Bonjour de Paris!

A quick look at what I'm up to:   The Queen Mary 2's last westbound Atlantic crossing this year leaves Southampton on Nov 8.     Ever since I left her in Feb. of this year in Hong Kong, I have wanted back on.      Last year's Nov. crossing encountered the heaviest seas that she has ever plowed through, per the captain; you can see a video on you tube if you enter QM2 November.   Well, I enjoyed the few rough sea days that we encountered on our way to Hong Kong, but there were not enough of them!   Ergo!    My excellent travel agent,  Sue Clark Koenig of Luxury Cruise and Travel fixed me up for the passage across what I hope will be a good ride on the (hopefully fierce) No. Atlantic.   Although we don't wish for any near what Shelly Winters (poor thing) encountered!

Tickets home in hand- well not really, even Cunard has gone the E ticket route, I said to myself, I need to invent a quick trip around Europe, so that I have a place to come home to from.     I love traveling on trains, I love cities, and I even like planes, hence the current title of the blog.    I cashed in Mileage Plus points and booked a free ticket to Paris, immediately after  which the French started rioting over the age at which pension benefits kick in.  I called up United, they were completely flexible, I had my choice of anywhere from London to Madrid, with no fee due to "les greves", as the French call it-- the French love to strike (and riot)  since Louis XVI.    I chose Munich, after which I  said, but I really wanted to go to Paris.                                                               

                                                                                                                                                        So I booked an overnight sleeper on a German train to  Paris.     I thought, I'll  spend the whole day wandering around Munich, which is a lovely city- I've been there several times, but is more like Denver than than the grand  spectacle that Paris is, then take the sleeper on to Paris rather than staying in Munich     I know, it seems silly- Sue, I know, thought I'd flipped a lid, but I felt fine about it.   Well, things did get a bit complicated.        After a fun day running around Munich (more about that later) I boarded the Paris bound sleeper at 10:40 last night (Thurs), only to be told that the train would only be going as far as Mannheim, an hour short of the German- French border, arriving at 2:30 am.     From there, busses  would bring us into France, drop us off at Paris Disneyland, and that we would then take the suburban rail on into gay Paris.   Now that it's over it's fine, but last night was rough.    Fortunately there were really nice people that I hooked up with early on, one of whom had the best sense of humor.   We (5 bus loads in all), spent the next 8 hours getting to know each other       So they threw us off at Mannnheim, we all stood there waiting in front of the station, with no idea really when the busses would arrive, for an hour, before the they came.   Fortunately it was just above freezing and there was no rain or wind, otherwise it would have really been a drag!     Seven hours later we hit Disneyland, (I kept making jokes about wanting to see Blanche Neige  (Snow White), and actually the lady with the great sense of humor and her teenage kids decided to stay there, to check it out for a while.        Am now ready for bed, staying at the Ibis Hotel, Gare de L'Est, (nice and very reasonable), had some wine and a Croque Monsieur, and ready for bed-- I think I'll sleep well!   Cheers