Day 41

Greetings All,

It's almost 11:00 pm and it's time to pack for an early taxi ride to the train station in the morning. Sharon and I are going to Stuttgart, Germany, for three days. My dear friends, Chris and Bernd, will pick us up at the train station. This will be my third visit with them in their beautiful little town called Weinstadt.

Today was Sharon first full day in Paris and we had a great time exploring so many parts of the city. It was raining on and off all day long.Our mission was to find resale/consignment shops and we got the names of several out of books written on "where to shop in Paris." The first two had gone out of business and the third was in the Latin Quarter and was not what we expected. It was mid-afternoon when we were in the Latin Quarter so we decided walk around and see what we could find. Sharon found the chocolate shops immediately and enjoyed some "walking around dark chocolate nut candy." Then we stumbled upon a shop with beautiful cashmere and silk scarves. We couldn't resist and we both purchased two--2 for 20 euros.

We walked by a church where children were playing and saw this man reading holding an umbrella, completely at peace with the world. Then we spotted a fashionable woman waiting for a ride dressed from head to toe in her green Chanel coat, shoes and purse.




I had a run-in with the shoe repair man today. He now wanted 40 euros for fixing my walking shoes--my old Joseph Siebel shoes I bought in Bellingham years ago. But he had quoted me about 17 euros when I dropped them off two days ago. So back and forth we went--in French--and I walked out with my shoes on the counter as I would not pay 40 euros. Joseph to the rescue! I called him and told him what had happened and gave him the name of the shop and phone number. Within minutes Joseph called me (I was on the bus) and back I went before closing time to get my shoes. No charge. He told Joseph he had not done any work on the shoes yet, so I retrived them and will happily wear them tomorrow to Germany. It was not a good experience but it ended well. I thanked the guy and told him I was sorry for any misunderstanding.

Dinner tonight at my favorite local spot--Le Royal Pereier--and a pleasant walk home in the cool of the evening.


Time to gather my passport, pack and set the iPhone alarm for tomorrow's travel day.

Much love to all, Judy