Day 4 is now complete in Paris, and once again, experienced with Nicholas atop my shoulders.
Despite being told the carrier would arrive yesterday or today, it still hasn't. I did manage to get my point across to the guardian this afternoon (with some help from Google Translate, and a picture of the carrier from the web on my iPhone), so at lease we don't need to worry about it getting misplaced once it is delivered here. I can safely say that it was a necessity to bring with us, after much doubt in the months leading up to our departure. Nicholas is not willing to walk more than a few blocks before asking for a ride, and is then quite content to spend the rest of the journey in my arms or on my shoulders. I'm not sure if he's simply still worn out from the travel and adjustment to the time change, or if we vastly overestimated his stamina to walk long distances with us. Regardless, when the pack arrives, it will be a happy reunion. It's a much better system for Nicholas to ride in, as he sometimes complains that his legs are sore once I put him down off my shoulders... it's probably not the best long-term riding position for him.
Today we started out for Arènes de Lutèce, a remnant of the city of Lutetia during Roman-Gaulish times. It was unearthed during construction in the late 19th century, and was preserved as a city park. Unfortunately, after looking at it on the map briefly last night, neither one of us thought to write down instructions or memorize its location to take with us today. We realized this about 5 minutes after leaving the apartment and decided instead to simply pick a direction and wander. We walked pretty much the entire distance over to the Louvre, but turned short to head North and explore. (http://g.co/maps/
We returned to the apartment, and after a short rest went out to get a couple of items from the supermarche, and "finally" satisfy Nicholas' burning desire to ride the rocket ship merry-go-round. He was overjoyed with the two rides he was able to take, made extra special by the fact he could control the raising and lower, as well as tilt, of the rocket ship he rode in. We've promised to take him back tomorrow again.
We had a simple dinner of spaghetti tonight, and I did a bit of work while Laura cleaned the apartment. Nicholas is down for the night, and we're just going to relax now.
The weather here has been beautiful... perhaps too much so. It feels quite humid to us, and with temperatures in the mid 20's each afternoon, it's quite hot. It doesn't help that we had to pack for winter weather, understanding we might put up with a bit of heat as summer winds down here. The forecast calls for a bit of rain on Monday, but still a temperature of 24 degrees, so it's likely just going to make things more humid.
I think we're starting to settle in now, and get into a rhythm for what life is going to be like here. It will help things a lot once the carrier arrives, allowing us to head out a bit further during our daily excursions. We decided between the carrier and our shoes, there was about 850 dollars worth of value in that, so it will be difficult to swallow if it doesn't arrive. We'll probably purchase an inexpensive stroller in that event. We're sticking to our 50 Euro per day budget in spending, which should hopefully go down a bit now that we've purchased some of the staple grocery items, and the desire for cafe (a cost of 2.40 Euro each... for what is essentially a shot of espresso) is not as strong as it was when we arrived.
That's all for today. Laura did post some pictures on Facebook today, but I'll keep on her to get an album put together on Picasa to upload more (and higher resolution) pictures.
Love, Brendan Laura & Nicholas
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