1999: France and Italy

A Short Ride Into Paris

It sure is a long flight, across nine time zones, to Paris. Luckily we had already made reservations at a hotel in the Rue Cler part of town, and would be able to settle in after a quick train ride from the airport. We landed around 8:30 in the morning (rush hour), and as we were taxiing up to the gate, they announced that Metro had just gone on strike. Well, one little strike shouldn't hurt that much. After a 4 1/2 hour bus ride through total gridlock, and a 45 minute hike across town with our luggage, we finally stumbled into the hotel. We spent the afternoon wandering around the neighborhood, up under the Eiffel Tower, which was scaffolded for the bottom third, and has gigantic lights on it saying how many days are left until the millennium. [A note from the year 2000: just a few hours before midnight, December 31, 1999, the countdown lights on the tower stopped working!]

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