From Paris to Brussels

Tim says: The last day in Paris we went to the Louvre and saw the Mona Lisa. As I had promised Rosie, it is really a fairly small painting and not quite as awe inspiring as some of the other paintings and statues that are there. But she can cross off "seeing the Mona Lisa" from her list of things to do in her life.

The Louvre itself is really interesting and big. We did our regular see as much as we can in 2 hours and then we headed to les Galléries Lafayette for some speed shopping before racing back to the apartment to collect our luggage and head to the train station. I had forgotten how crazy the traffic is in Paris especially the traffic circles such as the one around l'Arche de Triomphe. The other interesting thing is the way motorcycles wind in and out and between the cars.

The taxi driver from the apartment to the train was quite interesting. He had come from the Congo twenty years ago and he spent the whole time on the way to the train station swearing at and telling us how lousy the other drivers were.

Great cars in Paris, lots of everyday cars that we don't see in Canada as well as pretty some exotic cars. Sunday when we were shopping on the Champs de Elysées, there was a Lamborghini that kept going up and down. The driver made a point of stopping at every red light so he could rev his engine and take off fast. There was also an Aston Martin that was parked on the Trocadéro that lots of people stopped to look at.

The TGV train was fast . We were in Brussels 1.5 hours after leaving Paris. There we found out we had made a rather bad mistake in not pre-booking our train from Brussels to London. As a result we paid a rather large sum for tickets for Friday. The best deal was to buy a return ticket rather than 1 one way ticket. So if anybody knows someone who want 2 first class one way tickets from London to Brussels, to be used before the middle of August let us know.

!st day in Brussels


There was a big thunderstorm last night around 3am that woke Francine and I up. Rosie slept thru the whole thing. This has really cooled things down, today is much more pleasant than the heat in Paris.
This morning Francine took off for her meetings and Rosie slept in till 9 a.m. We went to breakfast and then she and I headed out into the wilds of Brussels.

We even took the subway to the shopping center that I remembered from my last visit. We walked the whole outdoor shopping mall and ended up in the Grand Palace square.

The highlight of our day however was the traffic accident that we saw. While wating for the traffic light to cross the street a police car was coming our way. A truck ( about the size of a Postal Truck in Canada) was trying to get out of the way to allow the police to pass. As he did he did not notice the car beside him. The result - the whole front fender was torn off the car. He was only going 5 miles per hour but just the weight of the truck was enough to pull the fender off.

We were like 20 feet away. After we got back to the hotel room I thought we were perfect witnesses, perhaps we should have stayed and gone to court as witnesses. That way we may have been able to use the overpriced train tickets we bought yesterday.
SEe you tomorrow