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The last plane ride from Chicago was the worst. I was tired, smelly, and had a headache. I was ready to be home. All I could think about was collapsing on the floor and having my doggies jump all over me, and that’s exactly what I did.

They were pretty pumped that we were home, for about 2 minutes and then the went and grabbed their bones and teddy bears and carried on lol. Ah well.

I had a nice hot bath and got fresh pj’s on and went to bed shortly thereafter. I woke up a few times in the night, but mostly because I was hot. I was able to fall back asleep.

It’s good to be home.

Last leg(s)

Here we sit in the Chicago airport waiting for our last flight home to see our boys.

Our trip home was quite smooth. When we were going through immigration in Paris there was a lady who was traveling, with what appeared to be, her two 6-8 year old grand children. She was having a pretty heated argument with the immigration officer. Because it was all in French and I obviously couldn’t understand her, but my instinct was that it had something to do with traveling internationally without their parents. It was going on and on and I was feeling quite stressed out for her.

We got through smoothly and our ticket allowed us to head into the American Airlines club which was nice and quiet and had free food and drinks!

I took my share and enjoyed the big comfy chairs and relaxed.

The flight was good, and apart from getting pulled into the immigration office due to my green card extension for a few minutes, the trip was very good.

I am losing power a little and I smell and I’ve worn the same sweatshirt for 7 straight days, I’m ready to be home with my boys in my big comfy chair.
This lady has been blabbing on her phone for well over an hour, full voice, completely oblivious to her surroundings. It’s cell phone etiquette 101 to not blab on your phone full on in a room full of people. Brutal.

When she got off she just strapped on her backpack and headed on her merry way.

I’ll post more pics on my Facebook page when I get the energy to do so.

Hope you enjoyed my blog and could make sense of the typos. It was fun to write and hope it was enjoyable to read. I will probably have a post or two more summing up our trip and our favorite spots etc.

We are already talking about a trip for next summer. Ireland, Scotland, Italy, Switzerland, Northern Germany have come up in discussion. Next year we are planning on doing a slower paced trip. Maybe 2 places with a little more R&R. We are taking suggestions.

Almost time to board!

Forget that.

4-5 hour line for the catacombs. No thanks. It’s a shame because it was at the top of my list of to see, but that lineup was ridiculous.

Chez Paris

We made it. The last leg of our journey. We have seen a lot of really cool things and the travel has gone better than one could ask. 3/4 hotels we were randomly upgraded to a bigger room which has been nice. The one room, however, that we could have used an upgrade in is here in Paris. Note to self: when pretty much all you see in the photos of the Expedia page of a hotel is the bed and the lobby, it means there is no place in the room to stand to get more of the room in the pic! This room would have to have another 100 square feet to be considered small. Never mind the size of the bed. Oh well, we’ve be lucky so far so we will manage.

We got in and hopped one of usual double decker city tour buses. We had a slooooow, (traffic was ridiculous) but pretty complete view of all the majors sites. Hitch and I are more of the ‘fly by’ type of tourists. Have a look and then move on. No need to longer around and climb and snoop around in everything. See it and move on which is why those super touristy your buses work great for us.

Here are a few shots:

And of course:

The Arc de Triomphe and the Eiffel Tower
impressed me the most right there with the Notre Dame and the sheet size of the Louvrewere most impressive to me without a doubt. I also loved all the beautiful bridges and amazing architecture as well, but I think I got more excited with this little black cast iron pot they served me my tea in.

It’s the simple pleasures with me.

To the Catacombs tomorrow and then a bit of a low key day. We are both missing our boys and will be glad to get back to them. It’s been a good trip so far though and I am looking forward to a light sight seeing day tomorrow.

Just waiting.

Just a few thoughts while we wait to catch our train to Paris.

There was some bike race in London today that caused a bunch of roach closures so we decided to take the underground to the international train station. Hitch isn’t really one to go out of his comfort zone: “I would rather just take a taxi,” but he was quickly denied his request. The cost of the cab and the time it would have taken to go around the closures would have been ridiculous. The train station was directly across the street from our hotel and it was a 15 minute ride. It would be silly NOT to take the train.

The people at the train station are super helpful and friendly. We got our tickets, hopped on, made our connection and were at the international station in no time.

