So the past few days have been a real whirl of wind. After we walked ourselves out on Friday, Una passed out from jet lag and Casey and I walked around St Germain Des Pres where we stumbled upon what appeared to be a homeless-ish man giving a street concert in honor of Natalie Imbruglia. We then walked around the neighborhood where every store is an art gallery and saw a picture of Sammy. It's amazing that that many art galleries can be sustainable businesses.
"You're a little late, I'm already torn..."
Sammy!!
Then on Saturday we took the Metro to the Rue Cler where we walked around the street market and looked at cool stuff that we wanted, but had absolutely no practical purpose. Including: taxidermied penguins, giant buddhas, and 50 year old movie lights. After we strolled through there and ate an amazing lunch at Cafe Roussilon, we walked to the Eiffel Tower. It was the first time we had been there during the day and we also decided to take the ride up to the top. Unfortunately, Saturday afternoon is a terrible time to try to go to the top of the Eiffel Tower. We got up to the second floor, which was amazing and we got a ton of great pictures. We attempted, once again, to get up to the top, but the line was just way to long. Oh well, it was probably stupid anyway. stupid eiffel tower. When we finally decided we needed to get down, Una and I made Casey walk down the 700 hundred or so windy steps to the bottom, all while getting a lesson in why the French don't value the same safety regulations we Americans enjoy. We trudged through the riff raff selling garbage and hustling people in 3 card monte to the Trocadero, where we took the Metro to the Champs Elysees. Walking past the stores and through the Winter Village that seemed to pop up over night, Una had her first crepe and Casey drank some hot wine, which was, as predicted, super terrible. Then we ended up back at the apartment where we got ready for Sunday.
Sunday - Not much happened on Sunday. We walked around the Marais and then had lunch in a gay restaurant. We watched the Lions on score updates and then Casey called her dad and talked to him a while about how weak the secondary is. We rested up for our big day on Monday...
Monday - Champagne Campaign! The day started pretty bad, but then got super awesome, then kind of nervous, and then capped off with the worst meal we've had so far (outside of the meals I've attempted to microwave from the Votre Marche). We got up and ready for Champagne country around 5 am, which was bad, but not the bad part. We got on the Metro and to the train station with plenty of time before our train left. This was good and I was feeling good about it. We then attempted to print off our tickets from a kiosk, but were denied. This was bad. I went to about 3 different ticket offices before I found someone who could print them off, so I did! This was good. I ran back to the terminal with time to spare. I thought this was good. I had printed off the tickets for Casey and I, but forgot I had Una's information too. So we went back to the ticket office and watched our train pull away. This was real bad. Then Casey made us realize that maybe, just maybe, Paris might have more than one train going to Champagne. So we changed our tickets and got on the next train and still made it on time for our first tour. She is so smart and works well under pressure. I was just going to tear up the tickets and start shoving people onto the tracks. So we arrive in Reims at around 9, but nobody told us the entire town was under construction. This made it rather difficult to follow the map, and we may have done a few circles before we arrived at Mumm. The tour started with a video about the winery and then we went down to the cellar. This was very cool and informational and blah blah blah. We then drank some of the best champagne ever and took away a few souvenirs from the boutique. Then we walked back to the train station and caught our ride to Epernay. The timing, was a little off, but theoretically it could have worked. We arrived at around 1:30 and didn't have our tour at Moet and Chandon until 3 and then we had to catch our train back to Paris at 4:30. So we wandered around the Avenue de Champagne and looked at all the champagne houses. All the ones we saw required reservations or weren't open, so we stepped into a bar that specialized in.... champagne. We all had two glasses and then needed to get going, but the French have a thing called wine takeaways. and at this bar, you could buy a bottle and drink it in the restaurant for like 60-80 euros, or buy a takeaway bottle for 20 euros. So we took one away. We went back to the Moet house and bought our tickets for the tour, even though we knew we were cutting it awfully close. After trying to step into the Dutch tour, we joined the English tour and had a set time, that we decided no matter where we were, we would leave and get to the train station. So we take the tour. And it is exactly the same as the Mumm tour. A few more mentions of Dom Perignon and Napolean, but otherwise identical. So it was closing in our time and I asked the guide how much more there was in the tour just as we were ending. So we decided we could squeeze a few more minutes if it meant we got to have a few glasses of Moet. We waited in the tasting room as long as we could and then decided to sprint back to the train station. Thankfully we made it in plenty of time for our train and then rode back to Paris with Champagne in tow. We were pretty beat after a long day and wanted a good meal and then to head to bed. The meal we got was pretty mediocre and the creme brulee Una ordered was awful. Oh well. Tomorrow she flies back to Philly then to Texas. Casey and I will take a nap day.
