Paris! The City of Love and Romance... sorta

If you know me at all you know I am not the romantic type. So, Paris was a bit foreign for me. The beauty of the city, couples making out on every corner, the beautiful pastries and just how the city stands in grace. BUT everyone has to go to Paris, right? We saw the sights....and there were hoards of tourists because it's technically still summer break for most of Europe. BUT some of the things the surprised me. It's actually really dirty as well. I haven't been to New York City but that would be the closest comparison that I can think of. There is a certain sense of grit and dingy that goes with a big city. I guess I just had this ideal picture in my head of what Paris looks like. There is also a huge Muslim, Middle Eastern and African populations which is surprising for some reason. I guess France has granted citizenship for refugees of war thus the melting pot. Anyway we didn't want to hassle with Couchsurfing in Paris. It's kinda a mess. There are too many people requesting for hosting and not enough hosts. AND with Air BnB getting so popular most people rent out their spare room which leaves all the crummy floors and couches to Couchsurfing. No thanks. Getting too old to sleep on dirty floors. I'm on vacation Goddammit! So, we shelled out some skrill to rent out a room in a flat in the Bastille (like the Greenwitch Village of Paris). The women we rented from was so interesting. From Isreal and had lived in Paris and I think she was a Lesiban Muslim? Not sure how that works but there were female nude painting, sculputures and art all over her flat, no husband, no kids. I'm just assuming? Well whatever she was cool. What was also interesting is there is a picture of her kitchen below with a tiny washer. AND only 1 hot plate to cook food. It's amazing to see the simplicity of her home. It was very appealing. EVERYTHING was small! Bed, shower, sink, kitchen, tv... but the best thing was BIG this Windows! Aw the windows so beautiful The sterotype that the French refuse to speak English are true. They continue to speak to you in French... thank God Geoff speaks a bit of French. He tried to force me to order my meals in French for myself, I was like "NO!" I don't know anything and look like an idiot so that didn't last long. He ordered for me after the second meal. In the pictures below you will see a vending machine, they put the bottles in upside down that facinited me. They are in all the train stations. They are extremely expensive like 2 Euro (almost $3) and like 1/3 of the size. We decided to go to the Eiffle Tower on a rainy day so the lines were non-existent. Otherwise, they are about 2+ hours. We finally got to the top and it's beautiful view. The tower is not so pretty when your on it. Just metal and dirty. BUT beautiful lit up and from the ground. It lights up to a hue of gold... looks amazing. Most people are going to think I am crazy but I didn't care for the French food. It's patae this, duck that, weird meat eggs. I didn't enjoy the pastries. They just melt in your mouth and awwww so good! After all of this, I was happy to start our Germnay...

Our First Stop-Frankfurt!

We made it! That was of big worry for me! This was my longest plane ride Ive ever taken and I def had sleep feet and legs. The flight was pretty straight fowward. No jet lag yet! Cross fingers. Yesterday was Geoff's birthday and we def lived it up a little with consumption with the traditional Frankfurt Apple wine/ cidr which tast like an ape Chardonnay(very wine). We met with Claudia and Ken who Jeff met on the Camino de Santiago. And by the way I am using Siri to type this message so some of the spelling is going to be wrong and it's hard to correct it so you're just going to have to live with it. Anyway Claudia met us at the train station which was super nice and we went out for Italian food at the praise a salad pizza and German beer it was so awesome. Then we checked into our hotel and took a power nap which was awesome and then we met up with Claudia and can afterword and went on a great walking to her of Frankfurt. For Geoff's birthday we went to a traditional German place & had the most amazing food! Could finish it all so took it home in a doggie bag & duh had it for breakfast! By the way European bed suck. I've gotten confirmation from several natives. Get this you standards ounce sized bad is literally 2 twin beds together w/ the crack in the middle. I figure there are two reasons; Germans are small or they do not like to cuddle? All in all I really liked franfort. Germans are serious and straight to the point kinda people. Next stop Paris!

IS this really happening? Take off!

