First Parisian Run!

Christy and I pre-run
After a few days of getting acclimated, I finally hit the streets of Paris with my running shoes, underarmour, and Garmin watch. Mr. Garmin took awhile to get used to Paris and asked me once if I'd moved "hundreds of miles since my last use." Yes. After this, though, he was fine and kicked right in (thankfully). I ran with two of the participants in our program, Christy and Nikki (like me!). Here's the path we rocked, having started at our dorm and deciding to explore our nearby surroundings:


We left our dorm and headed over to the beautiful Jardin de Luxembourg, which is right nearby. Apparently, this is where Parisians come to jog as we kept seeing other people running all over. I noticed a few interesting things while observing the other Parisian runners.

1. When you cross an oncoming jogger, there's none of that weak smile/head nod that American joggers exchange—It's like you're invisible.
2. They don't hold their arms like we do (for the most part). I wish I'd taken a picture, but one guy just had his arms down at his sides as he ran. Does anyone know if there's a reason for this?
3. Running is the only time that you'll see them in running shoes, by the way.

Regardless, the Jardin is GORGEOUS. I've never run in Central Park, but I'd imagine that it'd be similar only here there's a palace (see below). Perfectly manicured lawns dotted with perfectly manicured shade trees and occasional statues. So beautiful. See?


A road diverged in a Parisian wood?

Probably my favorite sign every time I go to a French park: FORBIDDEN Grass!!!


Perhaps it was the gorgeous surroundings, but I was REALLY impressed with this run. After a few weeks of little to no running in Alabama, I thought hitting our 3 mile goal was going to be work, but when we finally stopped at 4 miles (since Nikki's knee was starting to hurt), I felt like I could have kept going. We kept a good pace and only stopped to take pictures or to cross the street. I think each run we're going to try a new plan and eventually maybe even take the metro to a cool spot and run back to the dorm... To me it sounds like a great way to explore Paris. Here are a few more shots from the run:




Here's the grocery right by our dorm. We got a great look from a Parisian woman who happened to walk by while this photo was happening.

A little park close to the dorm that we'll have to explore more later.
Nikki and I post run

Here's the break down for yesterday's run:



Instead of the boat cruise, we've decided on a night bike tour with Fat Tire Bike Tours that includes a boat cruise as well. We meant to go yesterday, but it ended up raining so we've rescheduled for Monday. Instead, the RA for the dorm recommended a quirky restaurant over in Montmartre called Le Refuge des Fondus. This restaurant is famous for the fact that for 18 euro you get an appetizer, fondu, and, get this, a baby bottle of either red or white wine. With 2 euro refills on the baby bottle, let's just say we definitely had a great time and have been suffering from "wine lag" all day. Oh, well, it was DEFINITELY worth it. I can't wait to find more quirky restaurants here in Paris to try!





Now, we're off for our next run, so more later!!!