Well, I guess I'm not a very good blogger, its been a while since my last post, life just seems to go so fast and sitting at the computer more than I have to is somtimes more than I have energy for.
The trip to France was...interesting. The best way to describe it is "unconventional" I had a good time, and learned a lot about myself.
There were some stressful times. Thursday, the day I arrived (after being awake for more than 24 hours), I realized that somehow I got out of the airport without my passport! To make a long story short, luckily the airport was a short walk from the hotel, so I kept checking back at the "objets de trouve" (lost and found) and they had it (luckily in time for me to fly to Paris on Saturday). Alas, the patron saints of passports did not receive enough gratitude from me, when MaryEllen and I arrived in Paris, after a heavenly breakfast at the Marriott, we headed straight for the Arc de Triomphe, unbenownst to me "the" place to go to be taken advantage of. My passport and entire wallet was stolen out of my backpack on the metro just below the Arc. Being me, I can hardly blame the patron saints alone, I must confess that I was being an oblivious tourist, not taking my normal precautions of separating my money, credit cards and passport, no I had everything together in one handy package at the top of my backpack for any clever thief to simply unzip and take.
When I arrived Mary Ellen was already in Nice teaching a class. We had planned to travel to Paris for the short weekend before she had to return to work in Nice Monday AM. Mary Ellen teaches telecommunications software for an international firm. I must say the hosts at the office in Nice were very kind to this "outsider". And the students in the class provided some entertainment too.
Thursday evening we (Mary Ellen, and 3 students from Belgum, India and Singapore, and I) went geocaching. This was my first geocaching experience, great fun that I will try to blog about later, but if you cant wait, check out http://www.geocaching.com/. This adventure took us up a big hill to a cemetery where we found our "treasure". 
On Friday the same geocaching crew grabbed a train to Monte Carlo, in the principality of Monoco. A very rich location, with lots of expensive cars, yachts, and buildings. We (and me very begrudgingly) walked up to the "palace" where we got to witness the changing of the guards. Much mor low key than I expected, but interesting. Being with a large international group as we were, meals were quite the challenge. Some not as open as others to the local tastes and textures so we chose Thai food for dinner (even that took some convincing), which really was a great meal that everyone enjoyed. We got back to Nice in time to prep for the trip to Paris the next day with our plane leaving at 6:30 am we wanted to get a little sleep.
Paris was a whirlwind. Being there barely 2 days, it was a quick tour, a lot of which was spent on the subway figuring out the best way to get from point A to point B. After the 2nd passport incident, Mary Ellen and I spent most of the rest of the day finding the police station, filling out a report and calling airlines, and banks to make arrangements.
Being Saturday, the US Embassy was closed until Monday (where an American goes when one finds oneself in a foreign country with out a passport). Since our plane tickets back to Nice were for Sunday, I had to stay an extra day so I could get my replacemnt passport since I had no other photo identification.
Other than the unfortunate incident, I liked Paris. There is a lot to see there. I would recommend not going during the summer. Even though it was late September, the City was still crowded, and quite warm. I cant imagine tolerating higher temps and even more people! We did a quick tour of the usual places, I returned to the Arc to climb to the top, we sped through the Louvre to witness the Mona Lisa and saw some other great pieces of art. We hit Notre Dame (though didnt have time to go in) and even found another geocache along the way.
I decided to take the train back to Nice (Air France refused to honor my ticket regardless of my circumstance), but I really enjoyed the train, I got to see some beutiful countryside, and it was very relaxing and lots of elbow room. It really didnt take a lot longer than flying and was much more enjoyable.
I had relaxing times on the beach in Nice. The water was perfect. The waves were very strong enough to knock me down. The beaches on the French Riviera though are not sandy, they are rocky naturally (small-ish cobbles) which made it a little uncomfortable to lay on, but on the good side, you dont have all that sand in your shoes and stuck to various parts of your body when you go home. Nice is a fairly large city, since my stay was short, I didn't do all the cultural/touristy things. But I did figure out the public transportation system, and walked a lot!
I have many other antecdotes, but I think that will have to do for now. I will go back and maybe this just prooves that a little planning and mental preparation is a good thing.
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