The slight irony of seeing Barcelona's less well-known arc de triomphe, _twice_ but not seeing the one in Paris at all. Also, prepping for the Olympics in a -year- **checks watch** this week. 🙃
You coming to Southampton at the end of the vlog was a plot twist I was *NOT* prepared for, it's very jarring to suddenly see ones home town alongside all the other exotic locales you've spent this vacation at.
I mentioned on the Day 1 vlog that seeing an area i'm familiar with is wild. We now come to the country I'm from and not only that this trip has taken the same train as me because it came to the PLACE I LIVE Deeply bizzare to see people doing a tourism of my hometown and artsy shots of my local train station
So I looked it up, and it turns out that Operation Sentinelle is an ongoing operation that posts military guards (as well as heavily-armed police and gendarmerie) in cities throughout France, in response to a series of terror attacks that hit France in 2015. In October 2023, France's emergency rating was raised to the highest level, causing Operation Sentinelle to deploy an additional 7,000 soldiers throughout the country. Naturally, the presence of heavily armed military in their places of work and living has not gone over well with a lot of people in France, so there have been a number of protests against this, as well as attacks on soldiers of Operation Sentinelle themselves. However, Operation Sentinelle shows no signs of stopping anytime soon.
It just like how your find armed police officers at key landmarks around London. It mostly for display and to reassure people. Security theatre, if you will like the TSA. It might surprise you but the Gendarme are an armed police force. Like the US is, just there is the loose rule that if your weapon gets discharged and you can’t justify it you’ll be dishonourable discharged from office and loose all your benefits and pension. Which is a sure fire way to prevent people from actually using their service weapon.
La tour d’argent is a very famous restaurant that is well known for their duck (they number their pressed duck and you get a certificate for the duck you eat). so it makes a little more sense with the logo of the boulangerie having a duck in it.
Watching in another room and my daughter hears the french train jingle and rushes in recognising it - we all think it sounds like something out of a professor Layton game 😅
On the train track question. Thats high speed rail track, it has to engineered to a higher standard. Low speed rail in france would be similar to what your used to looks wise.
I'm consistently impressed with how you make travel seem. There was a lot of sitting on trains and waiting around on the day you recorded this, and yet you still managed to make it seem like a great time through and through.
Surreal experience being able to tell exactly where you were in Paris by one of my favorite croissant places (La Maison d'Isabelle @ 16:29). Another favorite of mine, while Pierre Herme is famous for their macarons, their plain croissant is delicious as well. Not sure if they sell at their cafe, but I've had it for sure in the store at Champs Elysees.
20:24 I speak French natively so for me my brain automatically understood what the person said without thinking about it and had to double back when Graham said he was only guessing what she said, because for my brain she spoke English for some reason x3
I feel Kathleen's Parisian breakfast experience. I'm also not a big breakfast eater, but my friend and I were going to do a BUNCH of walking so I decided to try to eat something. So I ordered what I thought was going to be a little bit of bread, yogurt, house made conserves and a couple eggs to go with my coffee. The "bread" turned out to be a whole baguette split longways and covered with a frankly American amount of cultured butter. I did not eat lunch that day.
That really was a whirlwind stop in Paris! Also: the London shots feel weird but also absolutely amazing, to see places I semi-regularly pass through in a GVLOG. The cinematography is never as good when it’s me walking through at rush hour, though 😅
"She's 7, she doesn't care..." has been my mantra for traveling with my daughter this summer. Some examples have been: "She's 7, she doesn't care. She just wants to go swimming." "She's 7, she doesn't care about the museum. She'd rather watch cartoons." I'm looking forward to replacing it with "She's 8, she doesn't care."
I'm with Kathleen, sleeping on a train is NOT as easy as it sounds. I think it might've been easier for me if I had been sitting up to some degree rather than lying completely flat.
i'm not sure why i went into this vlog hopeful to recognize somewhere when my own family trip to paris was well over two decades ago 😅 the pigeons, though, i definitely do remember! very brazen little critters. one of my fondest memories was several of us, profoundly jetlagged, sitting in a public square tossing bits of cheese crepe to the pigeons. (have you seen a pigeon swing its head around stretching out a piece of gooey cheese to phenomenal lengths? highly recommend.)
When you arrived near Notre Dame I started internally hoping you'd visit the island next door and hit Berthilon for their yummy ice cream (tho they might not have been open that early) but alas. Still, it was nice to see a bit of Paris again.
Thank you all so much for bringing us along for your trip. And, I'm happy to report that I've managed to make my brain consistently edit in the Ghost in the Shell "Laughing Man" graphic over Penelope's head whenever she's in shot - I couldn't even tell you what color her hair is! Hooray, neuroplasticity!
This looks like an amazing trip so far!!! Loved the French Castle and trip to England, and yeah it's not so easy to sleep on a train when you're not used to it, though night trains are fun!
10:28 - My guess is it's likely to be an HVAC system, not a dishwasher. Even commercial units aren't usually that big, and "way up top" sounds like a bad place for the kitchen staff to go wash dishes.
Ah, to be in Paris, the "City of Light"... between 7am & 2pm. :| Pity - my folks took a two-day, one-night side-trip while we were visiting family in *Southampton* and they just gushed about how gorgeous the city was at night - the Eiffel Tower looks a dull, muddy brown during the day, but at night the lights make it shine like *GOLD*
My fiancé (who i met because of sidewalk slam introducing me to AEW) is English and while we are still LD, we meet in london. Seeing the underground hit me with a wave of homesickness for a place I am not from.
With the music and everything, I wish I could have the whole vlog animated studio Ghibli style. I think the part with the French Pigeon would especially be funny.
Operation Sentinelle from wikipedia On 13 October 2023, France raised its security alert to the highest level, and the day after it deployed 7,000 soldiers following the Arras school stabbing.
It's been said before, but it must be rather odd traveling with Graham, and having him constantly falling behind and running ahead to get a shot. (Source: My mom is always 40 feet back taking pictures of a random bit of architecture or something). This vlog has had less of the "plant camera in hotel room, go back outside, open door and go back in" bit though.
In honour of Paul, Graham should have walked up and been like "Hellloooooo" as our fave ginger would. If missing real Paul, summon his spirit with one simple word. Lol
14:30 Look you can’t start a sidesubmini quest and be surprised when the game throws a combat encounter at you, though I concede you were a tad under levelled for it.
The charge to use the bathroom *in the train station* is probably also to discourage casual passersby usage and 'keep the facilities available for paying passengers' (it was 2 euro, but 1 euro if you swiped your ticket), in addition to the usual capitalist greed. The general public bathrooms were free.
