Blog issues

Turns out blogger has been down much of the week. That's at least part of my excuse for not posting. The other is that we head out to the Atlantic Coast tomorrow and have been getting everything(ish) ready(ish). I'll try to post some pics tonight, but if blogger is down AGAIN you might check the new blog I just set up here. (It's intended to be urbanism pictures and thoughts, prompted by my friend Lee's occasionally wheedling.)

Some good fare sales, buy before Friday or Oct 31

Finally, some very nice fare sales, from United, Air France, American, and maybe others. Check 'em out, please come!

United

Atlantic E-Fares :

*Purchase by October 27, 2006
*Travel outbound October 30 - November 2, 2006
*Return November 6 - November 9, 2006
*Refer to International E-Fare Facts for more details
*Additional taxes and fees:

Fares do not include the September 11th Security Fee of up to $10 maximum per roundtrip or Passenger Facility Charges of up to $18, which may be collected depending on the itinerary. All international fares are subject to U.S. arrival and departure taxes and agricultural, immigrations and customs fees of up to $41. For travel to some countries, additional airport, transportation, embarkation, security, duty, and passenger service taxes/surcharges of up to $140 will apply depending on destination. For return travel from some countries, fares do not include airport and/or departure taxes of up to $36, which may be collected by the foreign government.

Departure city Destination city Price
Washington (IAD) Amsterdam (AMS) $452.00
Washington (IAD) Frankfurt Am Main (FRA) $399.00
Washington (IAD) London (LHR) $316.00
Washington (IAD) Paris (CDG) $501.00
Washington (IAD) Zurich (ZRH) $555.00

Air France
- I don't see DC-Paris but Houston-Paris is under $500 and DC-London is under $400!

To France
New York - Paris.....................................$188*
Houston - Paris.......................................$248*

To the United Kingdom
New York - London..................................$179*
Washington D.C. - London.....................$183*

and many more!

Departures through March 31, 2007 - blackout period December 15 through January 7
Purchase by October 31, 2006.

American - includes Houston-Paris $486, DC-Paris $578 (not so great).

American Airlines is offering special sale fares for travel from the U.S. to Europe. Outbound travel is valid November 1, 2006 through December 14, 2006. Return travel must be complete by January 13, 2007. To take advantage of these fares, purchase your tickets on AA.com by October 31, 2006.

A mixed-up day

The boys kindly let us sleep in this morning, and after brunch we got ready to go visit my friend Mary and her family in the close-in Paris burbs. Turns out I had failed to get her home phone, so the plan for us to call her from the train station to be picked up turned into us waiting at the train station for 90 minutes then heading back to Paris. Drat. We saved the day by going to the Gare de Lyon, the prettiest of Paris' remaining stations, and having afternoon tea at their historic restaurant, Le Train Bleu. We then took a stroll down the Promenade Plantée, an old elevated railroad that's been converted to a wonderful linear park. The boys even got to ride a smart car on a carousel! After, we had a lovely dinner at Au Metro by Daumesnil before heading home. The boys are out cold, Betsy's working, and I'm going to call it a night. Sorry for the delay getting more pictures up, but I'll get some done before next weekend when we head to France's mid-Atlantic coast for the Toussaint holidays. It's 10 days, but we have to stay here for the first three while Betsy works. Then we'll stay at this place for 4 nights and maybe here for the next few. What do you think?

Friday and out

Friday ... OK, Saturday 1:20 a.m. ... very tired ... long week ... 10 mile hike ... dinner party for 5 ... must sleep ... post pictures first ... figure out where to go on vacation next week ... sleeeeeeeep

That's me in the back, you know, the one who looks like a guy

Here's a picture of the group from our randonnée a couple of weeks ago. You can probably find me. We go again on Friday, and you can read (in French) about the walk.

We do too exist!

Oh yes, I hear you all out there, wondering if we've forgotten you, or home, or this journal, or how to use the camera, or all of our passwords, or all of the above. Well 'tain't true. We're here and leading our daily (en français, quotidien) busy lives. I'll skip the excuses and go on to the meat of a quick update. Since returning from Köln a week ago, I started back to french classes at the Alliance Française. It's 3 hours per day, 3 days per week now (it was 2 hours for 5 days last spring), and last week it was actually 4 hours per day to make up for the teacher's absence the week before. If you're wondering, 4 hours of french per day is too much for a 38-year-old brain, though our strong soldier Carter is managing at it quite nicely. In fact, his and Calvin's french has totally started bubbling over, just in the past few weeks. They've had conversations in french with each other without us, and if we ask in french they'll eagerly answer in much better french (than mine, at least). Their teachers all report that they're having fun and working hard.

