Paris in the Springtime or- Europe 2011 - part 2

Bonjour Paris! If you're just tuning in this is the second leg of our journey or days 4, 5, and 6 which we spent in the romantic and beautiful city of Paris. Here is a whirlwind look at our time there.

Getting ready to ride the Eurostar to Paris. Platform 9and 3/4 perhaps?


Hailey and Charis comfortable on the train.


Once landing in Paris we stopped off at our hotel to unload our bags and we were off on a walking tour. One of our first landmarks was the Hotel deVille.
Here are Jim and I outside the Hotel de Ville.

Then, after crossing the Seine River we made the unforgettable stop at Notre Dame.



Jordan made a friend outside Notre Dame.

The sculpture detail was extraordinary.


Notre Dame's exquisite stained glass work.






Jim, Hailey and I outside Notre Dame.
Hailey and Charis posing for a picture in front of Notre Dame.

Helpful European signals.

While standing in front of the Moulin Rouge, we saw this enormous air vent. Joel decided to amaze onlookers with a back flip. Pretty cool!
After dinner we took an unforgettable walk which was my favorite part of our time in Paris. If you're ever in Paris you can't miss this.
After stopping for a photo in front of the Moulin Rouge, we made our way up to Montmartre, a Bohemian section of the city. Here we strolled past Renoir's residence and hiked up the narrow side streets to the little town of St. Dennis. We rounded a corner and enjoyed a beautiful view of the Eiffel tower and the city of Paris. Just when I thought that was enough all by itself, we crested one more hill and came upon Sacre Coeur (Church of the Sacred Heart).
After walking through the church we had about an hour to ourselves, so Jim, Hailey and I headed down the hill to a little Parisan cafe and ordered - what else? Crepes! We sat on the patio and watched the people, enjoyed the most delicious coffee (the French know how to do coffee right) and devoured the most sumptuous crepes I've ever had.

We took the metro back to the hotel and literally "fell" into bed. It was about 11:30 when we got back to our rooms.

The next morning we slept in a little and headed out around 8:30 for a day in Paris. Here are a few of our sights.


The Opera House from the legendary, Phantom of the Opera.



We haggled a bit with vendors.

The Famous Arc de Triumph.

We took an optional excursion to Versailles. This was a favorite for several in our group. The pictures really don't do it justice.
Here's our group posing for a quick photo in front of the famous golden gates of Versailles.
Marie Antoinette's bed.

Hailey, outside the gardens at Versailles.
Penny and I around the back of the palace.

Later that night we rode up to the tallest tower in Paris for some breathtaking views of the city and then took a night cruise on the River Seine. Unbelievable!



The next day we were off to the Lourve. It was amazing!



We had a little fun too!
I'm sorry but this one cracked me up. I know - tacky of me, but I want to meet the person who can look at this and not giggle. There are so many possible captions I can think of.

But, I digress...

Venus de MiloMona Lisa

After the Louvre we had some free time so we headed over to the Eiffel tower and then to the Montparnasse Cemetery.
Here we are with the Bolanders eating a little lunch under the Eiffel tower. How cool is that?

One of several unusual head stones found at the Montparnasse cemetery.
Nothing quite like Paris in the Springtime!

We leave tonight for Italy on the overnight train. Tune in tomorrow for scenes from Florence.

Au Revoir!

London 2011

Here we are - our little band of travelers - headed out for 10 days traveling through Europe!

This trip is a culmination of a year and a half of labor and part of a larger vision for me as I worked to start up a travel program as part of our curriculum. After writing a proposal with educational objectives, and receiving board and administrative approval, I was allowed to start up a travel abroad program to Europe. This was very exciting for me and I threw myself into this new venture with a great deal of gusto. (Perhaps too much, but that's another story!) With the help of a fundraising guru, I came across some great opportunities for my group that allowed us to raise the entire amount needed for nine travelers. Thankfully, my first travel group was the greatest and they worked tirelessly to raise the funds.

