European Family Day

So since Kelly's return down under, the early morning phone calls to alert the European contingent of the family have slacked off. Alas, for this family day, the European O'Keefes were together and celebrating in Paris.

My job requires me to visit our other European offices from time to time and our department's policy is all foreign meetings should take place on a Friday or Monday to allow for full exploration and understanding of our other offices culture (and usually alcoholic beverages and clubs). This time, Gabby came with me for this experience.

We started off on a very early train from London to Paris, Gabby sleeping most of the way and me devouring Eurostar croissants to stay awake. We made it to our hotel, dropped the bags, changed for comfortable shoes and headed out to explore the sites.

Stop 1 - L'arc de triumph. We followed the tourists and visited France's unknown soldier. Although we were too tired and cheap to climb the arc, Gabby took some amazing photos from the bottom. From there, we headed down the Champs Elyeeses towards the Siene, with one or two brief shopping stops along the way.

From the Siene, over to the left bank for a spot of lunch (goat's cheese salads, yum yum) and over to Notre Dame to view the flying buttresses made famous by a humpback. After taking our fill of stain glass, we joined the Batobus for a trip up and down the Siene viewing some of the most iconic Parisian sites. By this time, it had started to rain, I was grumpy and Gabby very sensibly suggested returning to the hotel for a nap.

Dinner proved to be a quiet affair - drinks with my boss and her boyfriend, dinner in Montmartre, far too many drinks and a phone call from my parents to remind us that yes, it was in fact O'Keefe family day.

Day two was intended to be for shopping but Cat, very sillily forgot, shops don't open on Sunday in Paris so instead we went to Laudree's for macaroons, a bistro for steak and San Chapelle to show Gabby my most favourite tourist attraction in Paris.

Gabby took over 150 photos so we thought that we'd share some of them with you... Happy family day! The European O'Keefes.

Love, Cat