Day 38: Notes from the plane

I was starting to type this as my plane flew over Greenland; I had been napping when a spot of turbulence woke me up. The windows were down, as Ironman was being screened, but the row ahead of me had its windows up. I opened them in time to see some fantastic glaciers.

Over the last few days, I’ve been asked if I’m excited to go home. I’m ambiguous, like I always am: it would be nice to be home again, in familiar surroundings. On the other hand, I’ve been bitten by the travel bug; some people on my tour have booked two-day extensions to Rome or Amsterdam, and hearing our tour manager go through the major sights of those places with everyone, it did make me think I should just throw away my flight home and keep going.

This tour of London and Paris was quite the whirlwind; while regimented, with plenty of early wake-up calls and late nights, it did offer plenty of free time to explore the cities. Here’s the rundown (forgive the length, but keep in mind I had a lot of time to kill on the plane):

• Day 31: the tour began in the evening, with a meet-and-greet over registration and dinner, then a walk from our hotel to the Covent Garden area. This was a Saturday night, so it was quite lively. A few of us moved on to another pub in the area and were surprised last call was before 11:00pm! There were other places that did stay open later, but we probably didn’t get over that.

• Day 32: a day trip to Stonehenge and Bath. Stonehenge did indeed have that air of mystery around it; a slight fog enveloping the surrounding countryside just added to the effect. Bath had the Roman baths and unique Georgian architecture, some of which served as a backdrop for Jane Austen’s novels. This meant I had to visit the Jane Austen Centre; I thought it was slightly overpriced for a brief talk on Austen’s connections with Bath and a selection of costumes worn for the BBC production Miss Austen Regrets (my review).

In the evening we returned to London and I joined another group for dinner; the six of us more or less bonded for the duration of the tour, as did any number of sub-groups arranged by age and/or nationality. In my case, it was a group of five Canadians and an American in our late 20s/early 30s.

After dinner, we decided to walk to Westminster; there was the clock tower in all its lit-up glory, and the London Eye. I had passed by the Parliament buildings the day before, but it has to be seen at night.

• Day 33: a free day in London: as the last day there, time was of the essence, so I went to take a ride in the Eye, then the Tower of London (I recommend the guided tour), and Harrods. The evening was capped off with The Sound of Music in the West End. Given I had never seen the film, I was personally surprised at how much I enjoyed it, if not for the performances (which I initially suspected as lip-synced), but for the second half, and the historical aspects (Anschluss) that served as background.

• Day 34: the transit day from London to Paris. The ferry ride was certainly a lot better than that from Ireland to Wales. Indeed, the whole week of the tour was the best, weather-wise. We paused at the Vimy Ridge memorial (a piece of Canada in France, we were told). I was taken aback at the sereneness of the whole thing, and I am more appreciative of those sacrifices those young soldiers made at that spot in 1917. Once in Paris, the whole group went back to the coach for a night-time tour of the city. It’s not called the “city of lights” for nothing.

• Day 35: daytrip to Versailles. We roamed the gardens before we went inside for a tour of the state apartments. King Louis XIV certainly went OTT in the construction of the whole palace, and it shows in the meticulous grooming of the grounds, to the sheer grandness of all the rooms. We returned to Paris, and were dropped off at the Arc de Triomphe. After a long walk along the Champs-Élysées to the Louvre and on to Notre-Dame, most of us went to the Moulin Rouge.

• Day 36: another crazy day of sightseeing. Given that two in our group would be leaving the next day, a lot had to be packed in. The Louvre, Musée d’Orsay, l’Orangerie (home to large-format Monet’s Waterlilies), Napoleon’s tomb, the Rodin museum, and the obvious one, the Tour d’Eiffel. The whole group gathered at sundown and proceeded to the lifts. Just being near the thing was breathtaking, but going all the way up to the top has to qualify as a once-in-a-lifetime experience. But two hours later, everyone went to the Champ-de-Mars to see the tower sparkle and shine, all while toasting the end of the tour with champagne. That was an unforgettable night.

• Day 37: as the tour officially ends and everyone says their goodbyes, I go with my roommate to Cimitière du Père-Lachaise to see Jim Morrison’s grave; he is a Doors fan, while Jim and I share the same birthday. We overheard someone say it was in a worse state, what with whisky bottles strewn all over, including adjacent gravesites. What we saw was quite tame in comparison; you wouldn’t even have known it was Jim Morrison’s grave if it weren’t for the continuing stream of people. Oscar Wilde’s marker, however, is another matter. Despite signs pleading not to deface the stone, it’s in a right state, with the requisite lipstick marks. I then went through to walk through Montmartre before returning to the Louvre to visit the emptier second floor. I had seen the Mona Lisa the previous day, and it was madness. You would think it would be housed in its own room, but it’s the centerpiece of a large hall filled with other spectacular paintings on the edges that are all but ignored by the hordes.

• Day 38: I had been concerned over the past few days about Eurostar’s continuing limited service in the Channel Tunnel, thanks to a fire a few days previous. Luckily, I managed to board and made it to London in two and a half hours. A long wait at Gatwick, and another 10 hours in the air, and I arrived in Vancouver, more or less awake for almost 24 hours.

Despite the long days, the sore feet, and sometimes sub-standard eating habits (not to mention the near-daily consumption of at least one alcoholic beverage), I enjoyed myself immensely. If anything, it proves I can still do this on my own, and that it’s something I would like to incorporate into my schedule, even if I have to pool all my vacation days to do it.

Expect best-of pictures on my flickr within the next few days (imagine uploading at least 2500 pictures!), and I am preparing a slideshow that incorporates those photos.