Here we are getting ready to head to Seattle to catch our plane to London!

Hailey and Charis are our only resident Seniors, so the parents and brothers of said girls, not to mention the fabulous Joel, tagged along. Actually, most of us planned on coming along - but we had a few surprises and that's how we ended up with the boys. We are thankful they are able to come along for the adventure!
Our first stop was London, where we were greeted warmly at the airport by a guide who took us to our hotel. There, we met our tour director, the fabulous Ali Bainbridge. We had the first afternoon free - since our plane got in pretty early that morning. We decided to hop on the metro and visit the Royal British Museum. This was amazing!




After a day at the museum, and an all night flight - this is kinda' how we were feeling:
Here are a few random photos of the museum:
After the museum, we made our way to our meeting spot for dinner. We had some time to do a little bit of walking and sightseeing on our way.

We saw the landmark telephone booths.

In fact, Hailey was so excited to see the telephone booth and get her picture in one that she ran
in only to discover a huge pile of poo.

I think she may be scarred for life. This seriously upset her "Sense and Sensibilities." Her pride was certainly damaged and she might be a bit prejudiced from using future red phone booths, or from London in general.

Let's just say, it was a severe disappointment.

Here she is in a telephone booth without feces:


Here I am coming out of a cute little bookstore:

We checked out Picadilly Circus, where we met up with the rest of our group and traveled to dinner. After dinner, we walked along to take in some more sights.

The next morning, bright and early after breakfast we headed out for a city tour with a local guide. Here are a few of the amazing sights:



At the risk of oversharing, I probably ought to limit some of my pictures here. When I got home I discovered, upon uploading, that I took over 1,000 photos. So, after some serious editing, I still have about 850. I won't share all 850 today.

We visited the queen. About a million other people had the same idea. She wasn't home. Here we are at Buckingham Palace:



From Buckingham Palace we hitched a ride out to Windsor Castle. This was one of my favorite things to see. And guess who was home?


This is the queen's own flag which is flown whenever she is in residence.


Since we ate lunch while we were there, I think we could technically say we had lunch with the queen. Yep, I'm going with that.



Notice how I am keeping a bit of a distance between me and the armed guard? Yes.. well right before I stepped up there another man was posing for his picture and he put his arm around this guy. I don't know about you, but that's just crazy. Does this guy look like he wants to snuggle? Anyway, the guard went a little nuts and started yelling and began his marching routine and the guy's camera bag was in his way so he kicked it out of his path. Apparently these guards do not like to be touched.

After our Windsor tour, we went out to dinner and then went to see Wicked. It was unbelievable!
Here we are at dinner.


Here is part of our group waiting for the show to start. We are so excited to see this in London!

A few more sights to take in!

The Millenium Bridge - as featured on Harry Potter.)

Shakespeare's Globe theater - across the Thames.

We took the Chunnel to Paris the next day! Can't wait to blog about our experiences there! Stay tuned for the next country ~ France tomorrow!

Arrivederci!

The time has come - tomorrow morning we head out for our long awaited trip to Europe. The bags are packed, the batteries are charged, the passports copied, and the Kindle downloaded (or uploaded, depending on your perspective - I'm never quite sure which one is correct). I have maps for every country we'll be visiting, I have a pharmacy - because, if you've read my blog and seen some of our trips you know this is critical for our family. We're heading first to London - where we'll be for 3 days, then on to Paris for another 3 days, from there we'll travel to Florence and finally end up in Rome.

A lot of love has gone into this trip!

This trip has been a year and half in the making - it started as my daughter's Senior trip with her class and has....well...morphed a bit. It's still a Senior trip just with a few extras - both girls' brothers and a friend as well as parents are along for the adventure.

This time tomorrow we'll be in the UK - I'm trying to talk my husband out of using a fake accent.

"Please, oh please, don't pretend to be British while I'm around."

Will post when I can.

Ciao!