Traveling

 We had really quick layovers scheduled in Dallas and New York and everything went very smoothly until we got to New York and our plane just sat on the Tarmac for 20 minutes, making us 5 minutes late for our connecting flight to Paris which was even just one gate next to our own. If people in the front of the plane has listened to the flight attendants when they said to stay seated if you didn't have a connecting flight, we probably could have gotten off in time.
But the real outrage was how the agent greeting our plane just waved us off saying he couldn't reschedule us and sent us all the way to the front of the airport, back to ticketing to rebook our flight.  Btw- JFK is a big airport.
So we get to the special cases ticketing line which took an hour and we finally get to the counter to a very helpful woman who discovered that someone had already rebooked us. Great!!! That really is awesome, except for that man who insisted we needed to go all the way out and back in through security. We could have easily been catching up on sleep or our skipped lunch, comfortably waiting at our gate.   It didn't feel good to be so angry and frustrated already. But it all worked out. We had a later plane that would 't mess up our arrival time at our 'rent a rooms'.  Btw- most of the places we are staying this trip were found from the airbnb website where you find normal people who rent out their rooms all over the world for great prices.
So anyways- we had a red-eye flight to Paris, arriving there around 10 in the morning. I did NOT sleep well on the plane. This is not common for me. I like to say that sleeping is one of my talents because I can do it anytime anywhere. Ask anyone in my family- I'm pro. BUT my seat was broken so it didn't recline and it was right next to the emergency door: this made it EXTREMELY cold. I thought anyone around me must have been experiencing the same cold, but I also get cold very easily so I asked my mom for her blanket that she wasn't using.  I had my plane pillow between my side and the cold wall for insulation, and I had my sweater on and two plane blankets and I was STILL freezing! I might have slept for a little bit but it didn't seem like it.  So it was a bad flight for me. It made it difficult to even realize and get excited about the fact that I would soon be in Paris.  I was just so focused on how not to be in pain from an uncomfortable chair and freezing temperatures.

By the way, about an hour before we landed, after my mom woke up and we had breakfast, we switched places and I discovered that I was probably the ONLY one experiencing such cold because the difference between my seat and hers was about 20 degrees. Yay!!
So finally we arrived in Paris and I was SO happy to get off the plane.
We took care of buying our city and museum passes so we could basically get into everywhere for free. And we could use all the public transportation.

Then we got on a train from the airport to the city and we got our first ever views of Paris!! Bienvenus!

Packing...not as painful as I thought...so far

We bought medium sized luggage because I only had my two huge mission suitcases. I already packed more clothes than Rick Steves would suggest but I am doing fine on space so it will be no problem. I selected mostly shirts that are older and I don't care about so if I need more space for coming home I can just get rid of some clothes there.

Most of the packing is done! I just need to organize my electronics and only take what I need.

Yay!!

We leave on Tuesday

We leave on Tuesday morning and we will fly into Paris!