Really memorable day...

Well today was another busy day, since Caroline is away we were able to sleep in, which was so nice.

For lunch we went to Bois de Vinncenes park nearby the house, where we walked around and had a nice picnic. After we headed to Il de St. Louis and wandered around the tiny streets on the island. After grabbing some dessert we made our way towards the Seine river and took a canal boat to the Eiffel Tower.

We climbed to the second level of the Eiffel tower, then took the elevator to the very top. The veiw was amazing and we were even able to catch the sunset.

After the Eiffel tower we walked along the north shore of the Seine river and found a cozy spot to watch the light show. The night ended with a wonderful, unexpected surprise :)

Got 10 Gigabytes!

Well, now I have way too much space for pictures. I'm using a tenth of my space now.
Great! Totally only something that would happen to me, and obviously I'm not going to be uploading pictures and stuff when I get home - my life is sadly not that interesting.

Album title " Sept 7 - Brushing teeth, walking the dog..."

Oh well, at least I can keep uploading pictures now. Ive got 2 new albums up. Aug 27 was a very very busy day. We woke up at 6:30 to get a chance to go up Notre Dame and walk around before Caroline left for work. Then we spend a good 4 or 5 hours in the afternoon wandering and shopping. Then, that night when Caroline came home we went back out at 11:00pm to wander around Montmarte and see Sacre-Coeur.

I must admit we've really had no time to relax, everyday has been go go go. No wonder i'm up at 2:30 am just to get my pictures up! I have no other time! And Ive gotta be up tomorrow at 6:30 to bring Caroline to the airport, so... goodnight!

Pictures on hold...

Well, I had to purchase more space to upload more pictures onto Picasa.
Unfortunately all along I had been uploading full resolution pictures which took up all my space a lot quicker. I could go back and re-upload everything but that would take me forever, plus all my informative captions would be lost ( I spent a long time writing captions). So i've bought more space and I should have it within 24 hours.

Tomorrow Caroline and family will be going away for 3 days. Me and Niki have lots of plans, we're going to see the Palace of Versailles, Mont Saint-Michel and Juno beach, where Canadian troops first landed to liberate Europe from the Nazi regime.

It will be a crazy packed weekend but we cant wait!

Paris Catacombs

Yesterday we went to the Catacombs , underground tunnels filled with hundreds of thousands of neatly stacked bones dating back to the 18th century. It was created because as the city of Paris grew many cemeteries had to be moved/removed, and this was seen as a hygienic way to keep the bodies. Plus it took up a lot less room.

Me and Niki waited in line for more than an hour but it proved to be totally worth it. 1.7 kilometers of creepy underground tunnels filled with bones and monuments. We took so many pictures I had a hard time narrowing them down for the album here. I'm so glad we went, this was something totally different!

Baby or no baby

Well! Caroline has been working a lot, so me and Niki have been doing some touring with Victor!
He is a pretty good baby so its not too hard to take him out. Except for having to lug that stroller up and down a gazillion stairs, and of course, weaving our way through all the crowds. Its amazing how rude people are! Cutting me off, not letting me join an escalator line, they all see a stroller and think "Oh i can squeeze in there, im quicker anyways..." and I never get to go anywhere! I get so angry.

Apart from that we've been having a great time. I really feel like Niki is getting to see lots (with or without a baby). Yesterday during the day we went to the Louvre, we spent about 3 hours there but we could have spent hours more if we had the time. Caroline came home around 8:30 and then me and Niki headed out again. We walked along the Champs-Elysees street again, walked down to Invalides and the Dome church, then we walked to the Eiffel Tower. We didnt end up getting home until about 1am! So there was no way I was going to upload pictures then, especially knowning that Victor starts screaming at 7:30 in the morning.

All in all yesterday was a really good jam-packed day. And hopefully today will be as well! Baby or no baby, im determind to see everything!!

Niki is here!

Its so great to have him here!! Finally, someone to walk around and see and comment on things with! He arrived yesterday afternoon around 2:30, and after he had lunch and a short nap we headed out all walked ALL over the place. Starting in the North, we walked past the Grande Opera, down past the Louvre, across and along the Seine river, saw pont neuf, the Concierge and Notre Dame, then walked more, and saw the Pantheon and the gates of Luxembourg park. Then we took the bus home, and stopped along the way for some groceries.

