In Paris

Well, we made it to Paris. We left home at 5am on Saturday with Pranaba and Parvati, so that they can take our car back to village. Bless these souls for their graciousness and service.

We had a nice flight to Chicago and after a few hours at the Chicago airport another nice flight to Paris. We landed in Paris at 9:55am. Despite our 7 pieces of luggage (including carry-ons), we wanted to brave the railways to our hotel. Let's just say that it was an adventure. I wouldn't recommend venturing into the metro system unless you have a small carry-on or a backpack. It is not trivial to go through the turnstyles when you need to maneuver 3-4 pieces of luggage. Even to get out of the metro system you have to re-insert your ticket and not only go through a turnstyle but also through a one way, one person gate that only opens for a second after you go through the turnstyle. Suzanne got literally trapped between the turnstyle and the gate waiting to be picked up by the local police :-) Luckily a young man who had not exited yet, put his ticket through the machine so that Suzanne's gate would open. He ended up jumping over the turnstyle while holding the gate open. He must have done it before. I think we will take the cab on our way to the airport on Tuesday.

We arrived at our hotel at 12:30pm, were able to check-in early. So we freshened up a bit and headed out towards Louvre. On the way, just a few blocks from our hotel, we found this cute little restaurant called Seraphine and had a delicious lunch there. The atmosphere was just what you would expect from a Parisian restaurant.

We then walked over to Louvre and spent about three hours there following the tour described in Ric Steves' Paris travel book. That was just the right amount of Louvr'ing for the day.