The Great NE Trip Part II

We accomplished our goal of waking up and leaving at 6am from Nashville. The only problem was the very slow valet man. We were on the road with hot starbucks in hand by 630am! Pretty impressive, don’t ya think?

The drive was very foggy and bright but luckily Ben slept through all of that. We made a pit stop in Marion, Tennessee at Subway and then one more stop at Dairy Queen to get an Oreo/M&M Blizzard to get our sugar levels up. 

This was our first attempt at the Virginia sign! It kind of snuck up on us...

We did a u-turn on the highway and tried again!! Haha!

The traffic was pretty bad around Arlington but we made it to Washington DC at 6pm! With the time change, that’s another 11 hour drive.

Our hotel is right in the middle of the city so we were able to walk around downtown before dinner. We saw the White House, the Treasury, the Washington Monument, and a glimpse of the Capitol. 

Dinner was at Old Ebbitt Grill, a recommendation from a friend who lived in DC for a time. The restaurant was across the street from the White House and the food was delicious!

The Great Northeastern Trip Part I

Ben has accepted a job with the FASB/GASB in Norwalk, CT and decided he wanted to drive all his things up to his new home. He (kindly) asked me to go with him and I (gladly) accepted! I have named this trip our “Great Northeastern Trip.” Hopefully the trip itself will live up to the name!

Day One of the trip:

We left Dallas bright and early at 8am heading east on 30. We made a pit stop in Texarkana, a Subway lunch break in Little Rock and made it to the famous Graceland by 3. 

Graceland is a place of its own. I don’t know if I can recommend it to anyone since we actually didn’t make it inside. We decided the $70 entry fee wasn’t worth it and we made a trip to the gift shop, then turned around and walked right back out.

11 hours after we pulled out of Dallas we arrived in Nashville. We passed the time by playing crossword puzzles on my new Kindle Fire, scanning the local radio stations and quizzing each other on New Years Resolutions and what we hope to see in the upcoming year. Overall the drive flew by until the last hour. We were pretty ready to get out of the car at that point.

Once in Nashville we got fancy cocktails at “The Patterson House,” a recommendation from Patrick Timson. It mimics a speakeasy from the 1920s, down to the curtains at the front that separate the hostess from the bar itself. The cocktails take about 5-7 miuntes EACH for the bartender to create but they were worth it. Anyone visiting Nashville should make a stop here.

We grabbed dinner at “Uptown Flats,” a recommendation from a friend who lives in Nashville. We missed the Wine Down Wednesday by 5 minutes, but still enjoyed our flatbread pizzas before crawling home to fall asleep. We hope to leave for DC at 6am in the morning….we’ll see how that goes!! 

 We thought this billboard was pretty funny. Tax refunds cashed at a fried chicken establishment! Maybe this is my new calling!!

Tennessee State Capitol in Nashville

Christmastime in New York City

Aunt Carol decided for her 60^th birthday she wanted to go to New York City! The timing was perfect since it was Oliver’s 4^th birthday as well and the rest of the girls decided we could celebrate with them J

It was a short trip up to the Big Apple but we crammed in as much as we could.

The first night we met Kelly, Oliver, Carol and Mike at Kelly’s apartment in Brooklyn for a warm homemade meal and an evening of trimming the Christmas tree.

The next morning Mom and I enjoyed a diner breakfast then met the family at the subway and headed to Radio City Music Hall to see the Rockettes perform. After the show we saw the famous Rockefeller Christmas tree and ice skating rink. Then Mom, Kristen, Lesley and I puttered around the city seeing: Central Park, 5^th Avenue all dressed up for Christmas, Bryant Park, and the windows at Macys. 

Sunday morning the girls ate a Mediterranean brunch at Miriam’s, one of Kelly’s favorites. Then we made our way to see a matinee performance of The Lion King. It was a tad scarier than we all remember but we enjoyed it nonetheless.

It was a late night flight coming home, with a few mishaps on an unnamed airline (Delta) but mom and I finally made it home by 1am! Needless to say 8am Monday morning came too soon!!

It was such an incredible weekend and I am so thankful Aunt Carol and Oliver were born so we could all celebrate with them!

My Last Day in Paris!

Trying to figure out the right thing to do on my last day in Paris was kind of hard. I was trying to decide what I hadnt done, what I wanted to see one last time, who wanted to do these things with me....

First thing on the Last Day List: Climb to the top of the Eiffel Tower. (No, I havent done this yet)

Could these boys look more American?! LA Dodgers and Texas Rangers...wow!

Pre-climb shot

About 300 steps later, we made it to the first level!

Since we got there early, and took the stairs instead of the lift, we skipped a HUGE line!

668 steps later, we made it to the second level!

In Paris, people do love locks on bridges around the city. They lock the locks to the bridge and then throw the key in the river. Ben thought it would be nice to be original and put a lock on the Eiffel Tower instead. And no, even though Ben wanted to, we did NOT throw the keys off the side of the tower!

