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Published: June 14th 2017
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Geo: 50.8371, 4.36761
OK, so the departure from Paris was a little stressful! Our host had asked us to be out by 10am, but told me that it was OK to leave our luggage. So, as we were leaving the boat at 9am, to explore the Bastille area, I was a little surprised when she said we had to be back to collect the luggage by 11am! But, ever the optimists re time, we headed off to see the Bastille area before collecting the car. The Bastille was still underwhelming (there is nothing to see there, really) but we walked through a market (M had the biggest pear in the world!) and went to the Place de Vosges, which we thought was very pretty but the kids thought the real appeal was that it had a playground!
We then had a few false starts to find the correct location of the Peugeot branch where we were to collect the car (which was near La Defense), and by the time we had the car paperwork completed, it was already nearly midday, and the GPS was telling us we were an hour away from the boat due to traffic. A truly memorable experience was driving
through central Paris, with Steven trying to get used to the new car (a Peugeot 5008, not yet released in Australia but very nice) and traffic coming at us from EVERY direction. We had the kids being absolutely silent, and were very surprised when, one block before the Arc de Triomphe, Tom yells "Bunnies!" Sure enough, there were hundreds of rabbits on the centre of the roundabout! Why the French traffic engineers haven't thought of the simple concept of lanes when driving is beyond me! The Arc de Triomphe saw dozens of lanes of traffic trying to merge together – there were cars at 270 degrees to each other, all trying to inch through the intersection without being killed! We got back to the boat, dealt with our hostess, got the luggage and were rather glad to get out of Paris and onto the motorway to Brussels!
It was wonderful to see Miranda and Johnathon when we arrived – they have a beautiful home in the centre of Brussels (although 6 floors of stairs is certainly a workout for the thighs!), and whilst we traumatized their dog and two cats with the arrival of 3 noisy children, it was fantastic to
see them. We had seen Miranda last weekend in London, but before that, hadn't seen them since Georgia was 6 months old. But the wonderful thing about old friends (Miranda and I were in Grade 3 together, as well as studying together and living together in London) is that the ties remain strong over time, and we were chatting 19 to the dozen as we walked the kids and Drama the dog to a nearby bar and then Brasserie de Chou for traditional Belgian meals (the kids were delighted to find that fries and mayonnaise is a meal, Tom only adding deep fried cheese (croquettes) to his meal!)
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Siobhan Healy
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It's almost as big as his head!!!