We Have Arrived

Well, I finally have something to blog about. As many of you know, we are on a trip to India, with a stop in France for a few days on the way. Hopefully this will help me to remember everything & share our experiences.

The whole travel process has been interesting. Jer & I have not been on a plane since a trip to Hawaii in 2007, and I have never traveled internationally. Even though we were a little apprehensive, everthing went smoothly. Despite an 8 hour time difference & an overnight flight, we are not too terribly jet lagged (well, I'm not anyway. Jer is passed out on the bed.) It is 11pm here, but it is 3pm back home. I was able to get some decent sleep on the plane, but Jer wasn't quite so lucky.

We flew into Paris & then made our way to the train station & headed to Caen.


This is a picture of Jer on our "bendy" bus we took from the airport to the train station. We will be heading back to Paris on Sunday for a few days, but are happy to be out of the city for now. Although the architecture was beautful, there were a lot of honking horns, smoking people everywhere, & grafitti. I also have to say I am not a big fan of European fashion... & I think I pretty much stick out like a sore thumb. I did not see one other woman wearing tennis shoes all day. Most of the men also looked more feminine than me ;). One other thing we've noticed is 3-4 year old kids running around with plugs (aka pacifiers) in their mouths.


The train ride through the countryside was amazing. It is already very green here, & saw lots of daffodils and croci (my pluralization) for crocus. We saw a lot of farming, but very little livestock- a few sheep, some Shetland ponies, and some Brahman & Holstein cows. No Limousin to be seen! [Background: Limousin is a breed of cattle from France, & it is the type of cows my dad raises. Tastiest steak you'll ever eat.] On a completly unrelated but interesting side note, the lady across the isle from us on the train was in her 20's & sucked her thumb. I kept trying not to look, but couldn't help myself. There is just something crazy about an adult woman snuggling and watching a movie with her boyfriend while sucking her thumb.



We saw this building from the train at a stop. It is in the town of Lisieux, but I know nothing else about it. Pretty amazing though. It was neat to see the beautiful stone churches in all the little towns along the way.

Here is a the view from our hotel:




We have found this little town to be quite charming, even though everyone & their dog is still smoking (cigarette smoke is one of my least favorite things in the world). We got here around 6pm, which is about 24 hours from the time we left Salt Lake. We checked into our room and then went out to find a quick bite. Jer was excited when we found a Kebab shop. The shop owner was very friendly (not French, funny enough) and the food was tasty. Jer had Kebabs & chips on his mission in Ireland, so it was fun to share that together.



Our last stop for tonight was a quick trip to the grocery store. Apparently most shops & stores in France close at 7pm, but we found one that was open til 9. (No Super Walmarts around here). Even picked about some eclairs, which are one of my favorites. A couple cherry cokes & we were good to go, although I have a feeling Jer has seen his last Pepsi for a while.



We are spending tomorrow exploring Caen & seeing some castle(it is very old, but Jer is out cold & I can't remember the details). The town has bike rentals for one Euro ($2), so we are excited to tool around town that way. On Sunday we are headed to Normandy, which will be a special experience as well.

I'll update again as long as I can find some wi-fi!