Next stop, the top level. You are not permitted to take the stairs to the top, you have to take the lift. You have to buy a separate ticket to get to the elevator to go to the very top. Ben, Luke and I learn this after waiting in line on the second level for about 20 minutes. Then, every single ticket office was closed.....one of the security guards told us to "just wait" until they open again. He said it might be 30 or 40 minutes until it opens again.....We could not make sense of this wack system the Eiffel Tower has going on here....we didnt make it up to the top after all due to the poor running of the tower ticket office. Maybe next time!

Lunch was at an Asian restaurant that I have come to love and dont even know the name of! We get the same thing every time: Bo Bun. It is basically egg noodles, ground beef, onions, and chopped up egg rolls. So tasty and gets you very full for only 5 euro!

Next, we biked around the city, made a pit stop at the Luxembourg Gardens

The boys left to go to Germany on a night train and I went to dinner with Mary Cameron at a souffle restaurant I ran across a week ago....the menu looked good and the place looked fancy so I thought we would try it out!

I got the tomato basil souffle. When it arrived, the waiter poked holes in it and poured tomato basil soup into the middle of it! 

None of my clothes fit anymore....this is probably why....I wont be eating like I have these past 3 months ever again :(

 Chocolate souffle for dessert. Again, the waiter poked holes and poured in piping hot chocolate syrup

 Im going to miss ya MC! Youve been such a great friend this summer

 We took an evening stroll after dinner and I fell in love with the city all over again. It is a completely different city at night when everything is lit up. I cant believe how beautful this city is and how blessed I am that I got to live here for 3 months!

A Few thoughts looking back:

Paris smells as bad as it is pretty. People use the public walkways and stairwells to do their business. Also, Europeans dont shower or wash their clothes. Oh my gosh, does this city smell bad. The only cure to this was walking by a bakery at just the right time when the pastries have just come out of the oven.

French children might be the cutest children in the world. Their parents dress them like little adults but they run around (obviously) like the 3 and 4 year olds that they are. Too cute

I will never be able to have this kind of traveling freedom again. But I think I took advantage of it as much as possible

I have the best friends and family in the world and they are in Texas :) You never know how much you are loved until you leave and get sweet messages begging you to come home

My clothes are fitting very tight these days...so this means no more drinking, no more bread, no more cheese, lots more running, lots more spin classes

My Only Regrets: 

I wish I had biked more and took the metro less. You learn the city so much better when you are above ground rather than below it.

I wish I had learned French over here....like hired a French tutor or something. Seems like a missed opportunity to be over here for so long and not at least get a grasp of the language

I wish I had taken one or two more cooking classes. Those are some of my favorite memories!

I cannot believe that this summer it is over. A chapter in my life is ending and now I return to reality....a new apartment and a real live j-o-b. Yikes. A far cry from my strolling life I have been living in Paris.

Im so happy to be going home though! I have missed everyone so much and it will be so nice to be back to my American life I have been delaying for 3 months! My flight leaves at 1130am tomorrow morning!! Get me back to the Texas heat! 

Geneva, Switzerland

Pure coincidence: Ian was picking up Mark, Tamsin and Lena in Geneva, Switzerland the morning I was leaving Burgundy. Ben had heard great things throughout the summer about Lake Geneva and the surrounding area and it was a small 3 hour train from Paris. So I rode with Ian to Geneva and met Ben at the train station in Geneva and did some exploring in the lake town....

For dinner we went to Hotel Edelweiss (Sound of Music anyone??). It was very cheesy, very Disney-esque, but so fun! There was live music, yodeling, St Bernard dogs everywhere, Asian tourists galore, and the most delicious fondue! Gave Simply Fondue a run for its money

The famous flower clock in the English gardens

We decided to leave the sunbathing by the lake and take a bus tour around the city. The tour actually costs a pretty penny so we were looking forward to some good sights and a good tour guide....oh wow. Wrong on all counts. First off, here is a picture of our bus driver...texting! Second, as we got on the bus and Indian family of 4 had taken 4 window seats in four different rows...taking up 8 seats! So Ben and I couldnt sit together...

 Our tour guide then showed us around the city...ugly buildings and a bad accent didnt mesh too well and Ben and I became very antsy. We knew it was a bad sign when she showed us the "2nd most important building" on the tour and it was a horrid looking Dept of Labor building. The #1 building was neat though...the United Nations:

The guides accent is very strong and it is hard to understand what she is saying. The Canadians behind us kept yelling up to the front asking her what she said, and what was the building to the left? The guide got so frustrated with them she began saying "maam I already told you twice! thats the XYZ building!!!" It became pretty comical

The head of the family of 4 thought that the 45 Swiss Franks spent on the tour was a good price for a 2 hour nap....

Ben being very tacky....

Overall, Geneva is a very neat city, but really only because the lake is so gorgeous and because the entire town has a beach culture feel to it with people picnicking, BBQing, drinking, lounging and laying out at all hours of the day. Interlaken and Gimmewald beat out this Switzerland city.....It is pretty fun though to say I have been to Switzerland twice in one week :)

Tomorrow is my last day in Paris.....