While waiting in the security line an American girl was standing off to the side blabbing into her phone about how she was going to miss her train. It wasn’t helping her cause to be just standing there on the phone chatting. Finally a train company employee came up to her and got right after her for wasting time. It was quite a little exchange with the staff member warning her that if she missed her train she will have to repurchase a new ticket. For whatever reason Miss Princess gave her nothing but attitude. I’m not sure why she didn’t let her miss her train. Another guy was running late and a Eurostar employee accompanied him to the front of the lines to give him the best chance of making his train. It was nice.

Most of our time in train stations consists of me leading the charge and Hitch lagging behind with a half terrified half amazed look on his face.

That’s about standard.

Random
The butter was served on this lovely little stone plate.

Master of the obvious: London is expensive. They stick on a 12.5% service tax on your bill and you can ask to have it removed if you like, but we never did. Plus the first few times we tipped as well. Fish and chips were £15 or so which, after the exchange is $25. For fish and chips. Yes, they were good, but that’s a lot of $.

London is surprisingly clean and, in the parts we saw, free of a bunch of horrible souvenir shops.

Time to board. Later!

London Calling

We bought ourselves a day pass for the Tube this morning and headed to the London Tower. It was supposed to rain all day so I dressed in my warmest combination. Big mistake.

That’s better.

For as stressful as the travel day was yesterday, today was equally as easy.

I had one of the best sleeps I have had in a long time in Bruges. Perhaps it was the sugar coma from the waffle to which I followed up with ice cream or the nice hot bath I was able to take, but I slept solidly until 7:30. The only reason I woke up then was because I felt like I should. I had the clock tower to climb and a few odds and ends to look at so it was time to get crackin’.

After another fantastic breakfast we headed out to beautiful day. The horses and carriages were all lined up in the square ready to parade the tourists around the beautiful town.

Now to the clock tower. It was 9:25am (it opens at 9:30) and there was already a pretty big line to get in. They let 70 in at a time and I was well with in that so I got in line. Hitch was going to wait for me in the square. He wanted no part of that climb.

After standing in line for at least 20 minutes, and barely moving along at all, I had enough. I was able to see only one ticket window and things weren’t going anywhere fast. We only had so much time I felt like it was something I could do when I came back :). I jumped out of line and went and grabbed hubs.

We wandered around and went into the Basilica of the Holy Blood. Apparently there is a cloth in there with some of Christs’ blood on it. At first we thought it was displayed in that glass case in this roped off area:

We then learned it is probably in here:

It would be quite a shame if this was it:

Nevertheless, the church was really cool. Super old with huge thick walls. Check out the distance to the window in this pic:

After a bit more wandering around it was time to get back to get ready to head to the train station. We had a little rest and took a cab to the station. €7.60. Odd because the driver on the way to the hotel charged us €12. He clearly took the ‘scenic’ route. Saw us coming I guess.

Onto the first train to Brussels with no issue. The next train was more serious business because we were headed to a new country and on the Chunnel. Passports and landing cards were required before being herded into a big gate area. Before too long we were in our comfy seats and on our way.

Hitch took two of the same pic and said he did so because he wanted to catch me smiling. What he fails to realize is that I am always smiling on the inside.

We arrived in London and hopped in a cute little cab and proceeded to arrive at…the wrong hotel. Apparently there are two intercontinental London Hotels and I guess our cabbie should have asked for clarification. Anyway, no big deal, we took another can to our actually less fancy hotel.

Along the way the traffic was horrendous and I was grateful that renting a car here didn’t even come into mind. Aside from the traffic I was really impressed with how clean and green this city is. Hitch said it was like a cross between Chicago and NYC. I get the NYC part, but I have never been to Chicago so I don’t really know. It really is a nice looking city though.

We dropped our things and headed on a double decker bus tour which ended up being great. Here are a few pics:

We finished off the night in a neat pub just down the road. Of course, fish and chips were on the menu:

Yum.

Another great, full day today. To the Tower of London and a few WW2 museums tomorrow. It’s supposed to rain so museums will be a good idea. We are also going to try the ‘tube’.

“In f%#ing Bruges?!”

Oh yeah, and loving it. I fell immediately in love with Prague last year and knew it was a place I needed to go back to. Now I can add Bruges to that trip as well. This place is incredible.

A little stressful…

We woke up and had another wonderful breakfast at our hotel before we set off in the pouring rain towards the Paris airport.

A full day.

Our day began with an outstanding fresh breakfast. A full spread with anything you could imagine. The thing I left raving about, however, was the butter. It spread like a soft cream cheese and tasted like nothing I have ever had before. I can’t wait until the morning for that again.