Last week we had to say goodbye to our friend River, who we met as a guide at Fat Tire. He came for dinner to see the boys one last time, and then he and I went out for drinks. Just in case you're checking, thanks, man.

Last weekend, we started by taking it as easy as possible Friday, being all beat after a long week and traveling weekend. Saturday we got up late, then headed to the Jardin d’Aventure des Halles. (I *swear* I wrote about this before, but darned if I can find it via the blogger search. Hmmm.) It's this excellent kids-only play area tucked into the mostly horrible public parkscape at Les Halles, that after 900 or so years replaced the largest meat and veg market in Europe in 1969. By kids-only, I mean it's usually open only to kids ages 7 to 11. I took Carter sometime in August, and he was so excited to take Calvin and us on a Saturday morning, the only time it's open to us bigs and littles. Weirdly, Calvin was hesitant to go in, but man did he, and they, and we, have a blast. It didn't hurt that it was another 67-degree October day here. Check out the pics of the park here - they're better than mine.

Afterward we visited St. Eustache, a beautiful church with an amazing pipe organ. We hadn't been inside before, but outside is where Calvin faceplanted in a fountain a couple of months back. After we went wandering the rue Montorgueil, a great market street, one of the oldest in Paris. We found a brocante (thrift market) specializing in mid-20th-century furniture, and wandered through marveling at the miracle of plastics and pleather until we got starving. Thankfully, Carter and Calvin spied a neat resto where I'd had drinks with Kevin once before - Le Tambour, on rue Montmartre. It's decorated in, um, urban eclectic style, and in fact bills itself as "un bistrot de l'urbain bucolique." We met the proprietors, the charismatic André and his harried wife Christine, and their exchange student from Massachusetts, Maya. The food, atmosphere, and environs were first rate, so we'll definitely show it off when you come visit. After lunch, we wandered some more, buying fruit and veg and ice cream and beer, before Calvin and I headed home and Betsy and Carter went to the sporting goods store at the hideous underground mall.

Sunday we did homework and straightened up before heading to the Jardin d'Acclimatation at the Bois de Boulogne. It's the 50-year-old amusement park we visited back in April or May. Both boys had also visited over the summer with their camps. Carter had a birthday party in the afternoon, and we had another pretty day, so we all went along and wandered the park while he partied. Calvin rode his first roller coaster, and after Carter finished we rode three more coasters! They're all the tiny, tame kind, but you wouldn't know it from the looks on their faces.

Well, I promised myself this would be short so I can get some sleep, so off I go. Post a comment to encourage me to get the pictures and movies together - they're very cute!

Fwd: Kayak Buzz Daily Alert

Check out the fares between Paris and DC (and other US cities) below.  I highly recommend Kayak for fare searches - it's the only one I know that let's you check flexible dates for international fares. Hit Kayak.com - you do have to register to get to use the flex dates search, but it's worth it.

Buzz: Paris (CDG) to "Kayak Top 25" in USD
Rank Best Fare* From CDG Travel Dates
1 $431 to Philadelphia, PA on United 5 Dec - 13 Jan
2 $109 to London on Easyjet Airlines 10 - 18 Mar
3 $373 to New York, NY on United 31 Oct - 7 Nov
4 $389 to Newark, NJ on Lufthansa 9 - 13 Nov
5 $419 to San Francisco, CA on American Airlines 8 Jan - 15 May

Buzz: Paris (CDG) to "Kayak Top 25" (United States) in USD
Rank Best Fare* From CDG Travel Dates
1 $431 to Philadelphia, PA on United 5 Dec - 13 Jan
2 $373 to New York, NY on United 31 Oct - 7 Nov
3 $389 to Newark, NJ on Lufthansa 9 - 13 Nov
4 $419 to San Francisco, CA on American Airlines 8 Jan - 15 May
5 $426 to Washington, DC 8 - 14 Jan

Livin' on borrowed wifi

Greetings from the land of the failed internet connection! The cable modem has been stupidly blinking its one green eye at me, which must be bad, because it's usually got a regular riot of combinations of fast and slow blinks to entertain all who bother to peer into the dusty corner by the power cords and trash can. Sigh. It's been useless all day, and I'm only now on a weak borrowed wifi. (Thanks, N9UF_TEL9COM !) So I'll save the stories of our Carter waking up moaning about twelve times during the night, Carter being in fine form this morning, our new morning dropoff routine, my four hours (!) of french class, a beautiful mid-70s day, and the mysteries of Carter's makeup homework for another day, and go buckle down to turn some of our recent pictures and movies into something presentable. G'night all.

