In Search of the Eiffel Tower - Our First Day in Paris

Dear Family and Friends,

I left Cuenca, Ecuador about 5pm on Sunday afternoon.  I met Chuck in the Detroit airport about 4pm on Monday.  We flew out of Detroit for Paris at 6:30pm and arrived in Paris at 8:30am on Tuesday.

After we arrived in Paris the first thing we did, after checking into our hotel, was to take a much needed nap......a long nap.

We did a little looking around our neighborhood, in our jet lagged condition, last night but decided to turn in early so we could enjoy our "real" first day in Paris the next day.

This morning we woke up about 8:00am and we both felt great.

A view from our hotel window showed a promise of a beautiful day ahead.

We started out day with coffee and a crescent.  I almost forgot to take a picture but a half eaten crescent looks delicious too.

We decided, while eating breakfast, to take a nice long walk and search for the Eiffel Tower.  After checking out the map we were on our way.

The tourist attraction we saw was this grand building called Les Invalides.  It was built in 1670 by Louis XIV as a hospital and old age home for war veterans. Today, it is a museum of the army of France.  Napoleon Bonaparte is buried here.

We kept to our course and we were soon rewarded with a glimpse of our goal. Can you find the Eiffel Tower in this picture?

As we walked along I took a picture of the beautiful roses in someone's window. I wonder if they came all the way from Ecuador?

Here is a cute little sidewalk nursery.

Wow, another glimpse.  This reminds me of Las Vegas...things look closer than they actually are.  We walked and walked and decided to stop for lunch.

A view of the interior of a courtyard.  Once again I was reminded of Ecuador.

I am sure we are making headway, but how much further?

Whoa!  Not far now!

Wow!  We made it!

Beautiful sight!

We decided to take the metro back to our hotel.  When we got back we were exhauted and took a long nap.

We treated ourselves to lots of shushi and shashimi for dinner.  It was so good!!

What's on the agenda for tomorrow?  We don't know yet.

Whatever it is, I am sure it will be fun.

Love,
Nancy

Catching up Before the Next Flight

Dear Family and Friends,

Holy cow!  It has been about 6 weeks since I last posted to our blog.  I knew I was letting the blog slip but I had no idea how much.  Please accept my appology.  The truth is, sometimes I get bogged down in other things and I am just not inspired to post.

At the end of my last post I told you I would post pictures of our cruise in Alaska.  The cruise was so long ago that I feel ashamed to do it now but I will share some pictures at the end of this post.

Let's see...six weeks.....we purchased another condo and have started to renovate it, we sold our penthouse condo that we rented out for a few years.

Chuck took off to the U.S. a couple of weeks ago to take our grandson, Bryce, on an Amtrak adventure to see his cousins.  We did this with our grandson, Cannon, earlier this year and this was Bryce's turn to spend with Poppi.   With thirteen grandchildren it is not easy to keep the score even but we do the best we can.

Chuck and Bryce finished their trip yesterday and tomorrow Chuck will be flying from San Francisco to Paris.  He is going to Paris to have a procedure done on his hand.  Chuck has Dupuytren's Contracture.  The traditional way to treat this condition is to have surgery on your hand.  However, Chuck is trying a different technique called Needle Aponeurotomy.

Chuck has had this disease for about 15 to 20 years.  When he first had symptoms of his fingers starting to draw up, he showed to his doctor in the U.S. His doctor advised him that when it became severe enough the treatment would be surgery on his hand to remove the fiberous buildup.  About 10 years ago it had reached that point.  Chuck spent a lot of time researching about this condition and found that it was being treated in by doctors in France without surgery.

He emailed one of the doctors in France who had developed this technique to see if it would be possible for him to have the procedure done on himself.  The doctor agreed, so off we went to France.  The procedure took about twenty minutes, was done in the doctor's office, and we were extremely pleased with the results.

Back then the doctor explained that it was possible that the fiber would grow back.  Over the last ten years it has grown back and Chuck has chosen to have the same procedure done by the same doctor as he did ten years ago.

I am flying out of Ecuador tonight to join Chuck tomorrow on the flight to Paris. This is about the shortest trip we have ever made to Europe....less than two weeks.

My inspiration to post is now sky high.  I know that there are a lot of people who suffer from Dupuytren's Contracture.  I am excited to share with you our experience with this procedure.  I will record through photography the procedure. If you have this condition or if you know anyone who suffers from it, you may want to share this treatment option with them.  I will provide more details later.

So, as promised, here are some pictures from our Alaskan cruise.

This is my brother and his wife, Norman and Nancy.  They invited us to join them on this cruise and we had a wonderful time with them.

Chuck and me enjoying the formal dinner evening.

If you have been to Alaska you already know how incredible the scenery is.

This is the Mendenhall glacier in Glacier Bay.

Another photo showing a closer look.

