Nous sommes ici!

After an easy flight to PA, a few days with my family (including two parties, because that's how the McClure's roll), and an uneventful flight to Paris, we're here!

After a 30-minute wait to get through customs, we decided to take a taxi from Charles De Gaulle rather than deal with our luggage on the metro. In retrospect, I'm not sure it would have been that big of a deal, except for the fact that it was rush hour. Instead of getting in people's way on the metro, we were stuck in traffic for a pretty long time. Paris drivers and motorcycle riders are brazen, wow...

Anyway, we got to our apartment in the Latin Quarter - what a great location! The man we are renting from is very kind and got us all settled in before we headed out to find some food and keep ourselves awake. After baguette sandwiches, and our first walk halfway across the Seine to Notre Dame...

We didn't go in yet as we were focused on some errands, but it's on the schedule for tomorrow! We also went to Rue de Rome (first métro ride achieved!), which features an impressive array of music stores in the 8th or maybe 17th? arrondissement. Four sheet music stores, two piano stores on opposite corners, at least four luthiers and another wind instrument repair shop. I found a gently used score of Poulenc's Stabat Mater (thesis progress!), and Steve bought a few things after sorting through an overwhelming amount of music. Below is just the horn music at one shop:

We wandered around for a while near Opéra Garnier after that, eating again, buying my six-day Paris Museum Pass, and finding Steve a jacket, which hopefully will be our biggest packing fail. It rained a few drops on us twice, but you wouldn't know it from some of the pictures. We decided to stroll the 2+ miles back home after that, checking out the scene outside the Louvre. I was expecting big, but good grief. Of course the buildings aren't actually curved like my iPhone panorama suggests...

Then another view of Notre Dame on our way home along the Seine:

Our feet hurt and boy are we tired, but we made it past 9 p.m., so even if it's not dark yet, I think we did pretty well. Except for my untested French, which is horrendous, but, hey, it's all up from here. Tomorrow: exploring Il de la Cité before Steve's first EAMA meeting!