Hope all is well. This year is moving by so quickly. Can you believe it is almost Memorial Day Weekend…the official start of summer! This usually marks the beginning of travel season for most. This is a special year for me. I celebrated a special birthday. Well let’s see.. April’s birthday just passed and she claimed 30, Dawn, celebrating summer of Dawn claimed 24??...ok really Dawn. Tricia can jump in the middle of these numbers when her birthday comes in November. Since I am the eldest of all 4 of the Pookalitas I will claim 32…yes that works for me lol! Any way I wanted to do something really special in honor of “32”. I decided to go to Paris!!!! I had never been to Europe and Paris was on my bucket list. My sister Bev also turned “32” and organized a group of 8 on a Paris foodie lover’s extravaganza!! (Thanks to Eileen and Alan our wonderful travel agents!) It was the most amazing trip of a life time!! We were there for 5 short days and really took advantage of every second. We did a shopping tour, a wine tasting, and ate at authentic Parisian bistros. A major highlight was the inspiring black Paris tour! http://www.blackparistour.com/ It highlighted the contributions of black Americans (I know about Josephine Baker but they truly worshipped her at a whole other level!) and black Parisians that contributed to what Paris is today. We had an authentic meal in the Paris hood…yes there is a hood in Paris with beauty and hair shops on both corners!! We celebrated Bev’s actual birthday in a fab restaurant next to our hotel, with a meal that was as beautiful as it was delicious! We went to an amazing Paris jazz club where the band playing was from Ohio lol! They were happy to see their fellow Americans in the house. A true highlight, my foodie fanatics, was taking a French cooking class. So are you truly seeing the theme here! We met a French chef in her historic French apartment that she shared with her chef husband. She got her basket and we headed to the open market. Loved it!! I was living the cooking channel! We sampled cheeses and fruits and olives, we learned how to pick the best fresh chicken and we took in all that is the French market. We then headed back to the apartment where we prepared a 5 star meal!!
Family, we had wine and cheese every day and at LEAST two croissants
lol! Every single person we met was so helpful
and so friendly. We navigated the Metro
better than the NYC subway system. I was
so struck by the beauty and magnificence of Paris. It was above and beyond what I could have
imagined as we strolled through the streets and the Champs Elysees….hi Louis
Vuitton! We spent our last night at the
famed Le Grande Colbert which is the restaurant featured in the movie As Good
as it Gets with Jack Nicholson and Diane Keaton. We dined on their most famous roasted chicken
and raised our glasses of French wine to one of the most memorable trips of our
life time!! Au revoir Paris! I am truly in love and will return to you one
day soon!!
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