Jetset Joanna: France

National Lampoon's Family Vacation Part One: Paris Recommendations

8:57 PM

Falling In Louvre In Paris (& Tours)

4:31 PM

This past weekend it was back to Paris, but with a special guest: John! A little over a month ago he decided he wanted to come but I wasn’t about to hold my breath because who actually just takes time off work and flies all the way to Paris to see their girlfriend? Well, luckily enough for me, he does!

We reunited at around 10am Saturday morning, and to my surprise he had found his way from the airport to the airbnb with a very limited amount of problems (his French is pretty much “bonjour” et “merci” so I'm banking on the fact that a lot of French people speak English ;). But, with the time change he could barely keep his eyes open so he, in what would turn out to be a recurring theme of the weekend, took a nap while I planned out where to go.

The second priority was food, so I led us to a small and deceiving hole-in-the-wall crepe and galette place nearby that looks pretty average but is actually really well known. And, for a good reason. We each got an enormous chorizo, goat cheese, and potato galette (Tgod buckwheat flour has no gluten) and agreed that they were one of the most delicious things we’ve ever had, minus the fact that towards the end I didn’t think I’d be able to finish mine without vomiting (I did finish sans vomit though, tgod because I just can't turn down food like that).

yes I had already taken a bite before the pic #hangry

As we ate, we walked to the Luxembourg Gardens, sat and people-watched while enjoying the beautiful weather, took some pics, and digested our massive meal. Once we felt a little less bloated, we meandered through St. Germain – a beautiful neighborhood with plenty of stores so basically I was salivating at the window displays the entire time. We ended up working our way to the Seine, where we engaged in one of the most touristy but also highly necessary things – the love lock bridge. Seriously, we couldn't go to Paris and not do it, so bear with us. We found a cool hand-painted lock, put our names and the date on it, and tried to find a spot. But sadly, the love lock bridge was taken down as it was too heavy (an outrage if you ask me, like just FIO), so we settled for placing our lock with the other non conformers on a fence overlooking the Seine (basically the same, right?)

jardins de Luxembourg

squinty

finding a perfect spot may or may not have taken 10 minutes

pop, *lock*, and drop it... into a squat

I then proceeded (on video) to try and throw the key into the water, not realizing there was a sidewalk below us, and almost nailed a small child in the head….suuuuper awkard but also a great representation of our relationship as it’s pretty much just me embarrassing myself constantly. So, we had to walk down to the sidewalk, pick up the keys, and try again… second time’s the charm, right?

After that typical day-in-the-life moment, we worked our way over the right bank, I dragged John to Starbucks and then he dragged me to the lawn in front of the Louvre where he once again napped…but tbh I may have napped for a little as well so no complaints there. And, I entertained myself by taking pictures of him sleeping so it was a GT for sure.

human pillow

We then tried to sugar ourselves up at Angelina’s but the line was ridiculous so we passed and got some macaroons instead, or I should say I force fed him macaroons. Then it was back to the airbnb for some more extensive (read: two hours) napping before heading out to a late dinner at Bouillon Chartier, which was fast, pretty, delicious, and cheap, so basically all we wanted/needed. Then we hopped on the metro, drank 3 euro wine from the bottle like you can only do in France (#ballinonabudget) and headed back to St. Germain to a bar/club I had read about called Le Cavern. It’s a wine bar on the first floor for if you're classy and wine cellar club in the basement for when you're feeling trashy. The drinks weren’t cheap, but they were quite strong and the music was American, even though the DJ played Kanye when we asked for Drake (we’re still a little salty but it’s fine). We ended up staying until 2:30am, which definitely did not help John’s adjustment to the time zone, but ~YOLO~ we were in Paris and there were tequila shots soooo.

spot the preppy american

can't decide if keeping it in the bag made it worse or not

seemed like a good idea at the time

We ended up not leaving the airbnb the next day until 1:00, slightly ashamed, looking good, and feeling better. We then checked in at our hotel for Sunday night, which was right by the Eiffel Tower, picked up some GF bread, ham, cheese, apples, beer, Gatorade and chips at the supermarket and had a picture-perfect picnic/hangover detox at the Champ du Mars in front of the Eiffel Tower. We ended up staying there for a while as it was such a nice day out, then worked our way over to the Trocadero Gardens for more views aka ~artsy pics~ and over to Bert’s Café for some much needed coffee where we channeled our inner old French man and people-watched from our table on the sidewalk. On our walk back to the hotel, we caught the sunset over the Seine with the Eiffel Tower in the background and may or may not have taken some selfies, but no shame because it was beautiful. (Side note: watch out NYC, Paris is getting up there in my list of favorite cities).

