Hopefully I'll be in Milan Today

Deja vu.

Yesterday my flight to Milan was canceled, leaving me stranded in Bordeaux for another night. I have another plane scheduled for today, which will hopefully take off as planned, but for now I still have another four and a half hours until that flight is supposed to leave. For me, that means a relaxing morning and time to write about France.

The rest of my time in Paris was so amazing. We did a lot of walking (and Paris is huge, so believe me when I say that three days in Paris made my muscles much more sore than five days in Disney World ever did), but we also did some cycling. It was really neat -- you're able to rent bicycles in most French cities, for only a Euro a day, and so Will and I cycled around Paris like the locals.

Keep in mind, though, that this cycling experience was also a bit frightening for me. Unlike Will, I'm not used to riding a bicycle through large cities. And we were weaving in out of traffic (and Parisian drivers are absolutely crazy) and around pedestrians, and so these bike rides weren't always relaxing. They were fun, though, and a great way to get around Paris.

I guess now I'll just write a brief overview of what we did in Paris.

1) The Louvre. On our second morning we went to the Louvre, which, I learned, used to be a royal palace. It was a great experience, and I got to see the glass pyramid, the Mona Lisa, the medieval Louvre (which is the basement, still in medieval ruins), and sections on ancient Greece and Egypt. We wandered for hours, but the thing is that the Louvre is so huge that you have to accept the fact that you're not going to see it all. We saw a very small portion, and I think it would probably take three whole days of non-stop Louvre to see it all (and even then, you probably wouldn't be able to take it all in).

2) The Eiffel Tower. It was, by far, the most crowded area in Paris, but I'm really glad we went. We cycled down by the river and then, when we arrived at the tower, took the elevator to the top. The view was amazing, and then we decided to take the stairs back down. The Eiffel Tower was so crowded that you had to queue for everything, including the elevator rides up and down, and so the stairs were a much better option (on the way down, of course -- stairs going up might have been a bit more intimidating).

3) The Pere Lachaise Cemetery. This, like everything else in Paris, is really, really big -- there are over 800,000 people buried there. Most of the graves, as such, are therefore really old, with house-like structures serving as tombstones (think the cemetery in the Haunted Mansion, for all of my Californian friends). This was another place where we wandered for hours. We saw some interesting grave sites, though, including Oscar Wilde, Gertrude Stein, and Jim Morrison.

4) The Catacombs. We didn't actually get to go down, though, as they were flooded and closed for a few days.

5) The Seine. We saw the Seine River many, many times, but worth noting is that for dinner on two nights Will and I bought dinner and wine and ate it down by the Seine. We got to watch the sun setting over Paris and the river while eating bread, cheese, and tarts, and this was by far the best dining experience(s) I've had yet on this trip. It was incredibly beautiful and romantic.

6) Notre Dame de Paris ... again. We had gone on our first day to see the cathedral, but we went back on our last day to climb up the bell towers. There were too many people on our first day, but the line wasn't too bad on our last day. We walked up 400 stairs that wound in a circular pattern up one of the towers, and from there we got to see not only the famous bell tower gargoyles, but also one of the bells up close and another great view of Paris.

Then we went down to Bordeaux, where we saw the Aquitaine Museum and went on a wine tour. This region of France is very well-known for its wine-making, so Will and I have been drinking quite a bit of it as of late. I'm not complaining. On the tour, though, we not only got to do some wine tasting, but I learned a bit about the vineyards and how the different types of wines are produced (Will had to translate for me most of the time because our official translator sucked).

Yesterday Will and I parted ways so that he could begin his research and I could head off to Italy ... but, as you know, I'm still in Bordeaux. Hopefully by tonight I will be in Italy, but I guess you never know with these things.

That's all for now, but I do intend to do a blog in the near future on French food. For now, I'll tell you that it's been amazing -- on our last night in Bordeaux, Will and I had some fondue, but we've also done seafood and other really nice things. I will try to write more in Italy.