We were out for like 5 hours. I cant believe he held up! I certainly couldnt have, considering the disgusting mess I was when I arrived here! The pictures of our day will be up by this afternoon, Paris time.

My beachy, hot, palm tree filled, beautiful day in the French Riviera

All I can say is "wow!".

The South of France is gorgeous. I've never been anywhere as beautiful. The water was warm, clear and blue. Palm trees everywhere, cute towns, colourful buildings, friendly people, mountains, history... my list could go on for pages.

I am promising myself to go back to the Mediterranean many more times in my life. Screw Dominican Republic, the Mediterraneans the place to go people! (I didn't mean that to sound spoiled or bratty). My pictures really dont do it justice at all.

My day started off at 4:45am. Our flight took off at 7am. We landed in Hyeres, France at 8:15.
9:30 I got dropped off at the coast, where I wandered around for a bit then took a ferry to Porquerolles Island. Many people moor their boats ( yachts, sailboats, speedboats, catamarans) there, or have homes or cottages on the island. There is a small town with restaurants, shops and cafes, and many really nice beaches and lookouts over the sea.

I went on a 'hike' or 'rough walk' around the Island and saw a lighthouse and got some pictures of the sea. Then I went to Plage d'Argent, a beach on the north side of the Isand, facing the mainland. At the beach I read, ate, and people watched. Saw lots of hairy men in skimpy skeedos, and lots of topless women! And might I add of all ages and sizes!!! Yikes.

After the beach I wandered around the Island more, went to the town, bought some food, then walked to another cliff looking north. At 3pm I took the ferry back to the mainland, and boarded a local bus that took me to Hyeres, a suburb city of Toulon. I met up with Caroline, Victor and her friend and went back to her apartment and took a short break. Then headed out to see the city of Hyeres. The city has an old and new part. To me the 'new' part looks old too, but they call it new. I had dinner on a patio and then at 7:45 met up with Caroline to head back to the airport for our flight that departed at 9:10. The flight back was quick and Victor slept for about 20 minutes of the flight, poor baby was so exhausted by the time we got to Paris.

What a super long day, but so worth it! France is amazing!

p.s. I got burnt at the beach - even when wearing sunscreen im screwed!

"You must bike on the road"

Here in France you cannot ride your bicycle on the sidewalks, I know that, but once in a while I do. Either when the roads really busy, or when there is no bicycle lane. And today as I was making my way home from my Butte-aux-Cailles tour I came to a red light. The intersection was empty... i'm on a bike, so I just went onto the sidewalk and crossed the street on my bike as a pedestrian.

So 2 seconds after I get across the street I hear "madamoiselle!". Huh? I think, me?? I look over and theres a cop on a motercycle pulling me over. Me... on a bike. Right! So he starts talking to me in french... and im like, "I dont seak french". Well unfortunately he knows english so he explains to me that...

1 - you can be fined for riding your bike on the sidewalk
2 - you can be fined for running a red light on a bike... which, he explains I did.
3 - my drivers licence can be taken away for running a red light on a bike.

Well! I was thinking, youve got to be kidding me!

Truthfully I knew that I wasnt supposed to ride on the sidewalk, but I pretended I didnt know. I also asked him some questions about riding your bicycle around France to make him feel like he had authority and that I was interested in him, respected his opinion and respected his countries rules. Finally after he explained things to me (I acted like, "wow, I never knew that, thank you so much for informing me", you could tell he liked that) he let me go, leaving me with " you must always ride on the road and obey all traffic signs".

"Always ride your bike on the road". That goes exactly against what I have heard all my childhood I thought as I continued on my way home.

Super Exciting Fantastic News!!!

Guess what!!??
Niki is coming to Paris! Yes! He is coming to spend my last week and a couple days with me! I'm so excited. It'll be great to share some of the city with him. It can be so lonely going around all by yourself, especially when you see other couples everywhere - barf.

Caroline and Stephane have offered him to stay here! How nice is that? I told you they we're the nicest people. So its going to work out perfectly, and wont cost him too much. He arrives Friday.
5 days!!!
I love you honey!

