Katie and Lucy's 2 cents

It's me!  Finally worked out how to log in to the blog so I thought Lucy and I would give a little guest appearance!  

We've been having an absolutely amazing trip so far!  The amount we've packed in to the short week since we arrived is kind of insane, but we haven't wanted to miss much.

My favorite things:

• Seeing the impressionists and post-impressionists at the Musee D'Orsay.  Degas remains my favorite but the Van Gogh's were pretty amazing
• Hopping on and off the Batobus ("Boat bus") down the Seine at our leisure
• Watching Lucy enjoy doing her vlogs so much!  She had done one every day but they mysteriously disappeared so she has now re-recorded them a few days at a time
• Just seeing how old and incredible the buildings and architecture are
• Fresh squeezed OJ that rivals Florida's
• Ogling the absolute excess of Versailles and totally understanding why the commoners would revolt seeing that built while they were starving.  Ridiculous!  Beautiful and incredible....but ridiculous!  There are 2,000 acres of gardens.  Driving around in our little golf cart was cool.
• Reims in general is very cool.  It's much quieter and more relaxed than Paris and it's been fun hearing about the champagne houses.  The champagne houses actually own the caves underneath the city, including land that normal people own houses on!  

General observations:

I truly hate when people don't pay attention to where they are because they are too busy taking pictures of it.  This was especially frustrating at the museum.  Did I get a little passive aggressive and walk in front of peoples' photos?  Maybe.... 😬 But really - I'm there to see the art up close, not take pictures of it I could have found online to look at later 😡

Our French is abysmal - but to be fair, we only had about a month of warning that we were coming here!  We're trying though and most people seem to be ok with that.  Here in Reims people definitely speak less English than in Paris so there has been much more usage of Google translate!

 The rhythm of France is much different than Australia.  It's 10:15am here on a Saturday and I haven't heard a peep from the street downstairs!  I did, however, hear quite a lot last night until the wee hours (3am-4am)!  Most stuff doesn't really open up until later either.  And getting breakfast (a petit dejenuer which is a hot drink, a juice, and a croissant) is dependent on whether the croissants have been dropped off from the baker yet.

Our weather has been perfect.  Crisp autumn days, some clouds, no rain during the day since our first day.  I would definitely come back at this time of year again.  Not too busy either.

What's next?

Off to Amsterdam tomorrow for my conference!  

https://2022.epicpeople.org/amsterdam-schedule/#10-09-2022

This is the conference I attend every year, although the last few years has been virtual.  I'll have 3 days of keynotes, papers, case studies, and events to soak up while Andrew and Lucy do their own thing around town.  I'm really looking forward to catching up with friends and connecting with more of my people!  There won't be much time for sightseeing for me while I'm there, but that's ok I'm sure we'll be back.

Check in again soon!