Into Paris

We arrived in Paris three hours late thanks to American Airlines’ inability to provide us with an airworthy plane. It took them three tries, and we had already been loaded onto the first one! Not a great confidence builder!

The flight sucked, and for someone who travels on airplanes a lot, it takes quite a bit to earn the description "sucked." The seats were uncomfortable, they showed two movies – October Sky and Ice Princess. I mean, come ON! October Sky is like six years old! And Ice Princess?! It’s a Disney movie. And not even a good one!

Since we were so late, our prearranged shuttles to our hotels were gone. The company with whom transport had been arranged sent a bus to take us all and drop us at our respective hotels. My wife and I and two of my co-workes are at au Manoir Saint Germain des Pres. I would post a photo, but you can Google their website and see much better photos than I could provide. It’s a decent place, certainly not a luxury hotel, but the rats aren’t so big as to be of concern.

I’M KIDDING! They’re HUGE!

Our first organized event was dinner at Altitude 95 on the Eiffel Tower. It was fairly standard fare, but “fairly standard” by Paris terms is pretty good. We had an appetizer of gravlax. I love salmon, but I’m not a huge fan of smoked salmon. This smoked salmon, however, was outstanding! The best description I can formulate is “creamy.” It melted in my mouth. The main course was beef tenderloin with haricots vertes. The filet was pretty good; I’ve had better. The green beans tasted like they were sautéed in a pound of butter…and that means they were fantastic! Dessert was an upside-down apple pie with ice cream (French vanilla, of course!) It was okay.

The owner of our company then invited us all up to the top of the Tower for an after dinner sojourn. We made it to the second level, froze our nipples off, and decided that we had enough.

Today, Wednesday, my wife and I scoped out tonight’s activity and restaurant location, and then took a leisurely stroll – well, as leisurely a stroll as one can take when one’s nipples, frostbitten from the previous evening, are freezing once again – to Notre Dame. I had been there in 2002 on a work trip and had only seen the outside. Today my wife and I went inside to look around and take photos. They caught us and made us put the photos back. I am atheist, but for some reason I love cathedrals. There must be an architect’s blood mixed in the soup running through my veins.

This evening’s event was a Seine river tour on Les Bateaux Vedettes, where we chugged past the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame, to mention but a couple, and dinner was at Ze Kitchen Galaries. I had roast piglet. Cooked baby bovine has the name “veal,” but I don’t know what baby pig is. The menu read “porcelet.” It was good, but the taste of the fish my wife had made me sorry I ate off the land.

That’s the first two days of our trip. I hope to send more. Time has been an issue, and I’m only able to post now because I couldn’t sleep tonight.


dassall!