I just love poo

This morning Caroline left at 4am. 6am Victor cries. I drag my lazy butt out of bed, up the stairs, and get him from bed. I feed him his bottle of milk and put him back to bed. Around 9am he woke again, after feeding him breakfast (1piece of bread and a pear and banana blended) we played in my room... on my bed, he was so cute:)

I smelt something funny, if you know what I mean. Ah, the part of babies I love. I grab him and carry him up to his bedroom, put him down... wait, "whats that smell??" I look down, and on my arm there is a brown smudge! Change table... poo on it. But he still has all his clothes and diaper on... oh no!! I quickly grabbed him back up (holding him away from my body) and took him to the bathroom. Sure enough, all up his back, seeping through his undershirt and shirt and pants... poo... everywhere.

I stripped him naked, put him in the bathtub, filled it. All his clothes had to be washed (rinsed first) the only thing he could re-wear were his socks. Change table mat had to be washed... even MY bed sheets had to be washed because he was laying there before I took him up. The whole time Victor was happy as could be, smiling and laughing, lol, he had no clue!

My conclusion is, as much as I love this kid, and most kids, I don't want my own kids for a while...

Augest 20th - South of France

Well, Ive booked a plane ticket to go to Hyeres France! I'm only going for a day, but I got a good deal on the ticket. I'm going with Caroline and Victor, they are going to visit friends and I'm going to go to the beach and tour the Islands off the coast. I'm pretty excited!!

For those interested, like mummy and grandma, click here to see a map of the area, it looks beautiful.

La Defense and Cite des Sciences

Well those are the two main places I visited today.

Located on the western edge of Paris, La Defense is the modern part of the city, there are many skyscrapers and modern buildings including the Grande Arc. The Grande Arc lines up perfectly with the Arc de Triumphe, and makes a really cool picture. There was a mall, theatre, a Hilton hotel and lots of other places in the area. I only spent a short while there though because it rained.

After I headed back on the metro and went north of Paris to Cite des Sciences. Basically its Paris's equivelent of the Science Centre. Overall I saw some cool stuff, but I dont think it was that impressive. I like ours better, and I wouldnt go back. But oh well! I got some really nice pictures of the Geode, the silver ball. Its actually a domed theatre, like the one at the Science Centre. My admission included a film there called Deep Sea. They gave me a special headset that would give me the english version, but it didnt work. So I got 45 minutes of french. The video was nice though. Outside the centre and across a little canal there is a modern park called Parc de la Villette, there are paths, gardens, rides for kids and a exhibition space. Basically, years ago the whole area and buildings were used as slaughterhouses and livestock markets, but they renovated and made a Science centre and childrens park in its place.

After my busy day I headed home on the metro. On the way home I realized (when looking over my pictures) that my mascara... or eyeliner, had smudged onto my face around halfway through my day. I guess when you are alone you have to check these things yourself. Funny, but it made me feel lonely seeing the annoying smudge on my face because I realized there was no one around to tell me these things :P

Musee D'Orsay

So yesterday I visited Musee D'Orsay, just on the opposite side of the Seine from the Louvre.

Man, I was at first very overwhelmed when I got into the museum. There was so much to see, so many aisles and rooms, so I spent a while figuring out which way i'd go first that way I could see everything efficiently. I didn't want to be running back and forth through the place. I recognized a lot of the artwork, and it felt so weird to see the pieces in real life. Like, for example, Monet's work... I saw his paintings that he actually painted! Weird!

After the museum I wandered across the Seine into the Tuileries garden, which leads to the Louvre. It wasn't the prettiest park i've seen so far, but It had a ferris wheel so that made it unique. I walked to the Lourve and took some pictures, but by this time it looked like it'd rain any minute so I didn't take as many pictures there as I wanted. On the way home I bumped into Caroline and Victor on the bus... imagine that, such a huge city and I manage to bump into the only people I know in it!

Well.. its fixed

Yes.. my computer is now fixed...
However i'm not that pleased because 1, I have Windows XP in French. And 2, I had to buy a new hard drive, which brings me to 2b, I lost all my information...

Well... that is unless Niki can take my old hard drive and restore the data when I get home. But i'd rather prepare myself for the worst. So its a really good thing that I had religiously uploaded my pictures of this trip, otherwise they'd all be lost as well...

Anyways, as you can see i've been up to a lot these past days, computer or no computer. I have 4 new albums up!! And the "Doors of Paris" album is especially for Mommy and Grandma:)

Well its 2:15 am here, so now I have to get ready for bed. Dont worry though, I get to sleep in tomorrow! Yay :D

Just my luck...

Well just in case anybody is wondering where ive been... my computer is broken.
It stopped working properly Friday morning and after trying various things Ive decided to take it in for repairs tomorrow. I really hope it is not a major problem...

