Journal No. 2
As I prepare to take my trip back to Paris in 31 days (but who's counting :) I thought I would share a little more about how I got here. In case anyone out there wants to try to plan the same trip for themselves.
The very first thing was deciding on a time of the year. I really wanted to go for my birthday, but that is at the end of winter. From what I understand, spring and fall are the best times to go to the flea markets. Spring wasn't going to work because of other work and personal commitments. Last time I went it was at the very end of the summer. I did not want to do that again, as many of the old buildings do not have A/C. We learned that the hard way with a room on the third floor.
End of September worked best all around. The summer heat has lifted, the flea markets are restocked, and the Michigan summer activities have come to an end.
The next things to consider were what exact dates, where to fly out of and where to stay. We have a local airport, but two international options within three hours away. Luckily the best option was local. I tried different dates, and what they say is true. Tuesdays are the least expensive option. Where we are staying also determined the flight times. When you travel from the U.S. you are essentially traveling forward in time. France is seven hours ahead so when you leave here in the afternoon, you arrive there in the morning the next day. Your hotel room probably won't be ready until 2:00 and if you stay in an Airbnb you probably can't check in until 3:00 or 4:00. With a hotel you can leave your bags and go wander. But with a short term rental, you will need to schlep your bags around. And even though the flight is overnight, you will be very tired.
In the end we found the perfect VRBO for us. We are staying six nights but with seven nights you get a weekly discount. So for only $100 for the 7th night we decided to book that so we can arrive (technically a day late) early in the morning. To us it will feel like it is around 1:00 am. We can take a nap, shower and get on with the day. This factored greatly into the arrival time. So now instead of arriving at 11:40am and staying at a hotel, we can arrive at 8:30, have a much larger space,and not lose the whole first day because we are exhausted. That's a lot for an extra $100!
So, flights are booked and the dates are set. Next I'll tell you how I figured out where to stay—which somehow turned into two full days of research. More on that next time. :)
If you’d like to follow along as I figure all of this out, you can join my weekly email below.
Jamie
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