It was about this point in the cruise that I came down with the cruise ship flu. Not a stomach virus but sore muscle achy joint flu.  Many passengers had this flu and we all had our turn except for my brother.

Glad I posted these pictures.  Now that little knawing feeling that I have felt for awhile can subside.  (smile)

Anyway, it is good to be back sharing photos with you.  I am taking my computer and camera with me to Paris.  It is my intention to post as we go.  I am most excited about sharing Chuck's medical procedure with you.

Love you all,
Nancy

Denali National Park Alaska

Dear Family and Friends,

We spent a couple of days at Denali National Park in Alaska.  The weather was a low overcast...but again I understand this is common.

We went on a bus tour of the park.  Even with the low clouds I was able to get a few good pictures.

As the day went on the weather got a little better.

Here is Chuck doing his caribou immitation.

During the time we were at Denali we never saw Mt. McKinley.  Not even a glimpse.

When we were on our bus ride from Denli to Seward, Alaska to board the cruise ship, the driver pulled the bus over and stopped.  What do you know, we were able to see Mt. McKinley in all her glory.

We were not skunked after all.

Next time I will share some of our cruise adventure.

Love,
Nancy

Train Ride to Denali National Park

Dear Family and Friends,

The cruise that Norman and Nancy booked was a land and sea cruise.  The first few days (the land portion) included a train ride from Anchorage to Denali National Park.

We were picked up at our hotel in Anchorage and transported to the train station where we got on beautiful observation cars for our all day ride to Denali.

Here are some pictures.

This is my brother Norman, wearing his Texas shirt and Nancy, wearing the sweet smile.  It was good to be with them.

As you can see from the pictures the observation car was roomy and perfect for viewing the scenery.

The weather was a low overcast so the pictures are not a good as they would be on a clear sunny day.  As I understand, it is more common for the weather to be like this in Alaska than sunny.

We really didn't mind the clouds...it is just part of the Alaska experience.  The scenery was beautiful anyway.

In my next post I will share with you about Denali National Park.

Love,
Nancy

Way Up North...

Dear Family and Friends,

It has been about a month since I posted.  The last three weeks we were way up north...in Alaska.

In February or March my brother and sister-in-law invited us to join them (in June) on a cruise in Alaska.  We jumped at the chance and set up our air flights and cruise bookings.

Chuck and I celebrated our 30th anniversary at about 35,000 ft in the air as we were flying from Atlanta to Anchorage on June 8.

Here is a picture I took out the airplane window as we were getting near Anchorage.

and another as we were getting lower.

We landed in Anchorage between 6 and 7 pm.  The sun was shinning brightly. We checked into our hotel and went out for an anniversary celebration dinner of king crab about 9 pm and the sun was shinning brightly.

We finally settled down in our hotel room about 11 pm and the sun was shinning brightly.  Thank goodness for black out drapes.

The next day (our first full day in Alaska) we hung out and toured Anchorage. We enjoyed more fresh seafood, shopped, went to a show about Aurora Borealis (the northern lights.)  Unfortunate for us, summer time is not the time to witness this spectacular event in Alaska.  It doesn't get dark and they are not visable. Looking at the fabulous pictures makes one at least speculate returning in the dead of winter to witness them.

For our second day Chuck had booked us a train ride to Whittier, Alaska.  From there we took a cruise on the Prince William Sound to see glaciers.  We took a tour called 26 Glacier Cruise.  It is a one day cruise and, if the weather is good, you see up to 26 glaciers.

I snapped this picture out the window of the train on our way to Whittier.

Here is Chuck, reading his kindle, on our three hour trip.  He reminded me of an Amish man.  You can bet he was the only passenger on the train wearing a panama hat.

When we got to Whittier, we stepped off the train and boarded the boat.  As you can see it is not a huge boat.  It held about 50 passengers.

Also, as you can see, the day was overcast with low clouds.  I was afraid we were going to get skunked.

As we sailed along the weather began to improve.  Here is a glacier with the clouds beginning to lift off of it.

Because the boat is not huge, we were able to get up close and personal with some of the glaciers.

The ice is actually this blue.  The reason we were told is that the ice is so dense. Over hundreds, maybe thousands of years, snow falls and compresses.  Over time all the air bubbles are squeezed out of the ice.  There are no bubbles to interfere with the passage of light.  The absorption of light at the red end of the color spectrum is six times higher than the blue end.  This is what causes the glaciers to be a beautiful blue.

The day trip was fabulous and the scenery was breath taking.

After our three hour train ride back to Anchorage it was about 10pm when we returned.  We loaded up our luggage and went to the hotel where our cruise tour would begin.

By the way, this view is out of our hotel window in Anchorage around midnight.

Once again, we were glad to have black out drapes.

The next morning we met up with Norman and Nancy to begin our adventure.  I will share about that in the next post.

Love,
Nancy