Anyways, over the weekend I continued exploring Paris. Went shopping (bought 3 posters for my room) ate at McDonalds... it was gross. I wandered around Ill de Cite, saw lots of things. Today I went with the family to a famous HUGE flea market in the North of Paris, then we went to Sacre Coer; a very old big church that sits on top of a hill in Paris. The veiw from on top of the hill is amazing... wait till I get those pictures up! I also visited Frances national library today, it enormous!

Well... hopefully the next time you hear from me I will have good news that my computer is back up and running, until then, aurevior!

Ive got so much to say!

Wow, I feel like I have seen so much in these past 6 days!

Yesterday I took the metro to the 7th arrondissement were I walked through the Champ de Mars park and saw the Eiffel Tower. And might I say that its nothing like I thought it'd be - Its so much bigger! And... its brown. I didn't bother going up the Tower though, the lineups were forever! I will go back another time. I did a lot of wandering, and ended the day off at the Are de Triumphe. Again, way bigger in real life. However, by the time I got to the Arc I was so hot, tired and hungry that I didn't bother taking many pictures of it. Guess i'll be going back there again too.

Today was just as busy. I woke up late, the baby slept in so I did too! Caroline went out shopping so I stayed with Victor, fed him and entertained him for a bit. By the time Caroline came home I was ready to go out again. Today I took a guided 'tour' of Monceau park. Well, it wasn't really a guided tour... I have this tour book, and one section has guided walks... so thats what that was.
The 'tour' took me all around the park, which was beautiful, and ended me off at St. Augustine. Since by this time I was parched and hungry I stopped at a bakery for a danish and iced tea... 3.50 euros, not too shabby!

After my snack I wasn't ready to go home yet, so I walked east on Boulevard Haussmann and ended up going to the famous Printemps and LaFayette department stores. First, may I say that those stores are gorgeous; however I was slightly intimidated to go in! There I am, all sweaty and worn out from my huge walk, and here is this obviously super expensive store with all these greeters/valets and whoever else standing at the door all dressed up in tuxedos! So naturally I was kinda like... maybe ill come back on a cooler day? lol, well I decided to hold my (sweaty) head high and wander in anyways... I figured at least go in for the air conditioning.

After going through the department stores and wandering the other stores like Gap, H&M, Mango, I ended up buying a pretty top at a random shop, and it was only 5 euros! So after all that I decided to head to the metro and end off my day. I will definitely go back again though, next time to shop for real.

Oh on a side note! I for one am in LOVE with the metro, its so fast, frequent and easy to use! And secondly, I thought it'd be interesting to note how many more lingerie stores they have here! I can only think of a couple main ones in Canada, but here they have a lot!

My first bike ride

Well! I was a bit nervous at first to venture out on the bike. Mostly because the cars drive a little crazy here and I have to ride on the road sometimes. Anyways, I got the hang of it really fast and I was able to go all over the place. For sure the bicycle is the best form of transportation here.

I drove my bike along the Saine river, towards the heart of the city, then I rode around on the Right Bank, in Bastilles and through the Bercy region. So I was in the 13th, 12th, 4th and 1st districts, or arrodissements.

What a great bike ride! My legs will be so sore tomorrow!! It was 3 hours!

Im here!

Well - apart from the desperate first day, where I felt like complete crap - this is putting it lightly. I was so tired, homesick and felt so alone! It was not good at all. But today was so much better. Ive caught up on some sleep, i'm getting over jetlag, eating regularly again. Getting my internet up and working made me feel so much better, that way I can be more in touch with everyone. Anyways!

Today I went around I'll de la Cite, walked by the Saine river. I went with the family here, we took the Metro (3 stops!) there and took the bus home (one bus!). Im getting familiar with the area, and I even found a EruoStore! So I picked up some stuff there, and believe it or not its the same kinda junk thats at our dollarstores at home.

I was at a Bercy's yesterday; a big WalMart like grocery store, and you would not believe how many different varietys of cheese, coffee, and yogurt there are!!! They have 1 whole long aisle just for yogurt, billions of different kinds. And 2 ailes for cheese!! Right now in the fridge there is a box with like 9 different kinds of cheese in it, and they have 3 different brands of yogurts in there too, all plain. Who knows?

Oh and lastly, you totally always see people walking around with baguettes. Everyone eats lots of bread - which I love.