November 16 - Arrive Paris

Bonjour - Arrival into Paris
Our flight arrived an hour early into Paris. The wheel chair was waiting for mom when we arrived. While she waited for the luggage, I called Viator for our transfer.

We shared the shuttle with some people who were from South Africa and were in Paris for a convention. When the guy in the front seat got dropped off, the guy from South Africa said he thought he was the Gonshee (sp?). Apparently, a Gonshee is the person who drives with the taxi drivers to make sure that people pay them. LOL

The Royal St. Germain
Our hotel room wasn't ready when we arrived, so they told us to come back in 45 minutes.

St. Germain Area
We were excited to check out the area around the hotel anyhow. Right next door were two great and very inexpensive clothing stores. There was also an H&M down the street and a store called Yves Rocher that had a lot of orange and chocolate scented lotions.

Check-In
When we checked into our room, it had two beds together and another bed under the sloped ceiling. The room reminded me of the upstairs at the cottage. The hotel was very small and funky....about 66 rooms total (and we were in room 66). We put our belongings in the room and headed out again as the weather was beautiful, about 53 degrees and sunny!

Luxembourg Gardens
We walked over to Luxembourg Gardens. It was very busy. So many people stop just to have lunch or rest in the park and enjoy the scenery.

We asked some girls how to get to the Latin Quarter because they said they spoke English, and one girl thought we were looking for a strip club. She got hysterical when she realized that wasn't what we were looking for.

Latin Quarter
We walked through the gardens and to the Latin Quarter area. We saw them delivering mail to the Senate with guys dressed in black following behind. That was sort of cool!

The Latin Quarter was okay, but we liked the St. Germain area, where were were staying a little better.

Back to St. Germain
We walked back to the hotel and I was starving. I figured that it was dinner time. As we passed a corner store with pastries and paninis, I asked mom if she wanted that (because she was admiring them earlier). She said she didn't, so we looked at menus at about 10 different restaurants before we ended up at Hippopotamus, which is like the Denny's of Paris. It definitely wasn't a most memorable meal. I had a salad with a piece of bread with warm goat cheese and a vinaigrette dressing (nothing else on it). While we were eating, I realized that it was only 3:00 p.m. We were so exhausted, and I know you're supposed to stay awake, but we decided to take a short nap. When we woke up, we went out and shared a Nutella crepe, that's when we discovered that they charge you more to dine in than to take out. That must be where McDonald's got that idea from! There was a place called C&A down the street, and I thought it was a sugar factory. We discovered that it was a mall! It was close to closing, so we just took a quick look around.

That sums up day 1 in Paris!