Fall 2019 Day 9 I did 2 day 6s

Today was day one of our tour group. Today is the hardest because we have to organize everyone to get from the airport to downtown and then into their Airbnb’s with as little stress and aggravation as possible. It went fairly smoothly. Everyone got in their place and we have some places that will definitely always be on our list for places to stay in Paris for as long as we bring people here. Once we got everyone settled we got started. It’s always best to just go, even if your body is telling you to sleep you need to acclimate to the time change and that means staying awake as long as possible!  So, we walked to the center of the city. This is the part I’ve been dreading for months now!  What’s Notre Dame going to look like?  How devastating will it be to see it?  Can you even get close to it?  Well, they have covered most of the damaged areas so you can’t really see any of it except the front that was pretty much spared the damage. They have huge fences around the whole area so you can’t get very close. And because of that it wasn’t as emotional as I was afraid it was going to be. It was harder to walk by it at night and see it not lit up as a beacon for all of Paris to see. That was the worst part. It’s such a special building. Paris has a huge hole in its heart without that building. It definitely made it harder to give our group that true feel of Paris, because it really does all start right there. I had a huge list of bulletpoints that I had written down to tell everyone about that I put together before the fire. I couldn’t talk about over 3/4 of them because you can’t see much. I took the best pictures I could from different spots but that’s all you can really see. After that we went to Saint Chappelle. That’s really one of my favorite places in Paris. It’s unlike any church in the world. The stained glass is breathtaking!  I always make sure that I get upstairs to the main chapel before everyone else so I can see all of their reactions to seeing it for the first time. It certainly never disappoints!  After that, we walked home because everyone had officially hit the wall. So we napped or rested for a couple hours before meeting up for an early, by European standards, dinner. We went to the restaurant we go to on our first night every time we come to Paris.  It’s a tradition that we never want to break. It is just the perfect place to eat your first French meal at. They have the very best French Onion soup. Or onion soup as they call it here. And they make everything extremely well. It’s a small cute place that is always packed. I had duck, or as my Father is going to say, I ate Donald Duck!!  It was amazing!  Most people got a few appetizers and shared. We all had the onion soup. Then we shared 3 desserts. It was amazing. They always knock it out of the park!  Then we walked home. I was stressed about how today would go, but all in all, it went as good as we could possibly hope for!  Tomorrow we tour our home neighborhood, the Marais. So we will have lots of fun pictures and stories I’m sure!!  Thanks so much for reading. It’s great to be in Paris and I just really love showing people the city through our eyes. It’s a magical place. Come with us sometime. Till tomorrow!  Au revior!!!

Fall 2019 Day 7

Goodbye Beaune, hello Paris!  Welcome to the big city!  We got to town, we have been here enough that we knew exactly how to get to our Airbnb from the train station. It’s like visiting an old friend. We were able to drop our luggage off at our place early but it was still being cleaned so we didn’t even get to see it, just drop our luggage off. We then took the metro up to Montmartre to find a patisserie and boulangerie I’ve been following on instagram for a few years and they have won award after award for their baguettes and croissants. We got croissants that were still warm. I bought one, gave Emily a bite and finished it and immediately went back in to buy 2 more!  Best croissant of my life!  So crispy and flaky and buttery. The flavor and texture was perfect and the layering of the dough was better than I’ve ever seen!  Their baguette was amazing also. We will be going back to that place regularly!  It’s not on the way to anywhere, but it’s worth the trek!!if you’re on Instagram, follow Le Grenier a Pain. We then made it back to our Airbnb. Check out the video!  It’s SO cute and perfect!!  Can’t imagine wanting to stay anywhere else while we are in Paris. Ok, so tomorrow is Emily and my 3rd anniversary. Our guests come tomorrow so we are celebrating a day early.  I’m truly the luckiest man alive. Emily is so wonderful and I’m thankful every day we found each other. I got married late in life and didn’t think I’d ever find the one. But, my patience allowed me to find the woman I was always supposed to be with. Together we have built a life that we both could only dream of. We work harder than we ever imagined, but we get rewarded by all of the love and appreciation from our customers every day. And as we all know, she’s the one that makes it all happen!  She’s the one that makes it the warm, wonderful, cheery, special place it is. I get to enjoy and appreciate her every day. That’s why I’m so lucky!!  Anyway, I’m taking Emily on a Seine River cruise with Champagne and then a romantic dinner afterwards. It’s going to be a late night so the blog may not post until tomorrow but we will see. I’ll be back to finish the blog after our special evening!  We had a lovely evening of cruising down the Seine and eating great food!  It was very romantic and wonderful!  I will keep it short and sweet because it’s very late and our guests arrive tomorrow morning. We had an appetizer of Foie Gras and smoked rabbit on toast that was amazing! Emily had the rabbit stuffed with oyster mushrooms and foie gras with bacon that was absolutely delicious and I had a ribeye steak with frites that was perfect!!  A great end to a great day!!!  Tomorrow we start being tour guides!  We can’t wait!!