Paris

Paris was unfortunately a bit of a disaster in regards to time. Which we ran out of.

We got to the campsite which was twenty minutes from Paris late in the day making it impossible to go in that day when we still had to clean the car and get it ready to be returned. Thus our first 'full day' in Paris was gone. Additionally our third 'full day' in Paris was already ruined by my early morning train, this left us one day total to see Paris.

We had decided to stop at a campsite in Maisons Laffette, as it was the closest and easiest way to get to Paris and not pay a ridiculous amount of money. Of course having left the tent (and suitcase) with my aunt, I only had my backpack and thus we could no longer tent. We had decided to rent one of the little cottages from the campsite as it was more affordable than a hotel, however upon arrival we were told we needed to put a 300 euro deposit down plus pay upfront. With no such amount of cash upon our persons, we headed off to the nearest atm. All seemed to be going well, we returned and there was a line so we chatted to some friendly English-speaking people as they were very excited we spoke English. One was American and the other was in fact from New Zealand, Rotorua. Our first kiwi the entire trip! We of course made many in-jokes and talked about home until it was our turn to go up to the desk. We were then informed that it had been the last cottage in the campsite free, and that someone had just booked it online on booking.com so there was nothing she could do.

Unsure of what an earth to do now we wandered out, only our new friends had heard the whole exchange and as the cottages were all four bedroom and of course they only needed two rooms, they generously offered to share. It was very kind and so we accepted. We later found out THEY were the ones who had in fact stolen the last cottage by booking online, and had felt so guilty they instantly offered to share; they were too embarrassed to tell us at first however.

Shyla and I finally made it into Paris the next evening by which time we only had time to figure out the metro for the next morning and see the Eiffel tower before having to return to the campsite before it got too late.

We then went out for dinner to a lovely little restaurant nearby the campsite. Our last dinner together, it was a somewhat sad evening, filled with 'do you remembers' of our trip. We had such a fantastic time together, finally achieving the trip we always said we would do but were never sure it would actually happen. Thank you Shyla for bring the best friend I could ever ask for.