nothing better

don't ask how we took this picture

follow-up to the #followmeto

don't kill me

cliché but still love it

After some more napping on John’s part, we headed to dinner at Le Petit Cler, which was, to no surprise, delicious, and finished just before 11:00 so we had time to sprint-walk over to the Eiffel Tower and catch it all lit up. You could definitely say it was très romantique besides the men constantly trying to sell us wine and champagne. To say we didn't almost take them up on their offer would be a lie but we probably would've passed out on the Champ du Mars right then and there if we had more wine in our system. So, we headed back to the hotel for some much needed (?) sleep.

even prettier at night

Monday morning we were up and at ‘em around 11:00 (impressive for us) and headed straight to Angelina for take two. We were much more successful and gorged ourselves on their world-famous hot chocolate. The name is deceiving though, because this was not your average Swiss Miss, and tgod for that bc the price was worth approximately 100 packets of Swiss Miss. It was literally a melted chocolate bar. We left feeling fat, dumb, and oh-so-happy (minus the fact that John thinks he’s lactose intolerant, whoops). Then I dragged us across the city to a disappointing GF bakery, and made John be truly French and buy a ham and cheese baguette at the bakery next door before we headed to the train (aka another location to nap).

pinkies up

I tried

By 3:30, we were back in Tours, and got John settled into his airbnb. Seeing as Tours isn’t the most exciting city in the world and I had class a lot Tuesday and Wednesday, I’ll spare you all the details of our time here. But, we did have some more great food, and on Tuesday night (our one year anniversary) we celebrated the only way we knew how by drinking wine at dinner, then splitting a bottle of champagne, and then going to a favorite local bar with an eclectic (?) range of very sexual shot names (all in English, of course) such as “Sex & Fire” and “Blow Job.” (Sorry, mom & dad).

had to go to my fave cafe in Tours

wish I could've watched him try to speak French when buying these

legitimate piece of pepper

eclectic for sure

carbs = great end to a great week

This morning, after realizing at 5:30am that he left his backpack at dinner the night before, we frantically contacted the restaurant and by some unusual luck, the owner had come in early so we grabbed his bag and legitimately sprinted to the train station where John had a 6:19am three hour train with two stops, then a three hour wait at the airport before take off...the things he does for me! Much love and many thanks to him for making the trek all the way out here to see me, Paris, and Tours, but mostly the back of his eyelids, and for keeping me company during my otherwise lonely days! And, here’s to hoping he gets some naps in on the plane ride back ;) See you (& Tom Brady) in December!!! <3

À bientôt!

Joanna

France

06896 Takes The 75000

10:14 PM

Amboise & Bordeaux

More Chateaux and A Quick Trip to Bordeaux

2:20 PM

I may have yet to travel much outside of France, but within France? I'm making my mark.

This past Saturday we had a group excursion to the nearby town of Amboise, a little over thirty minutes away. Although we had a prep session the day before, we all know how skilled I am at tuning out anything history-related so I really didn't know what to expect besides that we were going to see yet another chateau as well as the house of Leonardo Da Vinci. Needless to say I rolled out of bed rather reluctantly Saturday morning and made my way to the bus at 9:45.

After a short drive we arrived at a beautiful town right on the Loire River with a fortress/chateau high above it. We got a quick glimpse of the quaint village and were informed of an amazing chocolate shop (priorities, priorities) as we trekked our way up the hill to the chateau. Luckily, at least in my opinion, only 20 percent of the chateau remains today because the other 80 percent was taken down and repurposed (I think?? Again, not good with history). As a result, there wasn't a whole lot to see so the tour was rather quick tgod, tgod. And, we got a private tour which was also a saving grace because - surprise surprise! - we saw our Viking River Cruise friends who were so hard of hearing they walked around with headphones in that were connected to their tour guide's microphone... serious #oldpeopleproblems. But, the chateau did have some killer views of the city and the river and the grounds were beautifully manicured. Plus, we saw a small chapel where Da Vinci is buried. But, that's not scientifically proven so I guess everyone's just going with it because it sounds cool and impressive. I'm not going to question it.

just 1/5 of what it was...

royal views

hey Leo

Afterwards, we had some free time to explore and eat so, in another shocking turn of events, after we finished eating our lunches we went straight to the chocolate store. Good? Yes. Beyond expensive? Yes. I got a giant bear-shaped chocolate covered marshmallow that was definitely worth the multiple euros. Next stop was some beyond-necessary coffee and then we wandered around the village. Most of the stores were closed for some reason so that was kind of annoying but we enjoyed window shopping.

