Firstly, saying goodbye to the children was harder than I thought it would be. They were so excited to be going on their holiday with Nanna and Pa that saying goodbye to me, and putting up with my blubbering was an inconvenience! But I just had to get that last hug and last kiss in case….well you know………

Day one was actually spent on the plane for 23 hours. A stop over in Bangkok at the hugest airport I have ever seen. We had no money but spent some time wandering around looking at the shops and catching our breath after being sent though customs. I’m sure that the Thai people are lovely, but they sound aggressive and intimidating. As I placed my bag on the x-ray scanner and was ordered though the metal detector I was thinking about Nicole Kidman in The Bangkok Hilton and praying that I didn’t have drugs planted on me! I was truly sweating and found that experience quite overwhelming. What a novice traveller!!

The next plane was from Bangkok to Paris, a 12 hour stint that I wasn’t much looking forward to. However, luck was on our side as there was no-one in the row in front of us, so I scooted in there and we had 4 seats each to lie down and sleep. This was the best thing that could have happened as we did sleep a lot and eventually arrived in Paris at 7am feeling rather OK.

Sortie – this was the first French word I learnt. It means Exit and it would come to be our friend and foe over the coming weeks. At the Paris airport we were herded out and passports were stamped without much fuss or fanfare. We decided to catch the train into the city and find our hotel from there. We got some Euro from the ATM, bought a ticket and marvelled at how clever we were to get this far without incident! That is when we got our bags caught in the turnstiles and our tickets were used but we were still on the outside. We had to jump over the turnstiles like Parisian fare evaders, scuttle on to the train and pretend like everything was normal. Welcome to Paris.

At our city stop, Chatelet, we connected with our next train to Republique and emerged from the depths of the underground to our new home. Place de Republique. After getting our bearings (this happened everytime I came up from the Metro. There are so many exits that I was never sure where I would come up) we found the hotel and put our bags there as it was too early to check in. What to do next??? Hmmm…..Justin wanted to take a walk around the area, but this was too aimless for me. I wanted to get into the city to see some stuff. We headed back onto the Metro and back to Chatelet where we emerged in the centre of the city. We walked along the Seine for awhile then headed into the grounds of the Louvre. That amazing glass pyramid met our eyes and we fell in love with Paris. As this was a Tuesday the Louvre was closed and so at that point we decided to get on the Sightseeing Bus and have a rest while we could get a grip on the city and learn some things along the way. This was a great decision because it allowed us to navigate our way and help us decided where we wanted to go back to in the coming days. Highlights: Arc de Triomphe – what a crazy round about. No marked lanes, give way to cars coming onto the roundabout, vehicles going in every direction and yet they knew what they were doing! Champs Elysees was impressive with all it’s tress and fancy shops, but I didn’t go back there. La Madeleine – Roman looking Cathedral for Mary Magdalene, Eiffel Tower of course. Notre Dame and the Hotel Invalides. We learnt a lot about the history of these places while on that bus, sitting on the top level out in the sunshine with people from all over the world all around us! So many tourists, but no problems with them. Just a problem with Justin and the Hotel guy. When we got back to there after our day out and about, I had misplaced the tickets for our bags that we had left at the hotel. He wouldn’t give them over to us without the tickets. Even though the bags had our names on them and we had out ID with us. Justin nearly punched the guy though the wall. He reluctantly gave them to us and we skedaddled out of there before it got messy. Up a very narrow winding staircase was our room. Our tiny room. But it was comfortable and clean and that was all we needed after a very long day. I think we went out for dinner that night or maybe we went to the local patisserie and in very bad French ordered some food, but were so tired fell asleep really early in prep for Day 2. Justin’s first day of the course, and my first day alone in a strange city.

More to come…..