So Parisian

Dad and I spent our last day in Paris, not in Paris, but at the palace of VERSAILLES! It was beautiful, gold, ornate, and pricey. We learned about the history of the reign of the Louis'. Louis XIV built the palace, and he seemed to be the self-centered psycho Louis. Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette lived there before going to prison and later being beheaded by the guillotine. We walked through both the king's and queen's quarters (bedroom, study, etc.) as well as the famous Hall of Mirrors. All the rooms had huge paintings on the ceilings and walls. It was a lot like the other palaces I have been in, but this one was especially cool because of the people that lived in it. They were so famous (or infamous, I should say). So much history at Versailles...what a place!

We ate lunch in the ginormous gardens until we were kicked off the grass, and then we walked towards the other palaces in the back of the gardens. We rented bikes (my favorite part of the day) and rode to Marie Antoinette's little place and the grand and petit palaces hidden in the gardens, locked up our bikes, walked for five minutes, and decided we just wanted to ride bikes. Sooo...we left there and rode around for about half an hour. I'm pretty sure one of the first things I will be doing upon returning home is getting on my bike, Sylvia, and going cruising. It was so refreshing! Most of the gardens were pretty...the statues were still covered with tarps, and the trees were all dead, but I'm sure it's fantastic in the summer, and I just used my imagination like I have with just about every park I've been to. Half the parks in Paris don't have a lot of grass, and these gardens were no exception. It's all dirt, but it's still spectacular.

It was SO hot today. Dad's phone said it was 72! We both got sunburned and had our jackets off for most of the day.

We left Versailles and did some pathetic souvenir shopping. With the exception of food, there isn't really such thing as a good souvenir...so it was hard, and we just got some little things.

We headed back to our apartment on the metro, but we needed to get stuff for dinner first. Soo...we stopped at the boucherie, creperie, boulangerie, and marche to get all the things we would need for dinner cause that's how the Parisians do it. They shop every day and only get what they'll need for that day. Pretty crazy compared to our Sam's Club/Costco stock up on the goods ways at home. We got 2 pork chops, the crepe I have been dreaming about, a baguette (dad is obsessed) and a strawberry crumble (dad's obsessed), and some salad ingredients and cheese. We had potatoes at home that we stopped to put in the oven before heading to the supermarket...the oven doesn't have words, only pictures, which you think would be more convenient with the language barrier, but it's not. It's really not. How am I supposed to know what a bunch of dots/lines/swirls mean? I'd rather look up a french word in a dictionary and get it right. We cooked our potatoes with the oven set on "cleaning" mode...I've never seen potatoes bake so fast! Whoops...Dad made dinner again (2nd time this week), and I was ever so grateful because I'm still sick of cooking from my time with Roger. It was a delicious dinner and a great way to end our stay in Paris. So Parisian.

We watched The Bourne Supremacy, enjoyed our desserts, did some laundry (and hung it on the window to dry...so Parisian), and got ready for tomorrow. Dad will be heading to the airport to go home, and I will be riding the Eurostar to London and then a train to Bath for my last workaway at another B&B. Lucky for dad, we can ride to the train station I'll be leaving from together, and then I can make sure he gets on the right metro line to the airport from there. Then, he's on his own!

I'm so glad he was able to come to France and be away as well as spend time with me. It's been great to be with someone after all this alone time! I'm sending him home exhausted, so it's a good thing he has the weekend to recuperate. The second half of my trip is seriously flying by! I'll be home before I know it. Next stop...ENGLAND!

PS A side story that I forgot to include on Monday:

We went to the tourist information office to get a map, and the lady working there was super chit chatty. We told her we were from Utah and she went on to say that she really wanted to go there as well as Montana. We told her that Utah has FIVE national parks...the most of all the states. She said, "Yeah, well France has over 365 types of cheeses." Hahaha. We laughed (and secretly wanted to try them all!)