65,672 HOT Steps Across France 

According to my watch, we walked almost 31 miles this past week. I can’t decide if that feels right, or insanely low, because as my mom said at dinner last night, it felt like we walked across the United States of America yesterday alone. 

Today is Saturday, the 17th, about 3pm, and we just landed in Rome and are on our way to the hotel in Siena, about 2.5 hours away. (Jude, who I am convinced knows more random facts than any 11 year old on earth, told us as we got in the van with our driver that Italy has the 24^th worst drivers on earth. Apparently, Thailand is #1.)

Today also happens to be Luke’s birthday eve and his last day of being 12. Tomorrow, he becomes an official teenager. I would say it’s hard to believe but he has been pushing the envelope on all teenagery topics for a while now, so tomorrow just makes it official. 😂

Thursday night didn’t end up being the “walk around and see the lights” night, as we were all just beat at the end of the day. Which has definitely been the daily theme. In hindsight, we should have really only tried to do one thing a day as everything took longer than expected and getting a taxi/uber in Paris was not nearly as easy as we thought it would be. SO many “green” taxis would drive right by, not interested in picking us up for whatever reason. Thus the steps. (Although, given the amount of bread and cheese they eat in France ALL THE TIME, I need the steps.)

However, I have realized that many Parisians are just rude. We’ve had several guides explain this cultural attitude to us, and it’s not as if they don’t like Americans or anything; it’s just how they are. Gizelle, our guide back in Normandy (which feels like a month ago), said that if a French person agrees with you in the first 5 minutes, don’t trust them. She was SO right. Like the guy from the hotel who came to check on the AC in my room and kept telling me it was working fine and I would tell him to walk from one room then into my room, and how he’ll feel the heat smack him in the face. Nope. Didn’t feel it. “The AC works”, according to him. #liar

While yesterday was a looong day, it was a great day. We started off with our typical wake-up call. Shawn returned from his crack of dawn run and telling us we have 40 minutes to get ready. Up first? A “skip the line” tour of the Eiffel Tower and if we were late, at all, to meet our guide? Well, we weren’t going to be skipping any lines to see any towers. We thankfully found two cabs to get the 6 of us (dad still behind, feeling yucky, but better) and we made it in time.

My mom, Macy and I were in the first cab, and when we got to the meeting spot, there was a guy in Virginia Tech shirt standing there with his teenage daughter, holding a similar ticket to the one we had. (Well, to be clear, the tickets Shawn had bc of course he has printed all the things and I have nothing. lol) “Go Hokies!” I yelled to him. I could actually feel Macy wince at my dorky momness. 

“Did you go to VT?” he asked? That’s always a longer answer than it should be…no I didn’t, nor did my husband, but my nephew we “adopted” in high school went there and graduated two years ago. However, that wasn’t the start of the VT love in our house. Luke, at age 4, one day woke up fully obsessed with all things VT. Like many of his interests, we thought it would fade and a new love would take its place. Well, that never happened. He is truly a massive fan and has requested multiple times to retire from middle school and just go straight to VT. Every stat, every player, every prediction - he knows it. Shawn and Luke even have season tickets to the football games. It’s a whole thing. 

Anyway, turns out this guy and Shawn have a ton in common. He is from Blacksburg and went to VT, and was an attorney now turned pastor, living with his wife and 5 kids in Utah after going there “for a year” that turned into staying there bc they love the outdoors and skiing, and his 16 year old daughter has been obsessed with Paris for years so he took her on a quick trick on their way to Israel for a missions trip. 

Macy actually had her room decorated in a Paris theme for years when she was younger. She is a voracious reader (literally one of her BFF’s at school is the librarian who emails her when books she knows Macy will love come in!) and when she was about 7, she read “Lost in Paris” and it’s been a bit of an obsession ever since. 

The Utah & Virginia teenagers also had a lot in common at the Eiffel Tower, both hating heights, in addition to Macy’s elevator phobia, along with her fear of small spaces (see photo of her with my mom to see who she rode the elevator), but she proudly made it to the top, got an obligatory photo, and we all headed back down. Box. Checked. (I also don’t love heights and have a whole thing about there being too many people on things like porches and balconies.)

That event should have taken about 90 minutes, but instead was 2.5 hours due to the strike the Eiffel Tower workers decided upon that morning. They still get paid for the day if they go to work at 11:30, so Jude was right when he said, “Well, they’re just gonna wait until 11:29.” And they did. 

The delay meant we had to find a spot to throw down some quick lunch bc we had to meet Karine at the Louvre at 3pm for a scavenger hunt. We stumbled upon a random little cafe that was literally half convenience store, half restaurant, and in true “dive” fashion, it was the best lunch we had in France! 

We hustled our fannies to the Louvre, only 9 minutes late to meet Karine this time, and we split up into boys vs. girls groups to start our 2 hour scavenger hunt. (This is basically an easy way to see the Louvre with kids - making sure you hit all the highlights while having fun - highly recommend it!)

There are too many stories to post about this two hour adventure, but here’s the recap: it was hot. I don’t know if the French just have totally unique DNA and don’t feel how hot they make ALL THEIR SPACES, but needless to say, I was sweating in all MY PLACES and was going to need to continue with the required two showers a day apparently needed in France. I mean, are there not menopausal women in this country?! (By the way, the girls won the hunt!)

About halfway through the scavenger hunt, my mom and I were just done. Between the heat and the one million other visitors, it just made our normal level of being bad riddle answerers even worse. (We could have really used my brother Josh in that moment, however my mom did tip the win in our direction when she guessed that the blue they used in the paintings came from Lapis. Well done mother.) But when our guide said, “now that we’ve all been to Egypt, let’s see how the statues in here compare to the ones in Egypt. Do you think they are painted or raw marble?”

My mom, in complete exasperated, deadpan style, says “Well, I’ve never been to Egypt.” 😂 Macy and I legit doubled over in laughter. “Mom, she meant the exhibit we just came through.” The three of us couldn’t even look at each other so we could get it together. She’s just funny even when she’s not trying to be funny.

Speaking of funny, when we crossed paths with the boys amongst said statues, they both ran immediately over to me, in true 11 and 12-year boy fashion and whispered/giggled about all the penises and other body parts on display. They are both hilarious.

Once back at the hotel, we finally reunited with pop pop for a drink at the bar, a sure sign he was feeling much better. YAY!  We set off to dinner and enjoyed some epic seafood, and they were great at accommodating Macy, as it’s been a total struggle taking someone with celiac to the bread capital of the world. Poor thing has lived off of salads.

I am so excited to explore Siena and this awesome hotel we are headed to, and while I don’t want to rush time, I also can’t wait to get to our next destination – a villa. We desperately need to do some laundry. My menopausal undergarments weren’t expecting such aggressiveness!

Hoping for less heat, more AC, more gluten-free options, healthy immune systems, and more fun memories made.

Pics:

1. Macy finally seeing the lights at night!
2. How Macy rode the Eiffel Tower elevator - burrowed into my mothers neck.
3. The three of us at the top.
4. The boys at the top, fascinated by the worker hanging off the side. Insane.
5. The three girls at the Louvre, forced to re-create ballet moves for a photo. It was already funny but the photo was the icing on the cake.