i heart thursdays: London to Paris: Proof that money cannot buy happiness...

So, in an attempt to have a seamless travel day, I opted to pay for a cab to Heathrow, and then to our Paris apartment after landing at Charles De Galle. The cab in London was $80, and that was ok with me! We'd had a rough time on transit getting there...so, we had our final English breakfast, did a load of laundry down the way, hit a fantastic local, organic fancy-pants grocery - and then headed to Heathrow. This part went great!

In Heathrow, Jill found her first Makers Mark since we left. It was heaven for her, and she had one while I had another cider (new addiction, to be curbed by my lapband being switched back 'on' when I get back). Our flight was ok but we were seated separately. Earlier in the trip, Jill at one point turned to me as we boarded a plane and said, "Awesome! There's a baby on this flight too!" - well, the baby from London to Paris took the cake. And Jill was sittin' just behind her. Oy! She screamed for the bulk of the hour flight...

Arrival in Paris proved challenging as we could not (it seemed) find a legitimate cabbie, and settled on a car service that seemed ok. Well, we got gouged in the end but what can you do? There were two of them, they had all our bags...so we paid about $30 over what is normal. It was painful, but a good lesson. We're going to do better getting back!

On top of that, while on the eternal, hot, cab ride we phoned the apartment manager who said "Oh, I have to put you in a different apartment..." and immediately I thought, "oh my god - I got the bait'n'switch that you read about everywhere" when you book one apartment, and show up to find a dump. So, there we were - perhaps the lowpoint of our trip - sitting in a hot, stinky cab in horrific traffic, being ripped off by cabbies and finding out we may be staying in a pit. Good times. We felt like we were getting it from all angles...

So, we show up and the apartment is a couple blocks further out than the first, lacks a bathtub - but, is bigger, and still well-located enough on a nice street with a few restaurants, shops and grocery stores. Since I paused, the dude said, "I will give you zee free night, madam, for the trouble..." - I thought, well, there's a break - finally. So, we schelped up the zillion stairs to our loft apartment, which is pretty nice - and settled in. We rounded out the night with a quick trip to the grocery, a drink out, and a simple dinner at home. Lesson learned: Even when you try to make travel easier by kickin' money at it, still, things just happen. But we knew this already, no? Alas...not our favorite day; though, we're psyched to be in Paris!!