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3 Nights in Paris (Again)

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The cheapest transatlantic flights to France seem to always land in Paris. So it made sense to spend some time in Paris at the beginning and the end of our trip. For the finale of our trip, we booked three nights at an Airbnb in Paris -- but this was no ordinary Airbnb. This was the actual studio of painter Georges Braque  in 1911 which the host tastefully decorated with artists' books and period furniture. Located in the center of Quartier Pigalle, our home was two blocks from the Moulin Rouge (which lost its windmill sails just before we arrived) and steps away from the Rue Lepic and Rue des Abesseses restaurant districts. This is Toulouse-Lautrec and  Amélie territory -- which is the center of Paris as far we are concerned. After months of planning, we finally got to meet Juliette Dubois, our Cine-Balade tour guide. If her exhaustively thorough website is any indication, this woman is the real Ms. Cinema and I've been waiting to meet someone like her all my life. As the r
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2 Nights in Baden-Baden

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My partner Bonnie loves spas and Baden-Baden has been on her travel wish-list for a while. A UNESCO historic site, Baden-Baden is just one hour north of Strasbourg and definitely a worthy tourist destination. Although we had to cross over to Germany to visit Baden-Baden, we hardly noticed. Sure the language changed from French to German, but almost everyone spoke English so it didn't make much difference to us. The most notable difference was the speed limit on the Autobahn -- there was none! It's obvious that Germans enjoy driving fast and cars zoomed by us so fast we didn't dare enter the left lane.  We're here for the baths, so we booked Hotel Römerhof which was two blocks from the spa. It just so happened that our hotel was also a few blocks from the town center, so we were surrounded by restaurants of all types. We had a really nice dinner at a Vinami Kitchen , a Vietnamese restaurant that went pan-Asian just to keep the tourists happy.  The real surprise was find
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8 Days in Colmar

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We wanted to spend some time in the Alsace region of France because my partner Bonnie's ancestors immigrated from this region to the USA in the 1800s. We have also read that the villages of Alsace are well-preserved and very charming. So we chose Colmar to be our home base in order to explore the area in-depth. Exploring Alsace required a car. In France, all major train stations have car rental counters, and we discovered that the cheapest one-way rentals were from Dijon to Strasbourg ($30 per day). So we took a regional train from Lyon to Dijon, then drove from Dijon to Colmar. The total travel time was five hours and we arrived at our Home Exchange condo in Colmar by 5pm and settled in for the week.  Our condo was conveniently located five minutes from "old town" and "little Venice," the two major attractions in Colmar. We were immediately floored by small winding cobblestone streets, the beautiful half-timbered buildings, and the amazing history on display.
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2 Nights in Lyon

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There were two things we needed to do in Lyon before moving on. First, we have to eat at  Les Halles de Lyon Paul Bocuse . If Lyon is the food capital of France, then their legendary covered market must be the center of the universe for French gastronomy. The history of the original covered market goes all the way back to 1859, but the building was expanded and rebuilt in 1971 and renamed Les Halles de Lyon. Legend has it that Mr. Bocuse (Lyon's star chef with three Michelin stars which he kept for 54 years) shopped at this very market way back when he was a working chef and sourced the supplies for his restaurants here. In 2006, after a complete redesign and modernization effort, Mr. Bocuse offered to lend his name to the new building which is now known as Les Halles de Lyon Paul Bocuse. There are many "food halls" in France with the centuries-old Paris Les Halles being the most famous. Perhaps Brasserie Les Halles in New York City might come in second because that is th
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6 Days on the Rhone Princess (CroisiEurope Riverboat Cruise)

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CroisiEurope is a French company with a fleet of over 40 river boats that cruise all of Europe's major rivers. My first CroisiEurope experience was two years ago when I booked their Prague-based Vltava River cruise. The experience was so perfect that I swore allegiance to this company immediately. When it came time to choose a second riverboat trip, we went to the CroisiEurope website immediately and didn't bother researching any other options. This time we chose a cruise based in Lyon (the so-called food capital of France). Both experiences were identical: first class service, the most amazing gourmet French food, all-you-can-drink wine, beer, cocktails, aperitifs, digestives any time of the day or night. On both trips, the crew were amazingly friendly, very accommodating, and genuinely enjoying their jobs which prioritizes keeping their clients happy. Every cliché about French people being snobby gets thrown out the window the second you step on one of their boats. CroisiEur
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Location: Lyon, France
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2 Nights in Paris

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When flying international, we like to book the national airline of our destination. This way, our cultural immersion can start before we even leave the US. On previous trips, we have flown Swiss Air, China Air, Finnair, LOT (Polish), Air Lingus (Ireland), even Aeroflot (Russian). So it was a no-brainer to book a red-eye on Air France to Paris. Besides, with the recent controversies over at Boeing, we felt a little safer flying on an Airbus which is an European commercial airplane builder.  One of the real benefits of flying Air France is access to French movies without American distributors. And what luck, I didn't know Michel Gondry (my absolutely favorite French director) had made a new movie called The Book of Solutions and it was available to stream right on my seatback screen. Gondry hasn't made a major feature film since Mood Indigo in 2015 (I was one of the few people who actually appreciated what many people dismissed as an incomprehensible disaster). So I sat back,
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Location: Paris, France
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Preparing for France

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Going to France is a big deal. To really appreciate France, you shouldn't just hop on a plane to Paris and go visit the Eiffel Tower. One has to know at least a little about French culture, travel a little bit around Europe first, drink a little wine, and then perhaps work your way up to the Holy Grail of travel destinations. I didn't realize it, but I've been preparing myself for this trip of a lifetime most of my life. It all started in high school when my psychology teacher took me to see Black Moon , my first French film. I didn't understand the movie, but I immediately knew this one was different. This was an "art" film. Later, when the director's name appeared on the poster for Pretty Baby  and I intuitively became aware of what I later learned was called the " auteur theory" (a French invention). Soon I was following Louis Malle, then Francois Truffaut, Alain Resnais, and later Michel Gondry -- and I became a film geek. Then there were th
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