Steve The Wandering Aussie

28/10/2023
Le Havre and Paris, France
The clocks changed overnight. God only knows why as at 8.30 in the morning it’s still black dark. Just the French being difficult, I imagine.
We walked past a paddock full of Siemens wind turbine blades on our way to the bus for our tour then waited an hour for those who didn’t realize they had to change their clocks. Why did we bother? Whine ends.
Our tour guide is a delightful lady who has seen more of Australia than ALL the aussie folks on board. She has had six trips to Oz and planning her next. Impressive.
The speed limit is 130k/ph, or 80mph, which I find civilized compared to Australias highway crawl pace.
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Paris:
The Eiffel Tower popped itself above the roadway well before we entered the city. Our driver parked in the designated bus drop off spot for us to Ooh and Ahh and then we got back on for more sight seeing. I didn’t realize it’s brown. Dung brown.

There is no access for parking the bus near the Arch de Triumph so we went around the ‘roundabout’ a couple times to let us take photos. Organized Chaos is my best description. Or you could call it a Shit Fight. What ever. Madness.
Driving down Des Champs Elysees and there are cops just everywhere. Columns of small police trucks. Some Parisian and some federal. Flack jackets and automatic weapons and tasers. Billy clubs mounted on quick release holders and small arms on every hip. Some serious shit.
Photos of Gendarme are strictly forbidden and the distinctive wailing of French sirens is constant. Keeping the cops employed, I guess.
Notre Dame is covered in scaffold but at least we got to see the old girl. Seems the repair crew have found a single oak forest with sufficient large trees to rebuild the damaged medieval section.
Our bus driver, with remarkable skill, deposited us where we could walk to the Louvre Museum. To our surprise the rest of the tour group went the other way, shopping. I kinda like being us. The museum is enormous and ‘eye candy’ for those of us who like old architecture. I never thunk I’d ever see this.
We wandered the many gardens and admired the prolific art works. Life is good and truly I am blessed.

The police presence has increased to even greater numbers. Apparently it’s due to the Rugby World Cup being held tonight. Not a fan of armed French anything so, I bravely scampered back to our waiting bus.

14:30. Lyn bought me a beer. In Paris. So I drank it sitting in the park like an old wino. Task complete. The only city I haven’t had a beer while visiting was St. Petersburg, Russia. No shortage of vodka but nyet to the beer.
And as we left, we drove through the tunnel where Lady Diana lost her life. (1997?) Kinda morbid, it being a tourist attraction. Not my place to judge.
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While I’ll never forget The Rainbow Warrior or Mururoa Atoll, I really didn’t mind visiting here. And it’s a (non) bucket list item ticked.
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Enough for today. We’re on the bus heading back to the ship. Be kind to yourselves
Steve
Stevethewanderingaussie.com