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Published: July 26th 2016
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Statue of Liberty
Found this along the Seine! First blog of the trip!!
No blog yesterday as we had wifi troubles which have since been resolved. Flight was good and we found the car without a problem. Driving to the house was fine although heavy traffic for part of the drive. Nigel always loves driving standard but the drivers here are very aggressive. We settled in and picked our rooms (there are 7 bedrooms here so we will be rotating around the first few nights to test all the beds.....). Then we walked to a nearby shop to pick up some food essentials (baguettes) and then relaxed for a bit. Ate in and then walked around our neighbourhood for a while. We are in an urban area in the S of Paris just outside of the ring road. It is such a culture change being in the "big city". Shops close by, walk everywhere (avoiding the dog poo on the sidewalk), lots of smokers here. We have a really lovely park right across the road from our house and there are walking trails all though it. There is a nice big pond and several play parks for kids scattered around. The kids jumped on the trampoline
Market Day
Nigel made friends with this guy while buying some fruit. for a while after that and practiced on the slack line in the yard. I managed to stay awake until 8pm (well, almost).
Up early this morning and Nigel and I ventured out while the kids slept in. We scoped out the park again and the sports complex right beside it. Then home to try to wake the jet lagged kids....Not an easy task. However, they both opened their eyes when I said we had the wifi figured out. So, we all got cleaned up while Nigel tackled getting the four bikes road-ready. Then we headed out for our first real adventure of the trip. We biked to the Eiffel Tower!! It was not very far and we took our time getting there. Most of the ride was along the paths beside the Seine. This must NOT be the part of the Seine that the songs are about (unless ABBA were a bunch of liars) as it was quite industrial. It was tricky at times navigating the traffic and the pedestrians but we all managed. Out last house swap was 3 years ago and what a difference 3 years makes! The kids easily handled their bikes and the chaos
once we were in the thick of downtown Paris. We also made stops along the way at a weekly local market near our house and also at a boulangerie for more baguettes (baguette count is now 5 total) for lunch. So, we stopped at the base of the tower in the Champs de Mars to eat and people watch. Then back on the bikes to wander around the area for a little while longer before heading back. Made another boulangerie stop (obviously) and then came home to chill for a bit. We are all covered in bike grease but overall, biking in was a very good choice.
We decided to walk across to the sport centre again to see if the turf field was available to the public and much to Russell's delight it is! There is a full grass field with a track around it (there are always people using the track but so far the field has been empty except for someone watering it but it is reserved for the Vanves team apparently). But down below that field is a large turf field. It is a full field but also has nets set up for two half
Other view of the tower
Got a nice Australian to take this one. fields across it so there are six nets total. There were lots of other kids/youth there but plenty of nets to go around so we stayed for an hour and half taking shots. Nigel and Rachel left after 1/2 hour and so Russell and I made some new friends with our very limited French and their broken English. It was quite pathetic. Wish Nig had stayed. Dinner on the patio and now a short walk to pick up picnic supplies for our outing tomorrow.
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