After a quick look at the exterior of the Notre Dame Cathedral, we decide to go back to Fabienne's apartment where we join her and Bob for grocery shopping. We buy sausage and ham (jambon) … bread, wine and cheese … and fruit salad. We also get olive paste that goes well with crackers, orange soda, and bottled water. Later, around 8 pm, Fabienne and Bob host a movie-watching party for which she invited Eric and Katya as well as Kelley, a woman from Wisconsin who sold her house and gave up her old life in Phoenix to move to Paris. We watch a rented movie on DVD called "Snatch," directed by Madonna's boyfriend Guy Ritchie.

Friday, July 5, 2001
It's the morning so it's market time again! This time we wander through another nearby outdoor market a few blocks away where we buy a breakfast of baguettes, peaches and grapes. Then we take the Metro to les Halles shopping center where we finally figure out what's wrong with our laptop and get it back in working order. (yay!) We wander around the Chatelet Les Halles for a couple of hours just people-watching. After a quick lunch of an eggplant and cheese sandwich on baguette, we move on to the George Pompideau Center to check out the Modern Art Museum. Is it really art? Well, we are trying our best to keep our minds open … like we do when listening to music. Trying to convince ourselves that sometimes art is just beautiful and we don't always have to understand it. But damn! Some of that stuff is really weird! Joe leaves the museum halfway through the tour and takes a nap among the mimes and artists on the front lawn of the Pompideau Center. Afterwards, it's back to Fabienne's for more wine and cheese (we could never get tired of it!) Then Joe does laundry with Bob while Jenni works on getting the website up. Dinner is falafels (deep-fried chickpeas) with humus and thina (sauce) in pita bread at a restaurant in the Jewish Quarter of Marais.Afterwards, around 9 pm, we walk up the Champs Elysees by the five star hotels and the high-class cafes. Then it's on to the Arc de Triomfe, a giant arch commissioned by Napoleon in the early 1800's to commemorate his victory in battle. Napoleon later lost and died before the Arc was completed. 10:00 We walked on to the Eiffel Tower to see the light show. Every hour on the hour for ten minutes a fireworks-like sparkling display lights up the tower and the night sky. Home at midnight.

Saturday, July 7, 2001
We sleep late because we are not awakened by the bread-makers dragging their metal cart against the cobblestone. After coffee, Jenni and Bob try to take a late morning tour of the Paris sewer system. Eeeeew. Pee-eeew. But it was closed because of some recent flooding here. Fabienne and Joe decide to remain ignorant of sewers and share more coffee at an outdoor café. Around 2 pm we go to an internet café and check e-mails. We all meet back up and go shopping at the mall in the Chatelet les Halles area for school supplies (Bob starts French classes Monday). Aterwards, we walk up to the top of the Samaritane Department store where there is a beautiful view of the Paris skyline with helpful little pictures that tell you the names of the main sites. I think that's good of the Samaritane, don't you? (get it? 'good samaritane'?) After a late lunch of chinese food, we walk through the Marais district and back home. Fabienne helps us make train reservations for Sunday night. Jenni and Joe go shopping for dinner (what else? Crackers, cold cuts and cheese, of course!) while Bob and Fab rent two movies; "Charlie's Angels" and "Me, Myself and Irene." Probably not the exotic Saturday night many people envision of Paris but this is exactly what we want to do!

Sunday, July 8, 2001
We sleep late again, then walk back through the outdoor market for breakfast. Then it's on to the Marais district where we spend most of our Sunday in a park, catching up on our journal entries. Jenni spends most of that time finishing the web site so we could get it live by Sunday night. As always, she makes her deadline! Around 8 pm, we take Bob and Fabienne to dinner at a nearby restaurant where Jenni eats a delicious dish of pasta with salmon and Joe has a steak and fries. (Hey! I thought I was ordering French food but I got beef and potatoes instead. Mom would be proud …) At 11 pm we board the overnight train from Paris to San Sebastian, Spain.