Bonjour Paris!

The holiday has been non stop for ma & pa since they arrived... So Tuesday morning it was up at the crack of dawn again and off to Kings Cross St Pancras station to catch the Eurostar to Paris.... ah Paris! Definitely one of my favourite cities and I was sooo excited about going back and showing mum and dad all of the sights. One of the best moments was coming out of the tube station at the stop for our hotel and seeing mum's face - I think she fell in love with Paris as quickly as I did!

We got in at about 10am and headed to our hotel in Republique - we managed to find it without tooo much hassle and dropped our stuff off before heading out to explore. We stopped at a cafe to rehydrate ourselves... dad and I had a beer since we were on holiday (we figured it was 5 o'clock some where in the world even thought it was only about 10:30am ...on a Tuesday... in Paris!). We then started walking towards the Rue de Rivoli soaking up the Paris as we went. We stopped at a fruit stall and stocked up, then went next door to the pastry shop and stocked up on all of the naughty treats. We headed across the lane to Forum Les Halles and chilled out in the park eating our lunch and watching the world go by - this was a fantastic break. We carried on down to the Louve and then through Concorde to the Champ Elysses. Dad had his camera on hand and was snap happy as we went (sorry how many thousand photos did we take pop?). By the time we got 1/2 way up the Champ Elysses we were all buggered! So it was onto the Metro and back to Republique for a bit of dinner and some delicious pastries for desert! Yep we managed to sample a fair few of the delicious items on offer!

The next day we had a bit of a late start and once we finally ripped ourselves out of bed we jumped on an open deck bus tour and got driven around Paris. This was a great way to get our bearings and figure out which things we wanted to do during the day. We went past some incredible buildings, the architecture is stunning and so intricate. Dad spent half his time generally blown away by the various buildings around the city. We hopped off at Notre Dame and went through the cathedral - it is an absolutely overwhelming place. We spent a bit of time wandering around looking at the stained glass and taking in all of the complexities that took over 200 years to build. We lit a candle for nana and then headed out to regroup over brunch before carrying on.

After brunch in the Latin Quarter we wandered down the Seine and stopped to look through the stalls for various Parisian souveneirs - we were not disappointed! Yes I bought pictures, and a xmas decoration, and a T-Shirt and another beret.... hey tourist crap is part of the experience! and I like my purchases.... anyway enough of defending my shopping habits - we jumped back on the bus and headed towards the Eiffel Tower. We jumped in the queue and went up to the top! The view is incredible - last time we were up there at night and the view is totally different so it was excellent to get to see everything during the day as well. Have to admit though it was a bit busier on a nice spring day compared to a cold winters night! After battling the crowds we got to the bottom of the Eiffel Tower and jumped on the boat which took us cruising down the Seine passed a number of landmarks. This was quite a relaxing way to spend an hour or two before jumping off at the Champ Elysses and hitting the shops. There was only so much shopping we could do before dad (and his credit card) started having a hernia! (just kidding dad...) So we headed off in search of dinner. We managed to find a bistro near the Champ del Mar (right by the Eiffel Tower) - the plan was to have a delicious dinner and then head over to see the tower light up! Well our delicious dinner was a little bizarre, we managed to experience some very poor service (just stuff like removing the plate while we were still eating, general rudeness, spillages etc), the food was pretty average but the thing that really got mum was that they took our left over bread and put it in a new tray for the next customers... not cool! Anyway after dinner we headed to the Eiffel tower and spent a couple of hours just people watching, taking photos and waiting for it to sparkle at the strike of 10pm!

We had a bit of a second wind and decided to head to the Louve to take some night photos as well, we jumped in a cab and I managed to ask the taxi driver to take us there completely in French - 'Le louve sil vous plait' (English Translation - The Louve please) ok so not that hard but enough to impress the driver and mum and dad! Once we had taken another hundred or so photos we jumped on the Metro and headed for the hotel to collapse for another night!

Day 3 in Paris... still so much to see and again we tried for an early start but hey we are on holiday! So after breakfast it was off to the Louve to battle the crowds and take in a little culture. We hit the Mona Lisa and Venus de Milo first up - it was insane how crowded it was and everyone was hot grumpy and pushy - the perfect way to enjoy some of the finest art in the world! Anyway we let that section pretty quickly and went and had a look at Loius XV's coronation crown and the Napolean Apartments. These were things that I never saw last time and it was a much more pleasant experience to wander through these exhibitions than our first stop.

We left the Louve and mum and dad went through St Chapelle chapel while I went and did a little more shopping along the Seine... We reconvened in the square and then went for a little more shopping along the Rue de Rivoli as we wandered back to our hotel. That night was a pretty chilled out night as we knew we had another big day ahead of us tomorrow.

We woke up in the morning and checked out of hotel. We caught a cab to the car rental place and that wasnt all that inspiring as far as preparing to drive in Paris. He was in and out of traffic and it felt like rod rules were more of a loose guideline than hard and fast! He even managed to roll back and hit the car behind us while we were witing at the lights... no stopping to check if anything was damaged it was just back in gear and away we go! Anyway we picked up our little black racer and headed out of Paris. The first hurdle for me (apart from the wrong side of the car and the wrong side of the road).... the famed Arc de Triomphe roundabout! Yep this is the one where no insurance company will cover you if you crash and on average there is an accident on there every 6 minutes! So off we tootle and with my supreme driving skills and dad's excellent navigation we managed to get the exit we needed on the first go with no fender benders, no toots and our sanity in tact - I dont think mum even closed her eyes! Excellent result!

We drove through the french countryside towards Zurich, it was a nice drive and we saw alot of cows! Dad could tell you what they were.... he told us the breed each time he saw some - haha! We stocked up on supplies before we crossed the border into Switzerland and managed to get to our hotel where we were meeting Shane. After 9 hours of being on the road we were a bit knackered so it was a couple of beers in the bar before hitting the hay! We are really making sure that the oldies are getting the most out of their time in Europe - they will be heading back to NZ for a holiday!

Next stop Switzerland....