Tour Begins - September 15, 2008

I rode the escalator down to the lower reception area of the hotel. It was 5 till 6 p.m. and I was finally going to meet the guide for the La France tour I'd signed up for with Globus. I was wearing my Globus name pin so people would be able to see what my first name was. When I arrived at the reception area, I saw a number of strangers who were wearing similar pins. A blonde haired lady in her 40's or 50's was walking around with a clipboard meeting people and checking them off her list. Eventually, she made her way to Harvey and I. She introduced herself. Her name was Susan (she never gave a last name), she was going to be our tour guide for the entire tour (Globus also uses local guides who cover just a specific city or site) and she needed to confirm our information. I asked her how many people were going to be on the tour and she said 42. It was going to be another large group. Interestingly, there were people from Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the U.S. This was going to be the most international group I'd ever been with on a Globus tour.

Once Susan had accounted for everyone, she led us to a restaurant that was somewhat close by called the Le Bistro Champetre. This was our first group dinner and a chance to get to know fellow members of the tour. For the next 2 weeks, we'd travel over 2,000 miles together. During the meal, Susan told us what optional excursions were going to be available. Globus includes a list of possible excursions with each person's travel documents but, you find out what ones will actually be available from the tour guide. I went through the list again and figured out what ones I wanted to take and what it would cost. All totalled, I settled on 7 excursions which included an illumination drive of Paris, a visit and dinner in Monaco and a visit to the medieval town of St. Paul de Vence. We also received our wake-up, breakfast and departure times. The wake-up time was the time Susan would arrange for the hotel to give us a wake-up call. The breakfast time was the time the breakfast buffet would be open so we could have breakfast. Our tour included breakfast every day we were on tour. The departure time was the time the bus would leave to begin the morning city tour. On days we were departing for another city, this would be the time we'd leave the city. On days we departed for another city, there was also a bags out time which was the time we had to place our suitcases outside our rooms so they could be picked up and taken to the bus. It became a routine that Susan would give us these times sometime during the afternoon each day so we would know when to be up, have breakfast, be packed and be ready to depart.

Dinner was good though the portions were smaller than what I was used to in the U.S. This would turn out to be standard throughout France. After the dinner, we walked back to the hotel. It was then that we had the chance to do our first optional excursion. It was an illumination drive of Paris. What that means is you get to drive around Paris at night and see all the lit up places in the city. Paris is really stunning at night. One special treat we received was a special illumination of the Eiffel Tower. For 6 months, France would hold the presidency of the European Union. To mark this special occasion, France attached 12 gold stars to the tower representing the 12 original members of the union, back lit the tower in dark blue light and created a shimmering waterfall of white light that ran down the tower. It was incredibly beautiful and everyone ooo'd and awed at the sight. After driving around seeing all the beautifully lit buildings and monuments, we drove back to the hotel. The next day, we would get to see various sights in Paris.