Overall the flight to Paris was super smooth. Usually on longer haul trips I’ll watch at least two movies but I was busy with working on this blog and learning Japanese for our eventual return to the country (more on this in a separate post). If you’re a T-mobile customer, you get complimentary wifi on your smartphone through Delta wifi. If you want wifi on your laptop you have to pay $16 for the flight. My sister’s on T-mobile, I put her phone number in on my phone which unlocked the wifi and then I turned on the wifi hotspot on my phone and was able to bounce the signal to my laptop. Would be interested to know if that protip works for anyone else.
Before I knew it, we were landing and I hadn’t gotten any sleep yet. We got off the plane at 8:30, in line for customs at 8:45, out the door at 10, and arrived at our Airbnb at 12:30.
Customs was really easy except they put us in with the Brexiters 🤢
Can you guess what line this guy is in?
At this point we were both tired and hungry but our stomachs prevailed and we went out in search for food.
I was looking for a well rated crepe place but I guess they don’t add savory things to crepes here? Instead they have galettes which are made of water, salt, and buckwheat flour which means it’s gluten-free. The ones we got had a mix of cheese, mushrooms, carmelized onions, ham, and creme fraiche, were darker brown in color, and very crispy on the outside.
By this time of the day, I was running on 24 hours without sleep. While wandering back to the apartment, we checked out a supermarket nearby to see if there was anything that caught our eye in the snacks department. What did stand out to me was that a bunch of wine was being sold for around $3 a bottle!!!
I am not a wine drinker, the only knowledge I have is that if it looks red, it must be red wine. I had originally wanted to sign up for a wine and cheese tasting boat cruise on the Seine River, but the only available day was today and I knew it would be too much to cram into the day of arrival. Instead my replacement strategy was to spend a fraction of the money I would have towards that thing and just buy a bunch of random bottles of wine.
I got my much needed nap in and it was time to eat again! My cousin recommended a restaurant he really liked when he came to visit called Bouillon Chartier which was only a 15 min walk from our place. We waited about 45 minutes in line which isn’t too bad for a Friday night.
Had to order the escargot of course, got an order of steak and AUTHENTIC French fries, and beef stroganoff. We asked the waiter for a glass of red wine to share because we have no idea if it would be good or not and didn’t want to risk wasting it but he said they only do bottles. Whether that was true or not we took his word for it and got a $15 bottle of the wine of the day.
Wow I was so surprised that it wasn’t bitter or too strong with the alcohol flavor. It was light, fruity, and maybe a bit too easy to drink. We will be making the best of the next 3 days in Paris by expanding our wine drinking knowledge through trial and error. Another order of a dozen escargot needed to be put in, I asked Joanna if we should pay compliments to the rats in the kitchen cooking our dinner. At the end of dinner the waiter brought us our check and asked how much we wanted to add to the tip. I didn’t want to be rude because I thought that overall you don’t need to tip in Europe so I panicked and put in what I would tip at home. Several hours later, I now realize that you only need to tip 1-3 Euros.
I was really impressed with the atmosphere on the streets as we made our way home at 11:30pm. Every bistro had people eating, drinking, and smoking together at such a late time. I can definitely understand why young people would want to live or visit here to be part of the lifestyle.
You guys are so cute! Thanks for sharing your adventures. I lost track of your blog! I can’t keep up with what’s app cause I’m too adhd but I would love to see you all again!