New Thing #94 - Wanderlust (Paris & Barcelona Day 1)

Month 6 - Wanderlust

November 29/30, 2018 - Travel and Paris: Day 1

Okay, so wanderlust isn't a new thing for me. If you know anything about me, you know it's been in my blood for as long as I can remember, finally kicking in gear over the last decade or so when I became financially able to fulfill my travel dreams. And I know I have a big 40th trip planned for next year (stay tuned to hear about where I've decided to go), but that didn't stop me from planning a semi last minute trip back to Europe.

I love Europe. The architecture. The food. The history. I've only scratched the surface of cities to visit, but each time, I chip away at my bucket list. After all these years, I still hadn't made it to Paris or anywhere in Spain, though Spain has ranked rather highly on my list. A few months ago, I found a travel deal for 3 nights in Paris and 3 nights in Barcelona. I've never done one of these pre-planned trips before, so I was a bit leery, but decided to give it a shot since it was so inexpensive. Like, stupidly inexpensive. Like the 3 plane tickets, 2 hotel rooms and 2 airport transfers cost as much as one of my previous flights to Europe.

Sandi, my Peru partner from last year, joined me on this quick jaunt across the Atlantic. This would only be her second international trip and her first ever to Europe. (I'm breaking her in to this travel business!) Her parents were kind enough to take us to the airport and store my car for the duration of our trip. Did I mention I got to fly out of ST. LOUIS?! For the first time in my travel history, I was able to fly internationally from StL rather than driving to Chicago. It was glorious.

The only drawback to flying from StL is there are no direct flights to Europe. But, for this trip, I was willing to forego the direct flight for the ease of traveling from my home city. We had a quick 1.5 hour flight to Detroit before the long leg of our flight to Paris. I cracked my skull on the overhead bins trying to quickly shimmy into my seat, so that was a lovely throbbing pain for the better part of the rest of the day.

We had a fairly short layover (Yay!) and boarded our plane on time, though we lost some time getting de-iced. I've never been on a plane that needed to be de-iced before. I felt like we were getting a very large carwash. The 7 hour flight wasn't one of the longest I've ever had, but I found it incredibly difficult to sleep (even more so than usual). Which wasn't great since I needed to sleep to avoid jet lag. Watched a few movies, ate some food and tossed restlessly, but pretty much never slept. Neato.

Getting de-iced.

Airplane food is surprisingly less terrible than people might think. I try to block out thinking about how much sodium is in there though to improve the flavor.

Breakfast.

Arrived mostly on time, easily went through customs, but waited quite a while for our luggage. Luckily, our driver was waiting on us, and he spoke enough English to communicate fairly easily. We pre-booked a driver to take us the hour ride to our hotel since we had a feeling we'd be super jet lagged and not in any mood to deal with public transportation. And we were right. Private driver was THE way to go. Though, he was a bit too chatty for us, strictly due to the fact that we were struggling to stay awake and form coherent thoughts. Why couldn't I fall asleep as easily on the plane as I did in the back seat of his car?

Since we arrived prior to check in at the hotel, we dropped off our luggage and started to wander. The weather was beautiful, if a bit chilly, but it was the best weather day we had the entire time we were in Paris. Stopped in to have some crepes for lunch since we were hungry and weren't ready to power walk just yet.

Found this creperie, which turned out to be the first of many just on this street alone. The lunch special came with a buckwheat crepe, dessert crepe and a tiny jug o' wine.

Blue jug of water and tiny white jug of wine. Turns out wine when jet lagged equals hilarious shenanigans.

Buckwheat crepe with egg, ham and cheese. It was just meh. I could have used more filling and less crepe.

Dessert could either be a dessert crepe or sorbet. I had enough carbs so I went with the tartest lemon sorbet I've ever had topped with a ginger biscuit. Very weird flavor combination.

Cute little shop. Despite the chilly weather in Paris the entire time we were there, people still sat outside to eat. (Not in this pic though, obviously. We were super early for lunch, and the place filled up as we were finishing.)

Loving the architecture as we walk.

Le Jardin du Luxembourg was not far away, so we took a stroll in the 17th century park. It was still beautiful despite the time of year and the lack of leaves on the trees. The brisk wind didn't stop hundreds of patrons from strolling through, eating lunch on park benches, or others going for a run along the main path. I was actually surprised with how many people were out, given it was only in the upper 40s today.

Sadly, we never made it back here, but I'm curious to know what French tacos are...

Jet-lagged....and a little tipsy.

