Arrival in Paris

We left the hotel  by cab to catch our flight to Paris. At the airport we met an Irish artist named Fiona Graham with whom we hope to get together. The flight was uneventful and we broke through the clouds to see a snow covered landscape on the approach to Charles DeGaulle. After getting our bags, we bided our time until a van arrived to takes us to the long term parking where Jacques had left his car. When we got there it was covered with 3-4 inches of snow. We made our way to the autoroute and saw the northbound lanes, heading out of Paris, totally blocked with trucks. It looked like boxes on a cargo ship, they were so close together. The snow storm was over but they were still having problem.
We made it to Paris and found our apartment. It is in a very old (1600's) building on the 5th and 6th floors with no elevator located in the student section of the 5th Arrondisment. We called the owner who was waiting for us and he gave us the code and we preceeded to schlep all of our luggage  up the 5 flights. We had one huge suitcase that actually exceeded the 50 lb limit at Dublin airport but they didn't charge us. Judy had packed lots of stuff in nylon bags inside the suitcase so we could take those bags out and spread them around for people to carry. Between Jacques, Claire, Judy, the owner and myself, it only took on trip up the stairs.
We got a quick tour of the apartment before we left to have dinner with another mutual friend, Jo Shaffer, and her cousin, Lois, at Jo's place in the Marais. She rents there every year from Jan-Apr. After a great dinner and a fun time welcoming the new Pope and celebrating Jacques' birthday, we returned to the apartment around 11pm to make the bed and get some sleep.

We slept well and got our bearings to see what we had gotten ourselves into. But all seemed well when looked out the kitchen window to this scene.

More to come....