last day in france... again

1/4/2008

i should be at home, in dallas... but we had some difficulties today and i swear we're cursed. our train leaving avignon was 30 minutes late. then we arrived in paris at gare de lyon, one of the biggest metro stations in paris and absolutely none of the ticket machines took bills, only coins. since we had to have rer tickets to get to the airport i had to stand in one of two lines. one i could buy the tickets full price, the other i could use our railpasses for a large discount. of course in the toss up i chose heads when it was actually tails. another 30 minutes wasted, we had a little over and hour and a half to make our flight. we or course waited and waited for the first train because there was some sort fo accident in the metro. the second train we took went to the airport. some trains are express and don't make each stop along the way... we of course were so lucky to get one that does, doubling our trip time.

we finally make it to cdg with about an hour to spare - however by the time we catch the shuttle and get to the counter, it's only about 45 minutes. apparently some law has them shut down check-in an hour before departure so we just missed it! the next flight is the same time tomorrow so a $400 transfer/rebooking fee, 65 euro hotel room, and a few other costs later... here we are in the 19th arrondisement. of course we also had some train problems with line 5 on the way here. for some reason we had to evacuate the car then as soon as everyone was off they told us to get back one... then of course to get back off again as soon as we were all back on!

let me tell you though, other than missing my massage tomorrow this has been one of the best nights in france! we checked in and went almost immediately to the bar. before walking in we read the awning over the door and thought the bar was named shutz. delirious as we were, we made some good friends. dad made up a story about his mom being named shutz, what we thought was the name of the bar. come to find out it's a beer they serve there... they ended up giving us 6 nice beer glasses and a large beer mug which we intended to pay for as a souvenir to give kevin, hence the reason for the made-up story to begin with!

we ate sushi for dinner, both of us saying "screw the french food!" afterwards dad went back to the bar and i went to get some coffee and a crepe. believe you me, if i was staying in france one more night, i was eating a crepe! dad finally joined me after a little confusion. we shared a nutella and banana crepe then came back to the hotel to rest for what we hope will be a trip home tomorrow!