Paris on Tuesday was beautiful. Kerry and I woke to sunshine and immediately went outside to start walking around. We took our Metro (line 10) to Javal by Pont Mirabeau and started our walk along the Seine. Each bridge (pont) took us closer and closer to the center of paris. We started in a more industrial area, moved into a cool middle river island that contained the Statue of Liberty and lots of trees and parks.
We took a quick stop into the Japonese cultural center and then continued up the the river. We made it all the way to Ile de la Cite before going back to the house and eating a fortifying lunch of bread, cheese (Roblechone), and chorizo. Kerry managed to find a rogue wifi signal in the building and we noticed our friend Edith had written.
We made plans to meet up at her old apartment building to see her. It was Neighbors Day in Paris. Edith’s neighbors had been having a party for the past five years. It felt like a film as all of the neighbors sat around eating, smoking and telling there children to behave in French. Tess, Edith’s daughter, was the star of the show.
We ended up going back to Edith & Lorin’s apartment for crepe completes, salad and chocolates for dinner. At 1:30am we finally called it a night and walked back to our digs in the Latin Quarter. Paris was surprisingly active at that time of night.
Sleeping in the next day, we made our way through the rain to the Musee D’Orsay. It was not very crowded for a Wednesday. Musee D’Orsay is a very relaxing museum other than the fact they try and hide the majority of the artwork that people want to see on the 5th floor.
We took our time with all of the impressionist works and then made our way back towards home through Saint Germain De Pres. We found a crepere at the top of our hill on Rue Mouffetard which was a tiny creperie. We tried to go to the Tarte and Crepe show, a upscale crepery but they were not serving crepe complete (with egg and cheese) at that time.
The tiny two story creperie was perfect. I had a jambon and frommage crepe followed by a citron crepe. Kerry opted for egg and cheese then nutella. That was the only food we have had since leaving Paris.
Our trip out to Orly was uneventful on the RER B. The Orley VAL from Antony though was quite an experience. We had a to buy a special ticket and then got on a little tram that went to the airport. Once loaded the tram exploded out of the area going 60mph with flashing lights through a dark tunnel. 10 minutes later, we were deposited at Orly Airport.
This was the lowest rent airport I had seen (til arriving in Kosice). The check in area was made of old tv screens and peg boards. Then we went walking all around and around to get through both customs and security.
Kerry and I made the trip from Orly to Bratislava. When landing in Bratislava, we had to go through customs, exit the airport and then recheck in as if we had just arrived Bratislava. Hurrying to make our sercurity check and flight, we bypassed food and drink. THen we proceeded to wait for the next two hours til the plane decided to take off.
(had to wait for a Manchester flight to get in or something).
We strangely, met up with Andrea’s fiance in the secured waiting area. He had forgotten his passport that morning and had to take a later flight from London. This worked out very well for us as we got to see Andrea and her cousin at the arrival in Kosice. They kindly brought us into town and got us into our Pension Platz at 1am.
Everything is good here. We found the internet and are still looking for the post office. Kerry managed to woo the woman at the front desk into doing our laundry for us so we dont have to worry about that.
It is very pretty and old here. Think Prague mixed with Salzberg. Lots of domes, spires and strange little alleys with arches created hundreds of years ago.
We are off to find food and explore.
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