P.S. This means the vonage phone doesn't work right now either. You can still call us the good ol' international way at 011.33.1.56.58.14.77 (home) or 011.33.6.73.05.88.93 (my mobile).

P.P.S. Calvin's fine too, and Betsy called to check in from Köln between meetings and dinner, so she's also OK.

Back from Köln

The boys and I have returned from Köln, arriving home just after 8 this evening. The train both ways was a piece of cake, just under 4 hours. When we got back to Gare du Nord this evening, it was drizzly, so we decided to take a cab. Between 25 minutes waiting in line, and 25 driving, it took almost an hour back to the apartment. I think Carter has a bit of a fever, which is very unusual for him. Tomorrow I will take him to school though, unless he's really out of sorts, since he missed today, and I missed my first day back in French class today too. We'll have to figure out the logistics, since my class starts at 9 and the boys can't be at school until after 8:30. I think I'll try riding my bike tomorrow, since it's supposed to be 73! (The average high here in October is only 59.) We'll see.

I still have to get all Carter's work signed - about 7 notebooks I think - then dig out my ID card and other info about the Alliance Française class. Tomorrow I'll get the pictures and videos from Köln ready to post. The city was beautiful, especially with the sunny mid-60s weather, and we all had a very nice time. Betsy reports lots of shopping today once she got rid of us, and the boys will gleefully relate the number and relative quality of the many hot chocolates, cones of fries, museums, churches, and riverfront walks.

G'night all.

Off for the weekend

We're going to take a quick weekend jaunt to Köln. Betsy has to work there Tuesday and Wednesday, so the boys and I will go with her tomorrow morning, then we'll come back Monday afternoon. Our first hooky day in France! Carter and I spent a few hours in Köln on our way to Essen & Gelsenkirchen for the World Cup in June. It looks to be a lovely city, with the Rhine riverfront and cruises, a beautiful cathedral (The Dom), cool museums, and good urbanism. We'll let you know how it goes.

P.S. Be sure to scroll down for messages from the boys.

And from Calvin ...

Calvin wrote this to his friend Avery from the Smithsonian school.

hi avery, we're going to germany in two days and then we're going to come back and then what else? we're going to find ... what ... a hotel and some chocolate and we might take a boat ride 'cause i really want to. we took a ride on a bateau-mouche which is a boat on la seine, a big river in the middle of paris. that ride was with my summer camp. if you come here you might want to see some of the things around here like some chocolate and some candy and the eiffel tower you might want to see 'cause it's very cool and it sparkles and there are elevators that go all the way to the top so if you want to come you can see the top with us 'cause we know where it is. i miss you, i hope you like your new school, bye.
calvin

A visite from Melinda

Also from Carter, a couple of days ago. Melinda Rinehart was with us for a couple of weeks until Wednesday. We had a wonderful time sharing our apartment and city. She reports that we make reasonable hosts (honest), so come visit. Well, not over Christmas, when Cathy, Roco, and Victor (Jack-Jack) will be with us!

Anyway, from Carter:

Hello everyone! As you can tell from the title,this weekend Melinda came to visite. Me my mom and Melinda went to the musee Picasso. There are so many pantings (that Picasso panted of corse)!Pantings from a guitar that looked like a house that had been burnt down,to a panting called "Bathers waching an airplain" that looked real.

Love,
Carter

!@#$%^&*()_+{}:"?><-=[];'./`~

Carter wrote this a couple of days ago:

Hello, today I went to school even though I don't know French it is a
lot of fun. Today we had a science lesson it was very interesting the
experiment that we did was to put a Kleenex into a plastic cup and put
it all the way down in to a tub of Walter,and try to put it in and
take it out without letting the Kleenex get wet.Are table was the
first table to find the answer,the answer is to turn the cup over and
put it in to the tub of Walter and it will come out dry because there
is no place for the air to get out because the Walter and the plastic
are barricading it on every side.

Love,
Carter

audioboys

Paris by night

This Sunday's NY Times has a nice piece on how lovely the city is by night. To show Melinda it's not just hype, we walked out a few minutes ago to see the Eiffel Tower's last sparkle of the evening - well, night, since it's from 1-1:10 a.m.



Also, check out this awesome panorama of the city at night that our friend Coertje sent to us.