So, I love doors. A lot. But not just any doors. Old and ornate doors that tell stories. Usually I take photos of all the cool doors I see on vacation. Turns out both Paris and Barcelona have more awesome doors than I have storage on my phone. After 3 sets of doors in as many minutes, I realized that I would never see anything else if I just took photos of doors. So, you get these 3 and a few more sprinkled in throughout the trip.

Turns out Sandi loves doors as much as I do. Must be the designers in us.

We walked a few blocks north to Saint-Sulpice, a 17th century Catholic Church, that I didn't remember until a few weeks later was featured in Dan Brown's "Da Vinci Code". It was absolutely gorgeous inside this church.

These chairs are even smaller than they look, and the church was filled with them. If they're trying to make church more uncomfortable for people, they are succeeding.

I might love ceilings as much as doors. Though I have no control when it comes to taking photos of ceilings.

BDO (Big Damn Organ)

Unfortunately, lack of sleep for us both and a quarter carafe of wine for me was a dangerous combination. Everything was comically hilarious, and I realized if we didn't take a nap soon people might start to think we had lost our marbles. Though, it was France, so I assume they already think us Americans are cray cray.

We walked back to our hotel and were able to check in to our room. It was a cute room with a queen bed and tiny bathroom, but we didn't need much more space. We immediately took a 2.5 hour nap, followed by a shower to start to feel human again.

Quiet little corner for our hotel.

Our feet hurt, and we realized our hotel wasn't nearly as close to all of the main attractions as we thought when we booked it, so we Ubered to Notre Dame to sightsee and grab dinner. It was gorgeous at night, but we didn't go in, figuring we'd have plenty of time in the next two days. Walked some more around the area where Christmas music was playing and people were milling about. Stopped at a restaurant/bar for some wine and croque mosieur (ham and cheese on toast) with fries and a salad before heading back to the hotel for sleeps.

Notre Dame

The archway might be more impressive than the doors.

The River Seine

We have a boat tour scheduled for tomorrow, so we'll see the Seine at night.

Schmancy hotel!

  

Inflatable igloos with Christmas music.

Not really sure what's going on, but at least they're festive!

When in France, you drink delicious French wine. With a rose, cause you're classy like that.

Cheese. Ham. Toast. Fries. Can't go wrong with that!

This is the first time in all my European trips where our key card is required to turn the lights on. It took Sandi and I an embarrassingly long amount of time trying to figure out how to turn the damn lights on tonight. Eventually we figured out we had to insert our room key here. We'll blame it on the jet lag!

New Thing #93 - StL Exploration

Month 5 - StL Exploration

I've lived in St. Louis nearly half my life, and I've made it my mission to visit a lot of what this beloved city has to offer - the Arch, Zoo, breweries, Science Center, Botanical Gardens, Grant's Farm, City Museum and the list goes on. When I first moved here, I couldn't wait to see as much of it as I could.

I soon found that friends who grew up here hadn't even been to half of what I had explored. I suppose with the Arch in your backyard, you feel less compelled to visit. The same can be said for Ikea. Once it opened up a short 10 minute drive from my house, I feel less inclined to go.

Over the years, I either got lazy about finding new places or focused too much attention on my international endeavors. For November, I've chosen a variety of StL spaces that are less known, but still famous in their own right, but dropped off my radar for various reasons.

#1 - Compton Hill Water Tower - November 3, 2018

This towering beacon in the St. Louis mid-town skyline has always been on my list, but for whatever reason has eluded me. It's not far from my house, and is always visible whenever I return home from a visit east of the Mississippi.

It's only open to the public one Saturday per month, which is probably what led to me forgetting about it. I saw the event pop up earlier this week on Facebook letting me know that this weekend it was available for viewing. While the weather wasn't great (cloudy and chilly), I didn't let that deter me from making my way up the 198 stairs to get a 360-degree of my home. The cool weather actually helped cool me off after the climb.

A quick history lesson about the water tower. It was built in the late 1800s as a modern solution to an outdated water delivery system. The standpipe – six feet wide by 130 feet tall – was built on one of the highest elevations in St. Louis, an altitude well above sea level. To camouflage it, an architect/artist was hired to erect the surrounding structure 179 feet tall out of limestone, terra cotta and brick. The bell shaped terra cotta roof tops an observation deck providing 360 degree views of St. Louis. While I wish the sun was brighter today, you couldn't really beat the fall foliage!

There is a small $5 fee to climb to the observation deck – open only the first Saturday of the month March through November from 12-4pm (whew, just made it!), along with a few select summer evenings. The volunteer at the base gave me a few details about the structure, but most of what I learned came from a pamphlet. She also told me that over 2000 photos were found from the construction of the tower in the late 1800s and the tower's early usage in the early 1900s. The favorites were reproduced and hung along the walls of the stairwell, while the remaining can be found at one of the St. Louis libraries.

