We have Arived !

We have finally arived in beautifull Paris! We took a plane to a train to the metro to the street where we were to walk 300 meters or so to our hotel located across the street from Mc Donalds. Once we reached McyD's we looked to every corner of the 6 way intersection and buckled over in laphter. To which "across" did the drections refer? We finally found the small entrance tucked behind a fancy Cafe'. Unfortuanately our room wasn't quite ready, so we left our baggage and meandered on over to a streetside table to order up some beer. The frosty glasses and cold beer were exactly the reward we needed after the 5 hour airport to hotel journey. The man who served us the beer was very friendly, and the people walking by were for the most part very beautiful and well-dressed. All of them, effortlessly stylish, a French thing im sure. We began to wonder if the people glancing at us instantly knew we were American. This became a guessing game, to point out the Americans while in awe of the beautiful French. On our way back to the hostel we stopped to look in an intriguing theater, with colorfll french posters lining the outside windows. A nice young man named Claude stood behind the front desk. We exchanged french hello's and began asking him questions in English, doubting he would even understand. But in percfect English he said, "How did you know I speak English?" Eventually he said he saw us having a beer across the street earlier, and had asumed we were German because it was so early for a beer (11am). We took this as a compliment, considering we spent all morning hoping we didnt look as American as some of the people from our little guessing game. "Confesions of a Timid Penis" was showing that evening, unfortuanately we had prior engagements: sleep! We entered our room after riding the 5 floors in the smallest elevator i have ever seen. The room was better than we had hoped it would be, large french windows opened to that great 6 way intersection below, hardwood floors, two twin beds with clean white sheets and fluffy pillows, private bathroom, and private room. Ugh it was heaven! With our windows open we plopped down on the beds and slept till 10pm. It was GREAT. When we woke up, the city lights below glowed and begged us to explore, so we did. We put on some clothes and wandered around Paris' streets. After an hour or so, we decided to stop into one of the many Japansese food places we had seen to have some sushi for dinner. When our wine came, we toasted to our first meal in Paris, in Europe, in our trip. The rest of our walk after dinner led us to the Lourve and a romantic walk along the Seine. It could have been the jetlag or lack of sleep, but it all felt surreal, like a dream. We made it back to the hostel and unpacked and organized our belongings, then fell alseep around 5am. We had hoped the sun and city's loud noises would have woken us up nice and early but it didnt, we woke up just before 1pm. We brushed it off as needing the sleep and got ready for our day, Breakfast at 2pm in a nearby cafe', then headed back to catch up with people back home in the real world. The hostel's WiFi is supposed to work throughout the building but apparently only the first two floors get it. So we made our way down to the lobby with our laptops and finally got online for the first time since North Carolina. It felt good to hear from people at home, and felt good to be able to report the events of our stay so far. I love and miss everyone at home so much, and the ease and comfort of familiarity, but i love this here in Paris, in Europe, not knowing what's to come and just taking it day by day.

And it Begins

YAY!!! We have officially left the stress of packing and preparing behind, and moved on to the sleepless excitement phase. This phase requires patience, understanding, and that certain something that only we two young travelsers such as ourselves clearly carry out with great elegance and composeure... Well, at least thats what we tell ourselves when treating an International Terminal as our own personal living room for 10 solid hours. Backpacks become pillows, scarves become blankets and floors become beds on this terminal tour.

The smell of the bakery lingering from my left, the rising and setting sun to my right, and the colorful shadows cast from the large terminal pillars dance cross the floor while hurried travelers of all shapes, sizes, ages and colors shuffle from destination to destination. There is a certain comfort to it all, maybe its a destination, maybe its a journey, either way it's nice.

THE PLAN.

Hello Everyone,

Most of you already know, but here's a little back story to this grand adventure we have ahead of ourselves.

Last November at my roomate's going away party I got wraped up in deep conversation with a girl from work. Caehle and I had never exchanged more than a few words in the past, but after discovering just how many things we had in common the conversations quickly started circling around one particular interest, the constant nagging urge to up and move to Europe. The exciting conversation fueled by many glasses of wine quickly turned into the whimsicle drunken decision to move to Europe together... Later that week, well after the hangover subsided, we diskussed more realistic ways of living amongst the Euro's. Several lunch dates later we descided a 3-6 month trip would scratch our itch just fine.

On December 31st, mearly hours away from 2010, we met with a travel agent to ask how one goes about planning for a trip of such magnatude. We quickly learned that saving for a 6 month vacation would take too long. Instead we settled for eight solid months of saving in exchange for 3 months of sweet & simple European life. We also desided to avoid any and all return dates surounding thanksgiving, which cut our 3 months down to 2 & 1/2. The first step would be getting there, and so the search began.

A short two months of flight hunting later in late Feburary the price was right. And together on March 3rd we baught our roundtrip tickets in and out of Paris to officially seal the deal. Jumping up and down we only managed to squeek out high pitched noises of excitement because there were literally no words to express the amount of joy bubbling from within. We were on cloud 9, with wings on our shoes, and smiles on our faces.

So here we are, only one month away from lift off. We will be leaving San Diego Airport on Sept. 1st and landing in Paris on the 3rd at 6:00 in the morning, Paris time ....

Watch out Europe, Here we come!!!!