Firstly, a quick update - I have continued with my 8 glasses of water a day and I have managed to get in a minimum of 10,000 steps each day too which is excellent. I am definitely sleeping better and I am not waking in the night covered in sweat and feeling rubbish. My skin is softer and I feel good. I most definitely have not curtailed my eating, in fact, quite the opposite over this last week so you can imagine my surprise when I stood on the scales the morning to find that I have lost another pound. Yep, the scales now tell me that I weigh 13 st 3lbs.
I know that I still weigh too much but I think it's proof that keeping active...walking is the only exercise I am doing at the moment... and keeping hydrated has many positives and I have yet to find a negative. I shall be continuing with the challenge and I'll keep you posted.
On to more exciting things. Last Tuesday my youngest daughter and I met up at St Pancras station and boarded the Eurostar to Paris where we spent two days and one night in each others company and lived to tell the tale.
I had wanted to go on Eurostar for a long time. It seemed silly to me that I had never been on it so I asked my daughter if she would like to come with me as a birthday treat for her. It's actually her birthday today (June 14th) so it was an early present. I booked the tickets for the train in advance as the tickets are cheaper that way and I booked a nice looking but small hotel for the night and that was it. We just had to wait for the day to arrive.
As I mentioned, we met at the station, brought ourselves some treats for the trip and boarded the train. It was really a train trip like any other and we spent the 2 and a half hour trip chatting, eating the strawberries and sandwiches we had purchased and toasting our trip with Prosecco.
The area around the station is quite daunting. There were a lot of groups of men hanging around and also quite a few people begging. However, we knew that out hotel was literally a stones throw from the station so we made our way there. Just outside the station there was a large noisy gathering of police and taxis and there appeared to be a stand off of some kind going on. Lots of intense discussions and many frustrated Parisiens whose journeys were being delayed because the taxis appeared to be blocking the roads. Apparently there had been the discovery of some illegal immigrants in the area and, for reasons unbeknown to us, the taxi drivers were involved in the situation. We never did get to the bottom of it but it didn't affect us anyway. We were just curious about what was happening.
We checked into our very nice hotel and had a room with a balcony on the 6th floor where we had a lovely view of the streets below. The room the clean, bright and airy and the shower was fabulous!
We settled in and then made our way to the restaurant that we had booked and which had very good reviews on Tripadvisor.
Enroute to our dinner reservation we found that Sacre Coeur was very close by and, as we were early, we decided to investigate. We climbed a lot of steps and found ourselves here....
The place was full of people and it was really lovely. The views of the city from there were wonderful. We then descended the steps again and stopped for a glass of wine before making our way to the Sacre Fleur restaurant which was just down the road.
Sacre Fleur did not disappoint. It was a small, intimate eatery which was fully booked. The staff were very friendly and the food was wonderful. I had the frogs legs and a 'blue' rump steak which was divine. We shared a bottle of 'champagne' too and neither of us could manage pudding or coffee!
The next day we set off for one of the open top hop on/hop off buses which gave us a tour of the city. We had about half an hour to walk from the hotel to the pick up point but we found it which was impressive for two females with no sense of direction!
The sun shone throughout the day which made the open top bus even more agreeable. We were driven past the Louvre, Notre Dam, Arch de Triomphe and along the Champs Elysee. We decided the only place we could get off and spend any time was at the Eiffel Tower and that's what we did.
We really had a wonderful couple of days and it was a pleasure to spend some quality time with my daughter. We should do that kind of thing more often.
The day after I got back from Paris I went to the hut with my son and his girlfriend. He had only been once before and she never had. It was another glorious day and a perfect day to introduce the hut.
Son cooked bacon sandwiches and I made cups of tea. Then we sat about in the sun, they collected shells, and I went and got an ice cream for us all.
We had a lovely day which ended with me working a night duty and then the following evening was spent in Oxford where we had been invited to dinner in the halls at New College and which is quite an experience...very Harry Potter!
We all sat at long tables and were we served with a three course meal with coffee. We took our own drinks and generally had a wonderful evening which ended at a very respectable time as I had to drive home as I had an early shift to do the next day.
It's been a very busy, very interesting week and it has been a lot of fun. There have been a few things to deal with as is the norm and I don't think that I've let anything stop me form enjoying myself which is good.
I'm off to drink a glass of water now. Have a great week everyone and happy birthday to my little girl.
xxxxx
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