The Sawyer Stories

In Innsbruck, we had 3 total days. 2 packed with activities followed by one of leisure roaming and rest. We thought it made a good pattern, so we repeated it. After 2 very full days in Paris, our last day was almost completely unplanned. We started the day by lazily staying in bed as late as we possibly could.

Once forcing ourselves up and out, we made our way to the neighborhood we missed earlier in the week, Montmartre. We hopped on the metro and quickly noticed the train was quite a bit fuller than our previous days. Weekend schedule? New neighborhood? We weren’t quite sure. However when we got off the train, we were greeted with a very new vibe. We walked straight into an outdoor market with vendors (both official and unofficial) on all sides. There was chaos everywhere. Definitely a less curated part of the city and a bit overwhelming when we weren’t expecting it.

We got our bearings and climbed our way through the market and up a big hill to find the one vegan restaurant we had successfully found on our online searches. When we walked up we were greeted with the best news ever, “We are only serving brunch right now.” Oh, how we love breakfast food. She brought over the handwritten sandwich board with the fixed brunch menu including a savory pancake course and a sweet pancake course (as well as the best chai latte I’ve ever had). This was the one meal we fully embraced the French vibe of savoring and lingering. Well, it felt like we stayed a long time at least. We were still outlasted by the French duo that was there before us.

One thing that has been tough while being away for 10 days is missing our family. Though we’ve got to talk with Liam most every day, we haven’t gotten to interact with Capital with his love language (belly rubs). We definitely missed giving him belly rubs but fortunately, this restaurant had a substitute puppy that guarded the restaurant. After Michael gave him a quick rub on the head we were on our way.

We checked our maps to see which way to Sacre Coeur. To our surprise, it was only 600 ft away from us, up an extremely long set of stairs. We made our way up working off our brunch.

At the top, we were greeted by another gorgeous cathedral and the biggest crowd of people we had yet seen in the city. People in lines to go inside, tour groups, vendors, locals on the hill…there were people in all directions.

This didn’t quite match our chill vibe for the day, so we decided to skip going inside or doing a self-guided walking tour and to make our way back down the hill. I thought we were headed back to the metro, but we were headed in a new direction. Turns out Michael was lovingly taking me by Moulin Rouge to snap a quick pic. Now I’m bummed I didn’t put that movie on my iPad for the flight home.

We then got on the metro and headed back to the Eiffel Tower. We realized we had yet to see it in the daytime. We walked until we found the perfect spot in the grass where we could lay, read, and nap with the historic landmark in perfect view. We spent a few hours laying there and trying not to think about this being our last day.

We then packed out things to walk along the River Seine. We happened upon a crew race in the river and sat to watch the tail end. Gotta love happy accidents!

We had the perfect bookend to finish out our incredible vacation. We headed to our meeting spot and climbed aboard our river cruise for the evening.

Even though our 20th anniversary isn’t until July, this was our celebratory dinner. We clinked to 20 amazing years together and many, many more to come. We enjoyed the views outside our window as we slowly sailed along the Seine.

With our hearts (and bellies) completely full, we prepared to say goodbye to Paris and a perfect vacation together. While we missed our boys back home, this time together, just the two of us, was precious. There’s no one else I’d rather take on the greatest adventures or lazily do nothing with. We’re better together, babe.