Well tomorrow is it. We have about 90% of our things packed and just a few last min things tomorrow morning. We have also secured our housing for almost are whole trip. It's amazing that we have so many international friends. People always ask me why I do couchsurfing or let strangers into my home? WELL... this is the reason. When we hosted we had no travel plans but it's something both of us enjoy doing and really practice paying it forward. Over the past 6 years of couchsurfing I have meet so many amazing people AND they are so generous. The host we will be staying with that has the coolest story I would have to say is... Alan Don Jones. Let me tell you this story, it kinda goes like this... 4 years ago I set out to do some soul searching and I was not in a place where I felt happy. In my job, in my life and it just seemed like everything didn't work. I decided I wanted to go on the open road trip w/ my dog and just drive, camp and live! On my stop in TEXAS. Lubbock, Texas to be exact I meet Alan Don Jones. A Global studies student at Texas Tech from Austin. Great guy hosted an international dinner for me. There were people from France, Iran, Africa and prolly Timbuktu! That's where I meet Joel, a French/ Korean... cool huh?! Anyway, after my trip Joel and I have become great friends and shared many adventures together in Death Valley, Yosemite, San Francisco and somewhere else I can't remember. BUT after the dinner and staying at Alan's in Lubbock I stayed with his parents outside of Austin. When they sent me off his mother told me to take a jar of her homemade pickled okra?! So, fast forward to 2013, Alan was doing a roadtrip around the US with his girlfriend. They landed outside of Yosemite and we meet up for coffee. Of course, his mother who I stayed with in Austin has instructed him to give me homemade canned apple butter when he saw me. Now Alan is living in Berlin where were we will meetup again! This world is so small if you just expand your mind and allow others in. I am so fortunate to have Geoff to really guide me on this trip and that we get a chance to experience this together. He is also very luck to have me. :-) We hope that there are lots of internets or Wifi that we can update this blog frequently. Happy Travels and we will see you soon! PS- Both of us are in good health now. Thanks for all the blessings.

Germany!!!

Hey ya'll! So glad you are joining me again on another adventure! I hope that this trip OOOO's and AAAWWW's you into traveling yourself. Let me flash back a second or maybe two. Image you are a senior in high school and your parents ask you what you want for graduation? Of course I want to backpack Europe! Well that just wasn't happening. Fast-forward again! College. I am graduating and all I ever wanted was to backpack Europe. Nope, still not possible. Fast forward again 6 years out of College. WTF?! Why have I not backpacked Europe yet? You see, as many of us experience money had never showed up for me. I took me awhile to realize but the money was NEVER going to come unless I did something different! SO, in leau of my fustration came knives. CUTCO to be exact. I had sold CUTCO 12-15 years ago when I was a senior in highschool and a freshmen in collage. LOVED it and I made a lot of money. SOOO duh here comes a solution... I can earn extra money on the side and still keep my old job. Shit... do I have that extra time? I donno? Let's do the math (complicated math equations with adding, dividing and all that stuff- bleep-do-be-bleep- boo-pop)! YES! I can do it! I just need to sell $4,000 worth of knives so I can GOOOOOO TO EUROPE BABY! 25 5:30am wake up texts, 35 Phone Demos, 5 in-person demos and 67 phone calls and facebook messages later. I surpassed my goal to $5,200 in knife sales! Phew. This is the home stretch. This is the easy part. NOPE! We are 17 Days out from take off on Condor Air, which will be a direct flight 11 hours of sleepy heaven. I get food poisoning. Guh FML! Okay, okay I can do this. We got 10 more days till take off... I still have explosive you know whats. Then Geoff gets the flu... recovers in 24hours, phew. So, I'm still having issue and want to nail this in the butt (literally). Had an MRI, 2 sets of blood tests, stool test(gross) and we are 7 days out. Geoff gets stomach flu last night! OMG! Really? He seems to recover quickly, he's back to normal. But I still don't know whats wrong with me BUT hopefully an easy solution to come! Stay tuned! This is a test, I know it! Countdown continues...