Europe Trip: France

I know you've all been waiting with bated breath for all the details of our European Vacation...

lol, if not, and you really don't want to see about a million pictures, I'd skip this post... lol.

But if you do make it to the end, I hope you'll enjoy all our crazy pictures.

My sweet husband was in Belgium for work for two weeks. On September 26th, I flew out to meet him.

Because of the time difference (and the super long flight) I got there on the 27th.

I flew into Brussels, Belgium and rode the train to the little town my sweet husband was staying in.

I was very proud of myself because I'm kind of a scardy cat,

I don't like being alone and I was really nervous about being and traveling alone in a foreign country.

Thankfully, a lot of people spoke English, and I was able to get there fine.

It was SO great to see my sweet husband again! 

That day I think I was in too much of sleep-deprived fog to remember to take pictures.

But basically what we did was go grocery shopping (for pastries and chocolates),

some laundry for my sweet husband and his coworker (coworker did his own),

eat, and walked along the river. It's a beautiful little city. Belgium is a really pretty country.

The next morning we (my sweet husband and I and his coworker) woke up fairly early and headed to Paris.

Our first stop was the airport, we had to return the work rental car.

Then we took the train into the actual city of Paris, the airport is about 20 minutes outside of Paris.

We wasted no time and immediately began site-seeing. Before our trip we got these great travel books, Rick Steves'. In his books he maps out walking tours and he gives the history of what you are seeing and such, it's really nice.

So we started our first walking tour by going to the Arc de Triomphe.

It is beautiful... and in the middle of the world's craziest roundabout (my own opinion).

 Thankfully, you take a "public subway" under the street, so you don't have to cross the road, to get to the Arc.

 After viewing all the sides and just marveling at it and the traffic, we continued our tour down the street.

The walking tour took us past some super crazy expensive shops and to some old palaces.

We didn't go in them, but took funny pictures next to them.

 Then it took us on this cool bridge with this little gem in the background.

 It also had funny statues.

 Then we went to the Eiffel Tower.

It is really cool and the grounds around it are also really beautiful!

We got there right at dusk, so we had some pretty awesome views.

 And they have these cool lights on it and flash and blink and it just really looks like it's sparkling.

 The next day we went to the Louvre. 

 The art was neat, but I think we liked the building the most.

We also had fun taking fun pictures there too.

 But seriously, look at this!:

Then we went to Notre Dame.

It is beautiful!

Did you know that Notre Dame took 200 years to build?! TWO HUNDRED!

 This building was right next to Notre Dame, I thought it was really pretty too.

I loved that in Paris there were flowers everywhere.

 This bridge had tons and tons of locks on it. 

According to the book, people right a brief message on the lock to honor a loved one.

 This is Notre Dame from across the river and from the back.

 Later that day, we decided to go to this church, Sacre Coeur, that my friend highly recommended we go to.

It was really pretty; however, apparently the street vendors also know that it is one of the only places open that late. We got offered marijuana at least twice and beer and  some creepy guys tried to make a bracelet on our friend's arm. So if you ever go to this church, go in the daytime so you can see the pretty stained glass windows and miss the creepers.

 The next day we went on a D-Day Tour.
We drove ourselves there with a sketchy gps, which rerouted us after we missed a turn, through the center of Paris, and through that crazy roundabout. Thankfully it was 6:30 in the morning and not many people were out driving.

We started at Gold Beach and went to Omaha Beach, Utah Beach, and to Pointe de Hoc.

These next few pictures are of Omaha Beach.

These structures are what the American soldiers used as a floating bridge to enable them to get tanks and things from the ships to the shore.

 Some are still in the water

 We also saw an old artillery bunker of the Germans.

These two were in armament heaven

 Here's a picture of the front.

 We also went to the American cemetery.

It was right off the ocean and it was so peaceful.

 One of the things that I thought was really neat was that they put a Star of David instead of cross if the solider was Jewish.

 This is Utah Beach

 This is Pointe de Hoc

 This place hasn't been disturbed since then. So you can see the devastation still. This is our friend in one of the bomb holes.

 They also had these bunkers all over the place.

It was really humbling to be at these places and be reminded of all that happened there. 

These are bullet holes in the brick walls.

 This is the view from the look out holes facing the ocean.

 The bunkers were burned, these are the burned ceilings.

 The actual point, of Pointe de Hoc

 Then we went to Saint Mere-eglise and saw this church.

In the invasion of Normandy two American paratroopers got caught on this church, their story is documented in The Longest Day. 

 But the neatest part of the church are the stained glass windows. 

They show the American paratroopers saving the town.

If you look really close at this one you'll see that the yellow back ground is actually paratroopers.  

 The guy in the red was in our tour group, he is a veteran of the Korean War. It was really neat to be on the tour with him.

I am so grateful for the freedoms so many fought so hard to preserve!

 The next day we went to Versailles, specifically Louis XIV's chateau.

It was insane. 

 It was so ornate!

With crazy paintings, 

including this one: 

 It also had tons of statues.

Here are Descartes and my sweet husband,
he's doing the Cartesian coordinate system in honor of Descartes

(in case you are like me and don't know what that is)

I mean, seriously, look at this! 

But the inside wasn't even the best part... oh no, that would be the "gardens"

I am standing right outside the back of the "chateau" facing the gardens

Here is my husband facing the chateau.

 As far as you can see in any direction is still the "gardens"

Here is a map of it... I'm sure it isn't showing all of it either.

In each of the green hedged areas (on the map under and around "Gardens and park") there were statues, fountains, or just pretty flowers, etc.

We really liked this statue.. lol! Yes, the lion is biting that guy...

In one of the hedged areas they had two restaurants. 

 These weren't small hedges either

 This one had a water show, complete with opera music, which the water danced to

 This gives you a little perspective to how tall the hedges were, this is how they have to trim them!

 It was so big, we had to rest a lot.

 Apparently Louis XIV and Marie Antoinette felt the same way, because they also had summer homes in the gardens. Our philosophy was that the gardens were so huge that by the time they actually made it to the summer homes, it was summer and they needed a place to stay.

The summer homes were also outrageously decorated

 These two rooms reminded me of my sisters:

a pink room

 and a yellow room

 Some pretty flowers

 This is the canal, we rented a row boat and my sweet husband rowed me around.

I left out the pictures of the rude men that made their wives row them... lol!

 Hang in there, we are almost finished.. lol.

We went through more of the hedge things on our way back to the exit.

I thought this was one was particularly neat 

 This one is all seashells

 Phew, we made it back to the palace.

 Oh wait, there was more... we opted to just take a picture and imagine what it would be like to be by the lake.. lol. Our feet hurt too much to venture over there. Plus, we needed to go because we needed to catch our train back to Paris.

 But not before we got dinner and some yummy dessert.

 The next morning we boarded the train that took us through the chunnel to London!

 You  made it!

Be honest, was that too many pictures?

I tried to cut down, and trust me I did.

But it still felt like a lot.

Let me know for the next one.

Thanks!