Cadet Kelly

chocolate shop on the right

peep the VRC people in the back

After meeting up again, we began our walk to Clos Lucé, the house that some king had built for Da Vinci so he would come live in France. All that effort for Da Vinci to only live there two years and then pass away... whoops. The house was nice and small aka a mansion by today's standards but a cute little country cottage by a king's standards. We walked around, saw a bunch of small-scale versions of his inventions in the basement, didn't even pretend to understand them, and then explored the immense grounds. They also had life-sized replicas of his inventions on the grounds which were fun to play with even if we were too heavy for the tank to move and made all of the little kids annoyed.

quaint, right?

not a bad place to spend the end of your life

the grass is always greener...when you're not allowed to walk on it

The last stop of the day, which was unbeknownst to us, was a glass-blowing factory built into a rock cliff. Although it was approximately 5000 degrees in the cave-thing (the technical term), we got to watch a glass blower make a vase (? unclear) which was really really cool. Afterwards, we explored the showroom but then our VRC friends showed up and took over so we made a run for it. We finally returned home around 6pm only for me to realize I forgot my key. My host parents were out and so I was homeless until a little after 8, but lucky enough to have friends to foster me for those two hours :)

why it's called glass blowing

vase?

Sunday morning, I was up at 6:30 to head down to Bordeaux. My friend Katie and I took a 7:30 train from Tours and arrived in Bordeaux at 10:30. We knew we wanted to do some kind of wine tour because it'd be criminal not to, but that was pretty much all we had planned. So, we got off the train, figured out the tram system and headed to the tourist office for some help. We basically got laughed at for saying we wanted to do a wine tour the day of, so we settled for trying to do a wine tasting in the city. The brochure said you didn't need a reservation but the place closed at 1:30 on Sundays, so we attempted to take the tram back across the city to the wine tasting. Being our tourist selves, we couldn't figure out which tram to take and crossed from one side of the tracks to the other at least three times before some woman took pity on us and helped us out.

We finally got to the wine tasting only for it to be closed with a sign on the door saying to go to another location. We found that place, went inside and literally thought we were in someone's apartment. We asked the guy if we could do a wine tasting and he told us they were doing a brunch at the moment and to come back at 2:00. I looked at him beyond confused and showed him his own brochure that said they closed at 1:30. Casually, he responded that they had changed their hours and just didn't think to change the brochure. Typical Europeans.

We made a reservation for 2:00, and went off to grab a very expensive but nice lunch outside in a large square. We then headed back to the apartment? wine place? don't know what to call it. Turns out, we got a private tasting of 4 wines in wine glasses approximately the size of our heads. We learned a lot, drank a lot, and enjoyed ourselves a lot. But, we didn't pay a lot. All of that for only 12,90 Euro. So, if you're ever in Bordeaux, do a wine tasting at Be The Wine! Your head might regret it, but your wallet won't.

We then booked it to the port where we had a 3:30 boat tour of Bordeaux and its many bridges. Again, we were definitely the youngest people on the boat by 40 years. And the tour guide said everything in French then repeated it in English so it was twice as fun. An hour and a half of this was a little much and I'd be lying if I said I didn't have a nice nap on the boat, but it was cool to see Bordeaux from another perspective when I wasn't too busy seeing the back of my eyelids.

they promised the water isn't dirty...

the future "wine city" of Bordeaux...I'll be back for that

miroir d'eau (mirror of water)

We finished the tour at 5:00, and headed back to the tourist office for our bus tour of Bordeaux. While waiting for the bus tour we got lured in by a 40(?) year old guy selling candy (I wish I was joking) on the street. He was so excited to talk to Americans and we proceeded to have an entire conversation about how American girls are "bitchy" and "want to call the police" every time a guy tries to flirt with them. This conversation lasted at least 15 minutes because I felt like if I tried to end the conversation I'd look like the "bitchy American girl" on her way to "call the police". I mean, that's exactly who I wanted to be, but my pride kept me standing there, hiding my RBF as best I could. In the end we got a few free roasted peanuts and didn't get kidnapped so it was a win in my book.

But, our good luck ended there. The bus was supposed to be come at 5:45 but, in typical French fashion, they didn't come out and tell us that it had broken down until 6:00. We were exhausted anyways so we got reimbursed and then headed to dinner. We found another adorable square with some guy singing opera and plenty of restaurants with outdoor seating and treated ourselves to a three course meal and some amazing local wine, all for under 20 Euro per person.

cheers to good wine and a good day

highly necessary

ended the day on a very good note

Then, it was off to the train station for our 8:30 train home. I got home around 11:45 and don't think I'd ever been so happy to see my bed. But, the exhaustion was totally worth the spontaneous Bordeaux trip and I can definitely see why it was voted the best destination in Europe. Every building looked like it belonged at Versailles and it was definitely one of the cleanest cities I've ever been in. Plus, the wine. That's all that really matters.

Cheers!
Joanna

National Lampoon's Family Vacation Part One: Paris Recommendations

Falling In Louvre In Paris (& Tours)

06896 Takes The 75000

More Chateaux and A Quick Trip to Bordeaux

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