Zac is growing up, goodbye to our 2nd family & quick hello to a former companion

5 out of these 6 "kids" also pictured in the previous photo.  They've changed just a bit.

Our friends the Beals who make our Europe trip look like a weekend getaway.

June 30, 2018

Today was the day for the hardest goodbyes.  We had to say goodbye to Maria, Mimmo, Josh and Marie, and the last time we had to do that, we didn’t make it back for ten years.  This time, it wasn’t quite as hard because Becky and I will be passing through Geneva for a couple of days in September on our way to and from Slovakia to see Alex wrestle in the Junior World Championships.  We also had to say goodbye to Zac though who will be staying with the Vigliottis for a little over three weeks.  This will be his longest time away from home, and I think he’s a little nervous but also excited as well.  He’s 17 now, and being on his own a little (with the Vigliottis for support) will be a great experience for him.  He’ll have an amazing time, and we’ll see him in a few weeks, but it was kind of sad saying goodbye. 

After packing the car, we had breakfast with everyone and gave hugs all around.  Then we left Switzerland and drove the six hours or so (with a couple of stops) to our hotel in Paris near the Orly airport. 

We again stayed in a Formule 1 – which is the budget cookie-cutter hotels with shared bathrooms down the hall.  Today was also the first day that was pretty warm on the trip, and of course, the hotel does not have air conditioning so that did not make for a good combination. I think when Becky and I had first travelled in Europe over 20 years ago, the Formule 1's were still pretty new, but now those same hotels have not been updated and are pretty run down.  The one in Evreux was not as bad, but this one in Paris was kind of sketchy.  Note to self – we probably won’t be staying in a Formule 1 again, but we only needed a place to sleep before catching the plane to Iceland where I have a cute AirBnb booked for the last two nights of the trip. 

I also knew that we wouldn’t be staying in the hotel much because we were meeting some friends for dinner.  My good friend Seth Beal was one of my missionary companions, and then we had been roommates at BYU for a year as well.  He recently quit his most recent job, and he, his wife, and three kids – ages 12, 14 and 16 are traveling around the world for about 6 months.  They have an AirBnb apartment in Paris for three weeks so we met up with them for dinner at their apartment not far from the Hotel de Ville and Notre Dame cathedral.

Seth suggested that we might want to take the metro and bus from our hotel to their place because the roads in Paris were packed – there had been a gay pride celebration in Paris this weekend and then the French soccer team had won their World Cup game this evening in dramatic fashion so Paris was in full party mode.  I decided though that my family would be happier traveling in an air conditioned car than on an overcrowded bus and metro so I decided I would figure out parking once we got there.  It didn’t take us too long to get close to their place, but then the streets were crazy as we got close.  We found an underground parking garage at the Hotel de Ville and walked the ten minutes or so to their place. 

Seth’s wife Kara had made us dinner, and we spent 3 hours hanging out and visiting with them.  Our kids and their kids seem thrilled to have time to chat with American teenagers roughly their same ages.  This is the second time that we just got so caught up visiting that we forgot to take pictures as part of our European vacation. I will steal a picture of their family from their travel blog (bealsabroad.blogspot.com) to include in ours. 

It was nice having the car after we were done because the streets weren’t quite as nutty by that time.  We were able to do a nighttime driving tour of Paris with Alex since she hadn’t been with us when we visited Paris at the beginning of the trip.  We drove past the Louvre and the Tour Eiffel, and I even braved the huge roundabout the circles the Arc du Triomphe.  It took us a little while to find our hotel again, but that was ok because it was hot and stuffy there anyway, and we only wanted to be there long enough to sleep.  Thank you Seth, Kara and family for dinner and from saving us from more time than that in our hotel!