France - 2025
We toured Ireland last year as part of a WEDU-sponsored 'Travel Club'. There isn't a webpage for it because it was largely a bus tour, and (it turns out) such things don't provide much in the way of photographic opportunities, 'photo ops'. The tour was originally intended to be WEDU-exclusive, meaning that most or all of the participants would be from the Tampa area or would have some substantial connection thereto. But...
...Collette, the tour organizer, seemingly did not get the memo. They reserved half the seats for WEDU and sold the remainder first-come-first-served. As a result, the tour had participants from all over rather than 'strictly Tampa'. That turned out to be a good thing.
On the tour we met Ann and Jonathan Clarke of Tempe AZ, and despite the similarity of our family names, we are not related (as far as we know). We four hit it off so remarkably well that when we parted we promised to keep the others apprised of future travel plans. And so it came to pass that Ann called Norene in the Spring to let us know that they were eyeing a Seine River Cruise from Paris to Normandy and return. Never ones to pass up an opportunity to travel to France, we packed our bags and updated our passports.
Something magical happened in Paris between April 15th, 2019 and now. On that date, Notre Dame de Paris burned, and I was sure then I would not live to see it restored. How happy I am to be wrong! The last time we saw NDdP, its walls were covered with 800 years of candle soot, but during the restoration, the interior got a thorough cleaning. It looks like it's 1250 AD again! It's truly a nunc dimittis experience.
While we were prowling Paris for four days ahead of the start of the cruise, we learned that Melissa, Jessica's best friend from her middle school days, and now living in Sweden, was visiting Paris with her husband, Andreas, and their three delightful children: Vendela, Bella, and Evalina. We connected and met them for snacks near the Eiffel Tower before finding a good vantage point to watch it twinkle for the spectators, something it does on the hour every evening after dusk from 9-ish to 11-ish.
That Sunday, we checked out of our rented appartment and headed for the ship, Uniworld's S.S. Joie de Vivre where we finally connected with Ann and Jon. For the next week, we ate, drank, and made merry while we toured Giverny, Rouen, Honfleur, and Le Petit Trianon at Versailles. The last Saturday was a free day and Norene and I introduced Ann to Norene's favorite museum in all the world, the Musee d'Orsay (MO).
Allons y...
Notre Dame
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Sainte Chapelle
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Conciergerie
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Melissa
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Giverny
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Rouen
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Honfleur
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Versailles
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Cruisers |
M'Orsay
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