French Lessons

After a few weekends in a row of travel Dena and I decided to take a break and we wont travel again for a few weeks. So we have not had many things to write about in the blog. Dena has not had any more bad spills on the bus. So instead I have decided to post a picture of my French tutor.
Her name is Madame Lilian Torchet and she is a very nice and enthusiastic French tutor. She waves her arms around a lot and makes the funniest facial expressions. I have only had 5 lessons so far but I have many more to come. I meet with her at 8am on Tues. and Thurs. each week. So far we are just getting through the basics. I am learning how to say my name, where I live, what I do, etc. Very elementary stuff but I need a lot more practice. The other day I was on the bus going to work and this guy standing next to me pointed out the window to some trees and rambled on in French and the only word I could make out was "citrus". I figured out that he was talking abut some fruit growing on a tree but I am not sure why he was talking about it. I just nodded my head, smiled and said "oui" (yes in French). I was totally faking it and pretending I understood what he said and praying that he didnt ask me anything else because then the gig would have been up and I would have had to confess that I didn't speak any French. Luckily for me he got off at the next stop and I was in the clear. So hopefully after many many more lessons from Madame Torchet I will be able to understand a little more and I don't have to fake it. Au revoir!

Paris, France

We just LOVED Paris! This city has so much to offer and there is just something about Paris that you can't explain - you have to go and see for yourself. Believe it or not, we actually took this picture of the Eiffel Tower. On Friday we went there and saw it during the day and night (worked out perfectly because we got to the top around 8:30pm). Then we went to dinner at Au Rocher de Cancale. Reasonably priced and very good. On Saturday we went to Place de Concorde and Vendome (Vendome is where the JPM office is located) and Eglise Madeleine. Then we hit up a few museums such as de l'Orangerie & d'Orsay (Renoir, Monet, Matisse, Van Gough) and headed to the Jardins of Tuileries. Then we headed over to Place Charles de Gaulle (where the famous Arc de Triomphe is located) and Avenue des Champs-Elysees (tree-lined streets). We both bought some super sweet new shades! At night, we went to a new restaurant called Les Ombres. It's on the 5th(top) floor of a museum with a beautiful view of the Eiffel tower. I ordered this lamb dish with spinach gnocchi and Brian ordered the pork with some kind of pea mashed potatoes. For dessert, I had these mini waffles with fresh strawberries and vanilla ice cream. Brian got this chocolate dessert. Food was outstanding! Sunday was a little more low key. We went to the Cathedrale de Notre Dame de Paris, Ste Chapelle, Musee du Louvre (Mona Lisa, Venice de Milo, Van Gough self portrait). The du Louvre was a 3 hour event because it is just huge! For some reason the museum was free on Sunday and it was insanely busy! We also hit up a few cafes and ate a really late lunch before we headed home. J'adore la Paris!!

Barcelona, Spain

We arrived in Barcelona with Tyler and Sophie around 8pm on Friday night. We freshened-up, changed clothes and headed out to a restaurant Sophie researched. There was an 1.5 hour wait, so we put our name in and went to another place to get local Sangria, which was excellent. We headed back to the restaurant and ordered about 15 different tapas (little appetizers). There were mini-sandwiches, calamari, fried hot peppers, potatoes with mayo and hot sauce, cuttle fish and of course dessert. We enjoyed more local Sangria and called it a night. On Saturday, we got round trip bus tour tickets (the ones where you can sit on top of the bus). The weather was gorgeous and we enjoyed the sites all over the city. Looked at the Gaudi buildings and garden, cathedrals, Olympic stadium, little shops, etc. We also walked in the famous Las Ramblas area and visited the huge, local food market. For lunch we all got Paella type dishes. We toured the city for a few more hours then went back to the apartment for a cat-nap. We decided to go to dinner in El Borne. El Born is a quaint, older, cobblestone part of town that is amazing. We got more tapas again and they were even better than the first restaurant. On Sunday we went to the Picasso museum, saw more sites and then headed back to Geneva.