Paris

We traveled to Paris, France for the weekend of 19 October with Kate and Shaun. Getting from the Charles de Gaulle airport to our hotel Friday night turned out to be quite an adventure. Paris transit employees went on strike on Thursday, protesting a proposed cut in retirement packages. This meant that the metro wasn't running. Additionally, Paris hosted the World Rugby Championships over the weekend. Since the metro wasn't running, and there were at least 60,000 extra people in Paris, the taxi line at the airport was at least 1.5 hours long. So after a 1.5 hour bus ride, we ended up at the Arc d'Triomphe. From there, we caught a taxi to get to the hotel. At this point, we started getting excited to be in Paris and getting closer to our hotel and eating dinner...until the route was overtaken by some hundred roller bladers. That's right, hundreds of roller bladers apparently wind their way through Paris every Friday night between 10:00pm Friday and 1:00 am Saturday!

After starting the day off with delectable French pastries, we spent Saturday morning touring Notre Dame de Paris. In addition to touring the inside of the cathedral, we climbed a few hundred steps to the top of the cathedral to view the Paris skyline as well as see the gargoyles up close! Afterward, we found a boulangerie for a coffee break and croissant snack, and then walked throught La Sainte-Chapelle. The walls of the upper chapel are almost all stained glass and depict the story of the bible. After lunch, we headed into the Louvre where we hit the highlights, the Mona Lisa, the Venus de Milo, and the Code of Hammurabi. We all agreed that we are now officially cultured! Saturday night, we met up with friends of Kate and Shaun for dinner at L'estrapade near the Panthéon for a French meal. Carrie's meal consisted of prune soup, roasted quail with grapes, and chocolate mint crème brûlée. Kurt started with whole sardines, moved on to a cut of beef and finished with 'chocolat du suicide.'

Sunday we climbed to the top of the Arc d'Triomphe and then made our way to the Eiffel tower. Since the lines were long, we didn't go up to the top but did touch the base so that we can say we were really there! We then walked to the Musée d'Orsay where we saw several paintings by Van Gogh, Renoir, Monet, and Degas. Luckily, we decided to leave early for the airport because it ended up taking almost 4 hours to get there! Due to the strike, a few of the metro trains weren't running and the trip took longer than normal. That and the fact that the train we took, which normally does go to the airport, turned around about half way there taking us back to where we started. But in the end, we did get to the airport and on our plane...so all's well that ends well!

We had a great time in Paris and are looking forward to going back to see more sights that we didn't have time to see!

Click below to see some of our pictures from the weekend.

Paris

Brugge, Belgium

We took a road trip with Adam and Melanie to Brugge, Belgium over Columbus Day weekend. The roughly 5 hour trip from Mainz went pretty fast and we arrived in Brugge around lunchtime on Saturday. After winding our way through the tiniest cobblestone streets you can imagine, we took advice from Rick Steves and ate at a cute little Italian restaurant called Pili Pili. After lunch, we toured the Halve Mann Brewery, the only brewery still producing beer in Brugge, and enjoyed a Belgian Blonde Ale afterwards. The tour guide was very animated and we enjoyed learning how beer is good for us and how to enjoy a beer, not just guzzle liters down like the Germans. In the late afternoon, we went on a horse-drawn carriage ride around the city. The driver pointed out different sites and some of the meanings behind the architecture. For instance, many of the buildings had angels above every door and window to keep out bad spirits.

Brugge, Belgium

On Sunday, we toured Choco-Story, The Chocolate Museum. The museum was really interesting and we learned a lot about the history of cocoa and it's role through the ages from about 600 B.C. to today. Since the fog hadn't burned off, we made our way to the Diamant (diamond) museum. It was rather unimpressive, although we did get a sample of synthetic diamonds. After lunch, we climbed the 360 steps to the top of the bell tower and were at the top while the bells chimed which was a neat experience. After a boat tour through the canals, we made our way to Brugge's four windmills. They are placed along a canal, and it was a pleasant walk slightly away from the hustle and bustle of town. We also visited Brugge's Church of Our Lady which houses Michelangelo's Madonna and Child sculpture. This sculpture is said to be his only sculpture to leave Italy during his lifetime and one of the few outside Italy today.

On Monday, we drove about 30 minutes North to Zeebrugge to see the North Sea.

Zeebrugge, Belgium

On the way home, we stopped in Brussels for lunch. We were very impressed by the architecture in the market square as well as the chocolates!

Brussels, Belgium

Oktoberfest 2007

After a very long drive from Mainz to Munich, we experienced Oktoberfest for the first time with a group of friends. The whole atmosphere was definitely something to experience. Many people were dressed in traditional garb and everyone was having a good time. The fest grounds were huge...42 hectacres (almost 104 acres) and were packed with people, rides, and stands.

We took the U-bahn from our hotel to the fest grounds around 10:00 am and made our way to the Schottenhamel tent. After pushing our way through the crowd to get as close to the doors as possible, we discovered about 30 minutes later that they were overbooked and wouldn't be opening the doors that day. So we pushed our way back through the crowd and ended up at the beer garden outside the Hacker-Festzelt tent. There weren't any available tables so we all split up for a bit in search of beer. Luckily, at this particular tent, they didn't care if you weren't sitting, and they walked around yelling "Bier, Bier, Bier, Bier!" and we just had to follow them get our mass (1 liter) of beer.

Eventually, our group of about 14 people took over a table that some Brits had been occupying. We had it all to ourselves for a bit, but they ended up taking it back from us later on in the afternoon. While at the table, we had a great time laughing with friends and with others that were partying nearby. We saw a lot of cheering, singing, and chanting. We saw people standing on tables, chugging their mass of beer, and eventually passing out... basically we experienced a frat party at a whole new level. It was fantastic!

We had a blast drinking and eating with friends for most of the afternoon and look forward to next year!

Oktoberfest 2007