The Paris experience was not quite what we had hoped because of Diane’s lack of mobility, but what we did get to see and do we thoroughly enjoyed.

Some tower in Paris

First order  of the day was a blood test, then we headed off to the Cafe de Industrie for lunch.  Lunch was awesome, thanks Shawn a for recommending it.  After lunch we went to the Lourve, got to skip to the front of the line because of the crutches, then exchanged the crutches for a wheelchair.  What a huge place, we got lost several times, and ended having Diane hop up or down stairs many times as it is really not accessible.  We did get to see Mona and Venus amongst many other great works of art.

After the Lourve we headed to the Eiffel tower.

Once again we got to skip most of the line which was great because it was really long.  We only went to the second level, which was more than high enough for Linda.  It was quite crowed so we weren’t able to get the boobie shot in.  The East elevator broke just as we were going down, they suggested people take stairs, but that was definitely not an option for us.  They did get us to the front of the line for the other elevator though.

By the time we got down Diane was pretty much done so we headed back to the hotel, had supper at a nearby restaurant (La Belle Angela) which was awesome, then called it a night.  They are not as generous with painkillers in France as they are in Canada so added a Tylenol Body Pain to get to sleep.

We arrived in Lyon, got to our hotel and they had no record of our booking.  2 hours and a couple of calls to hotwire got it resolved.  Bookings.com works much better in Europe, the rest of our booking were through them and there was no trouble.

That day we walked down to the Rhone river, had a snack and walked back home, stopping at a supermarket to pick up some supper.  Supermarkets have saved us a ton of cash.  They have cheap beer and wine and an abundance of inexpensive food.

Next day we rented some bikes and rode to the old part of town.  Very picuresque (not like the rest wans’t) we had lunch and wandered around.  In the eve Diane missed a step and broke her leg.  Ended up being both tib and fib.  In emerg they casted and set her to a ward for the night while insurance was sorted out.  Next day was spent waiting and fasting then in the afternoon it was decided that surgery would take place in Lyon.  The doctors and nurses in the hospital were awesome.but hospital food is the same the world over.  If you have to get hospitalized abroad France is a good place to do it.  Next afternoon was released and went to the hotel.  Who knew it was that hard to walk with “Canadian Canes”

One more day in Lyon for Diane to get accustomed to the crutches, then on to Paris.   First day we found the Harley store.  How is it we always manage something Harley without even looking??  We have also managed to find a couple of great places to eat, the Vasche Acrobatic and Le Restoo.  Both had great food and friendly staff.  Le Restoo caters to a mainly gay clientele.  We were also able to see the Notre Dame cathedral, they let us in the out door because Diane is on crutches.  IT was still a long walk around the church, but worth it for the history.For those looking though the hunchback doesn’t live there anymore.

After Florence we went to Riomaggiore in the Cinque Terre national park.  We had a small apartment right on the harbour, with a balcony that had room for 2 chairs and a table.  We spent a lot of time out on the balcony people watching and drinking wine.  That is, when we were not out hiking.

The hikes in Cinque Terre range from “your grandma could do it” to “OMG! this is supposed to be fun!”

Trail from Monterosso to Vernazza. There was about 1000 of these steps up.

The views were well worth the effort though.  Even if we had to swim sans clothes as we didn’t take bathing suites with us.

We left Riomaggiore on Oct 6.  Caught the train to La Spezia.  Caught another train to VentiMagilia, which stopped in Riomaggiore.  It seems we didnt need to catch the first train after all.  When we got to VentiMagilia we were supposed to connect to a french train to Nice.  But, all of the french trains were cancelled because of a strike.  We hooked up with a couple of women from USA who were trying to get to Nice as well and shared a taxi.  Fare wasn’t bad considering, only 120 Euros shared between us.

Linda’s cousin Shawna met us at the train station and we walked to her apartment and met Scott who was making supper.  And yes, real men do eat quiche.  Next day Shawna and Scott went to work and we wandered around Nice and enjoyed a beer or two. Saturday we went to Monaco, saw where Shawna teaches and looked at the little boats in the harbour, one of which was 1/6th the size of the cruise ship that was also there.  Met Shawna and Scott at the beach.  Ocean sure is more buoyant than the pacific. In the evening we went for Moules Frites.  We were thinking a plate of mussels, but instead we each got a pot with 1kg in it.  We were stuffed and couldn’t finish.  Sunday we enjoyed a nice french breakie.  Linda had grand marnier crepes that were loaded with grand marnier.  In the afternoon the four of us took the bus to Eze, a medieval village high on a hill, where we had a great picnic lounging by a fountain.  Then we hiked out around a point to another beach for some more swimming and sunning.

Monday we caught the train to Lyon for the next leg of the adventure.

We finally got some new pics up on the pics page.  There are some from Cinque Terre, Nice and Lyon.

We were able to put a bunch of pics on the pics page before we left Florence.  Check ’em out.

Just a quick note as internet is tough here.  But you can be sure this involves lots of wine, good food, nude swimming and clothed hiking.

Slept in again, I am beginning to see a pattern here.  Oh well, it is vacation, and we are walking miles and miles every day.

Went to the leather market, what great prices on lovely leather.  Unfortunately the coats are made for people who’s waists go in rather than out.

Had a bottle of wine with lunch in a park.  Walked a few more miles then had another bottle of wine in a park that had grass you could sit on.  Then went to supper at Cento Poveri, very good food.  And surprise, surprise more wine.  Called it a night fairly early.  We are old and all this walking is wearing us out.  Love it though.

Didn’t get going until 1:00 today.  Then we headed out to Il Chicco di caffe for lunch.

After lunch we crossed the ponte vicchio (in the pic) then headed to the Uffzsi gallery, it was pretty awesome seeing works by artists like Rembrandt and Da Vinci.  Linda likes Raffael as he was a ninja turtle.

Only Linda and Diane would spend their first night in Florence in the biker bar.  When we left the hotel we were looking for a decent restaurant with outdoor seating.  What we ended up at was a bike themed rock bar.  It caught our eye because there was a hog parked out front.

We both ordered pasta, it came from down the street in take-away boxes. LOL  But the beer was good, and Scott from Scotland insisted on buying us drinks all night.  Although he knew we were here on our honeymoon, he was still disappointed when we went home to our own hotel rather than his.