Bonjour from Paris, the city of lights, city of romance, and city of... well, cool drizzly weather and a very very tired Sari and Ryan. It's been a very long day to arrive here. But now we're more than halfway home.

We woke up early this morning in Bangkok, got our bags together, and scarfed down the breakfast food we'd bought at the 7-Eleven last night. A quick ten minute walk to Phayathai Station, and we were right back on the same Airport Rail Link train that we took last night. 

Goodbye, Bangkok. Goodbye, Thailand. Goodbye, Southeast Asia. It's been a real treat and an unforgettable experience. 

Once at the airport, we went through Thai exit customs, made our way through security, and boarded the very long flight back to Paris. We took off just before noon, and arrived 13 hours later, around 6:30pm Paris time, though it felt like after midnight for us. At least this flight, unlike the Thai Airways one we took on the way to Bangkok, was relatively comfortable and went smoothly. No screaming babies or turbulence this time around. We even had an empty middle seat in our row. Score!

It was a daytime flight, so I didn't get much sleep on it despite how long it was. I watched four different movies and a TV miniseries to keep busy. As usual, I seem to do a lot of catching up on my TV and movie viewing on long plane rides.

Landing at Charles de Gaulle was familiar; I've transited here more times than I can count. But it was time for me to actually head into Paris proper for the first time in nearly 13 years, and for Ryan, the first time ever. Bienvenue à Paris.

It took nearly an hour to get out of the airport, CDG being what it is. We took the RER into the city, exiting at Auber in front of the Opera Garnier. Exiting the subway was a shock to the system; after three weeks of 30+ temperatures, being greeted with single digits and rain felt oddly refreshing. 

We found our hotel, a fairly basic little place in the 9e arrondissement, walking distance from most of the major sights and attractions. It's fine, nothing special, and the room is the size of a postage stamp, of course, but it's clean and well located and it meets our COVID safety requirements with windows that open to the outside, so it'll suit us just fine. Of course, given Parisian prices, I should point out that the nightly rate here is actually higher than what we spent on our five-star resort in Koh Yao Yai this past weekend. It's all relative, eh?

Even though we were both exhausted, we were also both starving, having eaten nothing since breakfast. Paris is, of course, a great city for wonderful food. But we were both way too tired and it was way too cold outside for us to be tempted by a restaurant meal, even if quite a few places do seem to have outdoor seating even in January. We'll look into that more tomorrow. For tonight, we just headed to the nearby Carrefour and got some pre-packaged baguette sandwiches and cheese and brought them back to our hotel room. Not exactly the Parisian dining experience we may have hoped for. But we're both exhausted, so dinner in our pyjamas and some sleep will work nicely, thanks.

More tomorrow, as we take advantage of this layover to explore Paris.