quick note from pari

We arrived in Paris a few days ago from Ireland. It was a good flight, and we immediately had to take a bus to Paris. Ryanair tells you they will take you to Paris for half the price, but they only take you half the distance. So after an hour bus ride, we were dropped in the middle of Paris, 5 miles from our hotel. We decided to walk the 5 miles to have a nice walking tour of the city, and to save money on the subway expenses. It was a brilliant walk... we saw the Arc de Triomph, the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, Notre Dame in the distance. Amazing. We are now staying on the outskirts of Paris with some very kind people we met on the couch surfing website, Jerome and Annick. While in Paris, we hit it hard, in one day, we saw and/or toured Notre Dame, Luxembourgh Palace, the Louvre, and the Eiffel Tower. It was the perfect day, and in all, we walked 13 miles, our feet were sore, and we rested well that night. Now we are recovering from two very intense/romantic/perfect days in Paris. Annick and Jerome live in a very beautiful city outside of Paris called Melun. We leave tomorrow for Normandy to work on the Lavender farm for one week. It should be fun, different, and interesting. We will write more later when we have more time. Today we will travel a few miles up the road to see the castle used in Leonardo Dicaprio movie The Man in the Iron Mask, pretty neat.