Today was officially day one of our tour. Brittany, David, Philip,
Jordan and I met downstairs of the Clink 78 hostel in the wee hours of the
morning – or more like 6am, but it sure felt like the wee hours – to meet our
tour guide. She is a very enthusiastic person who has some humour, and has
already completely 20+ tours with Topdeck (check – experience!). After checking
in with her, we headed to the basement for breakfast before loading up our
shuttle bus and heading to Dover.
It was a very pretty drive through
the British Isle… although I slept for a good portion of it, after anxiety of
missing my tour crept into my sleep last night… When we finally arrived at
Dover, we had to unload, get our passports check, and waited until we could
board. The traffic, and roadways were nuts. Thank goodness for BC Ferries –
they’re not anywhere near as horrible as everything thinks they are! I’m not
sure how anyone knew where to load, unload, enter, exit, etc. Ramps and
vehicles everything, and you’re actually facing AWAY from the ferries when
getting tickets (or in our case, fancy yellow plastic cards).
When we finally boarded, you
could feel the boat rock away, even at dock. It got worse as the trip went on.
Just when you think you have good ‘sea-legs’, the Strait of Dover rears its
ugly head. Not to mention, they force people to abandon the car decks and join
the passenger decks. The food wasn’t any better – mushy and unflavoured – I
would have been better off eating a cold meal and saving some money… We met up
with Adam, also out our tour, Hannah D and Jennifer again and decided to check
out the sights on the boat, and try and find a place to sit. We managed to find
a spot for all eight of us, which was quite a feat as it was, as our numbers
quickly grew to an easy 12. It was a very easy crowd to hang out with, all
laughing and joking.
When we landed at Calais, the
gangplank wouldn’t work, so we had a delayed exit (and almost had to brave the
stairs to get out! Oh my!). We loaded up our official Topdeck bus – our one and
only who will see us from here, back to this point in 49 days time – a new
driver, and headed off to Paris. Again, I managed to sleep most of the way,
minus the food stop in the middle of the drive, in which we also picked up our
official driver. The last 2-3 ‘nights’ of no sleep must officially be catching
up with me – too hot, too loud, too cold, too quiet, too shakey (joys of a top
bunk), and repeat, you name it, I probably didn’t sleep as a result of it – as
I normally can’t sleep at all on moving vehicles. We will see how long this
lasts.
We got to Paris after a little
history lesson, and arrived at our hotel upgrade (B&B Hotels) before 5pm
with a little time to orient ourselves and get acquainted with our bunk-mates
while we got ready for dinner. Brittany and I are rooming with Megan and Tess
who are doing the shorter Grand European Tour and will be leaving in Rome.
We wandered across the road for
dinner, which was included, and got to enjoy (or not for some people) the
French delicacy of escargot. It wasn’t bad at all, actually. A little different
texture, but was yummy enough. There was so much garlic on it, that you
couldn’t taste much of anything else. Not sure I’d ever eat a whole plate, but I was happy to say I did try
it. Megan and I may have also shared an entire bottle of wine… bring it on
Europe! Bring it on! When in Paris, do as the Parisians would I guess!
We finished our day with a
driving tour around Paris – a quick drive by all the main attractions and a
quick stop at the Eiffel Tower (or past an apartment where the artist normally
paints nude actors on the balcony – or so was Zoe’s excuse not to look at the
Eiffel Tower as we came around the corner…). We managed to hit the Notre Dame
Cathedral, the Military Academy, the Louvre and Musay d’Orsay Museums, the
Love-Lock Bridge, etc. It took about 2 hours, start to finish, and we even got
to see some of Jude’s impressive driving skills as we entered the grounds at
the Louvre.
Philip has self-proclaimed
himself the ‘back of the bus bum’ for the tour. His goal is to sit back there,
every day for the entire duration of the tour. Tonight, Megan stole the back
row from home, making him share. This could make for an epic 15 day battle!
Tommorrow is our free day. Having
already done Paris before, and only have a day there this time, I really only
want to see the Notre Dame Cathedral without mounds of scaffolding on it. I am
planning to spend the day with Adam and Hannah D, and we are planning on early
start to the game, hitting the metro to make it into Paris with the Notre Dame,
Arc de Triomphe, Louvre and the Eiffel Tower on our list of sights before
meeting up for our bus tour at 3pm. It’s going to be a busy day! We’ve signed up for the optionals tomorrow which
include the bike tour, a river cruise down the Seine (which I’m not doing), and
the Cabaret show at the end of the day after another included dinner.
Roomies: Brittany, Tess, and
Megan.
First (Second) Impressions of
Paris:
-
- Zoe is going to be a great and enjoyable tour
guide
-
- Paris is still quite dirty (particularly
compared to London)
-
- People are still pushy here
-
- Tends to have more ‘older architecture’ areas
than London (which blends various centuries in one block)
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