I've found that I really enjoy climbing structures and getting that rare bird's eye view of places. The 198 stairs went by in a flash – so much so, that I had to force myself to stop and pay attention to the photographs adorning the walls on the way back down. When I arrived at the top, only two people were on the observation deck – a volunteer and a young lady interviewing him for a project. They stayed relatively out of my way, so I was able to get views out of every window without having to wait my turn or worry about someone in my way. It. Was. Delightful. I hadn't been sure how busy it would be since this was the last available weekend until spring, but I really lucked out.

I spent about 20 minutes up here, taking pics from every window (they opened easily for an unobstructed city view) before heading back down. As I descended, I probably passed 15-20 people on the stairs, so I timed my viewing damn near perfectly. I spent a bit more time at each landing on the way down to check out the photos more closely. Hard to believe it was built in 1898. Even harder to believe were the quality of the photos from those early decades.

Two reservoir tanks.

Final tiny steps up to the top.

Looking south on Grand toward the South Grand neighborhood.

Looking north on Grand toward SLU Hospital and campus.

Those trees though...

Looking east towards downtown and the river.

Looking west down Shaw at the intersection of Grand. The tall buildings on the horizon in the top right are downtown Clayton.

Lots of windows for viewing! You can tell this is in the US though. None of the structures I've climbed in foreign countries have stools to sit on at the top.

Up to the dome.

The Arch way off in the distance.

Steps leading up the reservoir walls.

The Comfort Station, aka the bathrooms.

#2 - The Awakening II Statue - November 4, 2018

My quest continues for the weekend. After visiting the water tower yesterday, I researched what other quirky or new places I had yet to visit in StL. My search turned up The Awakening II statue in Chesterfield. You guys. This giant (literally) statue has been here the whole time, and I'm just now finding out about it.

The original 72 foot Awakening statue was built in DC in 1980 by J. Seward Johnson, Jr, and the second one was unveiled in Chesterfield in 2009. It's essentially pieces of a man that protrude from the ground making it appear that a giant is trying to emerge.

It's been super gross and rainy all weekend, which fortunately made tourists very scarce. I had the whole sculpture to myself. Unfortunately, the ground was soggy AF, and the pieces were too wet to sit on and take pics. It was still really cool, and I'm surprised I've never heard about it in the last 9 years!

#3 - Butterfly House - November 4, 2018

A few miles away from the statue is the Butterfly House, an extension of the Missouri Botanical Garden. While I did know this was here, I never made any effort to stop by. Which is a shame. It's a cute place with more butterflies in one place than I've ever seen. What I failed to think about was that in order for the butterflies to have a habitable climate, they needed a warm environment. Meaning it was a billion degrees in there. And I was wearing entirely too many layers.

Inside is a small gift shop, with you guessed it – a plethora of butterfly themed chachkies. Tchotchkes? However the heck you spell that word. A few spaces for educational programs, an outdoor garden, and more cockroach species than I've ever seen in one place, completed the building. I immediately headed out into the butterfly house, stripped out of my coat and scarf and took in the sites.

The employee gave me this to identify the butterflies I would see. Um, yeah, I didn't use this thing once.

Very busy butterflies. Trying to get photos of them on the flowers was tough, but I did the best I could.

Snack time!

When I walked in, I immediately thought it smelled like banana bread. Now I know why.

Perty!!

This would make two batches of banana bread!!

I tried to get a video of them swarming around. They were definitely everywhere, and it took all of my instincts not to flinch when they were flying at my face.

The employee warned me to watch where I stepped b/c apparently butterflies like to take little naps on the ground. I nearly stepped on this before I realized it was just a leaf.

Love this bench!!

Picked a bad time of year to see some foliage in the garden.

A 30' long lopatapillar statue created by the same StL native that created the City Museum, Bob Cassilly.

Another Cassilly sculpture.

#3 - Faust Park Carousel - November 4, 2018

The Butterfly House is located in Faust Park, around the corner from the Faust Park Carousel, a traditional 1920s carousel with hand-carved horses and deer. My new coworker helped with a remodel at one point, including the bathrooms, so I thought I'd stop in and see what it was all about. I also wondered if I could ride it. Turns out, adults are not allowed to ride (based on their website), and I was too chicken to ask if I could. There was only a guy and his daughter riding it, along with two employees, so the place was empty. Everyone just kind of stared at me while I looked around, and I quickly realized I looked a bit creepy, so I took a few photos and got the heck out of dodge!

Super cute little carousel.