Paris

My Mom, Dad and I arrived in Paris on the 8th of November in 2018. We took a taxi to our Marriott hotel. When we arrived we were hungry so after we settled in to our room, we headed down to the Marriott VIP lounge (my mom travels a lot). We were a little disappointed when we didn’t find many snacks there. After about 15 minutes our friends from Baltimore showed up. We then all headed down the street to a dinner spot, a cute little French bistro. There I got foie gras with quince paste, almond bread and a small salad. Time passed by as we chatted and caught up with our friends. Before we knew it, it was 10:00 PM. So we headed back to the hotel to get some sleep.

The next day after breakfast (a basic croissant with eggs) my Mom, Dad, I and our friends headed down to the catacombs of Paris. The bones were piled up and looked awesome. It was AMAZING how many bones there were. We walked in the tunnels for about 45 minutes and only saw a small portion of the tunnels. 

We then started our adventure from Paris to Reims. It is the area known for Champagne and about an hour away. We arrived and checked into our apartment. Then, we all walked the city a little and found a place for a snack. We all had croque monsieur, or as I call it a ‘ham and cheese sandwich.

After lunch we returned to our Airbnb for some play time. That evening my parents had a chef instructor come to our place and cook us all a classic French dinner. It was perfect to be able to play ‘at home’ while dinner was being prepared. It turned out to be so good as well.

After the champagne house we went to a great little French Bistro called Cafe du Palais. We all had a classic French lunch in a place with a lot of French style. They made some cute plates for the kids. I ate pasta in a funny face with cucumber eyes with half a grape in the middle for the pupil, a big slice of tomato for the mouth, half a cherry tomato as a nose, cut salmon sprinkled on top and dill for hair.

Later in the afternoon, we all took a taxi Uber to the Independent Wine Festival. At this Independent Wine Festival there were many many different wine vendors crunched in the busy room. It seemed like our parents enjoyed this stop more than my two friends and I. The stands had free wine to give you as a tasting. The wine makers would tell you the story of their vineyard and their wine. They also hade a few stands without wine. Like meat (salami), cheese, dried fruit and nuts.

Sunday morning our friends had to leave us to return home. My family stayed another day. We did return to Paris and checked into our hotel, then braved the weather to try to visit the Palace of Versailles. Not only was the weather not good, but it turned out to be the 100 year anniversary of the end of World War I. So, the Palace was closed. It did look pretty spectacular from the outside though.

The great thing was that we looked for a place to get out of the rain and entered the Palace Horse Stables. With no time extra, we were able to enter the rare performance. It was crazy how they riders could make the horses dance. It was like the horses knew ballet. We learned that they only do the show for 4 weeks, once a week each year.

This trip was very fun and my family and me really enjoyed it.