Souvenir

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Geo: 48.8566, 2.35097

The hotel we've been in the last two nights does not have top sheets on the beds. There's a bedspread and then a fluffy duvet. The duvet is nice and cozy, but I wonder if that's what has given me such bizarre dreams the last couple of nights.

We left Bayeux at 8:15 this morning for the drive to Giverny. Claude Monet first rented and then purchased the house and gardens at Giverny for his second wife and eight children in 1883, and he lived there until his death in 1926. The house, while not terribly interesting, is painted in soft colors and is full of light. The gardens, even at this time of year, are lovely and have been planted to look as they would have to Monet, who took great interest in the planting of his gardens and even gave his gardeners detailed daily instructions on what he wanted them to look
like. I saw a snail clinging to a plant stem, the biggest bee in the universe, and a field mouse. I tried to photograph the mouse, but he was too quick and sneaky. The gift shop is housed in the studio Monet used to paint his famous water lilies. It's enormous for an artist's studio and filled with light.

Yvonne and I walked down the road to a hotel with a crêperie to have lunch. I had a basic ham and cheese galette with a cassis Vittel (very refreshing), and then we decided we definitely had room for dessert. Yvonne had a sugar lemon crêpe, and I had dark chocolate mousse. I was in heaven, but I did manage to restrain myself from licking the bowl, even when Yvonne offered me a euro if I did! She's a bad influence.

Back on the coach for the drive to Paris. Saw a sign for Lisieux along the way, but not Lisieux itself. The autoroutes have lovely huge signs for each city with a line drawing depicting what the city is known for. I think Kerry has managed to photograph a few, but we are usually whizzing by too quickly for my camera.

As we neared Paris, Rolinka and René decided to avoid the ring road and go straight through the city to our hotel on the other side. René drove us around the Arc de Triomphe a couple of times before shooting off down Avenue Kléber so we could drive slowly by Trocadéro. There's some scaffolding around the first level of the Eiffel Tower. Then we drove along the Seine and around the Place de la Concorde, along the Seine again so we could see the bouquinistes, and then toward Place de la Bastille.

Got back to the hotel (room 305 this time, directly above the room I was in last week) and discovered that the wi-fi isn't working properly. It's midnight now, and I still can't get on. I didn't realize how much that would annoy me! Decided to get in a little last-minute shopping, so I wandered up to the Monoprix. I ran into Christina, Larry and Jean there, and then hooked up with Christina in the grocery department, where we were both buying chocolate. Christina and I walked back toward the hotel and ran into Yvonne, so we all went for a meander, which included a short walk on the Promenade Plantée.

We all gathered in the lobby at 6:30 for the Métro ride to our restaurant, which turned out to be
Nebuchodonosor, where John and I had dinner on our last night of the Paris tour last year. And Guy (whose name I thought was Philippe) was our waiter again. He's just as funny as he was last year. I had cheese ravioli for starters, the pork medallions for entree (which I had last year; I jut couldn't resist them again), and chocolate mousse for dessert. Guy was impressed by how well I scraped the sides of the dish and even mimed that I should have perhaps licked it! I can't believe I'm going to admit this, but I think I may have had too much mousse today. I'm beginning to feel a bit fluffy.

Everything was delicious, and we all had a good time. Afterwards, we walked over to the Eiffel Tower to see the sparkles. The weather has definitely changed since last week, and it was very windy and chilly. Rolinka gave everyone an envelope that contained a short personal note from her, some group photos, our buddy picture (I was right: my eyes are closed and I look like an
idiot in mine; I'll have to e-mail Larry to apologize), a list of e-mail addresses, and another list of tour-member-suggested books and movies. The tower sparkled, and I think we were all very sad to finally leave. We took the Métro back to the hotel from good old École Militaire; it was 15 stops to get back!

When we were at the Tower, Rolinka reminded us that a souvenir is not just something you buy. “Souvenir” means “to remember.” And she encouraged us all to visit our souvenir, whether it's in our minds or our hearts, as often as possible. Anyone who knows me knows that I do that pretty frequently, and that's why I travel as often as I do (though probably not as often as I want to), and I thought it was a lovely sentiment.

Well, I had better get to bed. It's about 12:15 a.m. now, and the shuttle is supposed to pick me up at 9:15.

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