Before I get to France, let me fill you in on the little bit you missed since I talked to you last. Kira made it home, basically in one piece, from Costa Rica. She brought me home the most lovely gift, a horrible cold, that ended up keeping us quarantined for almost three weeks. After we finally recovered all you really missed were a lot of gym sessions. We also went to a bridal shower that was so much fun, and we got cleaned up in nice dresses and heels (as a side note I cannot stay in heels for longer than 20 minutes). Immediately after the bridal shower we went to Ikea and long story short I ended up in the cart with the plants and kitchen tools we were buying. Rounding it out we hung out by the pool, went for hikes by the beach, did some grocery shopping/meal prepping, I also started at my new job! Luckily I work for the best company, so I was able to let them know we had a planned vacation for about a month after I started and they had no problem letting me go!
OMG! When I tell you I was excited for this trip I am not exaggerating. This truly felt like it was the trip of a lifetime. My mom always made me promise to go and travel when I finished college, so its always been on my radar. I had dreams to travel and would talk about it, but it was never the right time for me. When I met Kira, she was already a seasoned world traveler, and I was amazed at hearing all of her stories. Admittedly, I was so jealous I wanted that same experience but again it always felt slightly out of reach and overwhelming to plan a trip. When I told Kira I wanted to travel she was dialed in and ready to make that dream a reality.
The planning phase: As you can imagine planning a trip across the seas is difficult. Well, not for Kira. One day we were just hanging out, about to go out to breakfast or hike, and she takes out her phone and ends up making a call. I did not think too much about it until she got off the phone and said “Alright I just bought us tickets to Nice, France.” I literally laughed out loud like who does that. If you know me at all you would know I could about die from the lack of planning that went into this. Kira was like “We will just figure out the rest later.” I thought she was insane for like two minutes and then I really started to think about it and I was like “Wow !Maybe this is exactly what I need in my life, a bad influence.” All jokes aside ,Kira’s nonchalant way about traveling and her general approach at life is what has helped to balance me out and I am so thankful I decided to take the leap and “go with the flow.”
Kira’s aunt dropped us off at the airport on the day of. When we got into the airport and up to check in our bags, we found out we booked our flights without baggage! Starting off the trip with just a bit of stress and an extra spend was definitely a whirlwind. We found out we needed to buy our bags for both our flight to France and home. Lesson 1: Aways check your ticket to see what baggage is listed. We boarded our flight and were off. I somehow let Kira convince me to wear a romper on our twelve hour flight. It ended up being fine, but having to get completely naked in an airplane bathroom was an interesting way to start our trip.
Come back to hear more about our trip and more lessons learned…
