About the trip

Who: Me & my best friend, Jackie

What: 10-day trip to France

Where: Paris, Bordeaux, Provence, and Cannes

When: February

Why: To experience more French culture, since we’re both a little French by blood

France itinerary: 10 days

Here’s a quick outline of the time we spent in each city during our trip. Subscribe to Blue Sky Mind for an email once I put out city-specific guides for Paris, Bordeaux, and the south of France!

Fly in to Paris
3 days in Paris
3 days in Bordeaux
2 days in Aix-en-Provence
2 days in Cannes
1 more day in Paris
Fly out of Paris

A very crudely drawn map of our 10-day path through France.

Where to stay

We did mostly Airbnb’s, with one planned hotel and one *impromptu* hotel after finding out that I’d booked our Cannes Airbnb one day off. Whoops. We loved everywhere we stayed, though it’s good to keep in mind that anywhere you book in Paris - hotel or Airbnb - is going to be a fairly compact space. We definitely got more space in our Airbnb for about the same price in Paris. But we’d definitely recommend Le Pigalle, a vibey hotel in the up-and-coming Pigalle district, if you’re going that route while in Paris.

How to get around

We got around through a combination of trains, planes, and car.

To Paris: Plane (Lufthansa) from San Francisco, with a quick connection in Frankfurt
To Bordeaux: Train (TGV)
To Provence: Plane (EasyJet) to Marseille, rented a car through Alamo
To Cannes: Drove our rental car along the coast
To Paris: Plane (EasyJet)
To San Francisco: Plane (Lufthansa) from Paris, with a one hour connection in Frankfurt (our bags didn’t make it, sadly)

Know before you go

Just a few French musings/learnings for you as you think about planning a trip…

Plan for most things to be closed on both Sunday & Monday
If you rent a car, don’t let them give you a big American car; the roads in France (especially the south) are tiny
Natural wines are everywhere; get ready to explore!
Eat a big dinner - late night food is very hard to find
Look out for the many incredible books stores

Packing list

I packed pretty terribly for this trip. Despite the temperature being “about the same” in France as they were in SF, it felt much colder in France, even the south. I brought way too many t-shirts and tank tops, and not nearly enough sweaters. Learn from my mistakes.

Clothes and accessories

Wool coat
Down or heavy jacket
Multiple sweaters
- Turtleneck, cable knit, retro quarter zip, white Champion hoodie
Multiple long-sleeve tops
- Turtlenecks, balloon sleeves and lace trim
A few t-shirts
- I brought my Anine Bing and leopard button up
Multiple pairs of pants
- Straight leg denim, kick flare denim, white flares, black skinnies, leather leggings
Leather skirt with black tights
Lug sole or combat boots
White tennis shoes
Black belt
Beanies (or a beret if you’re tres chic)
Blanket scarf
Black crossbody bag
Cute backpack
One set of workout clothes (for yoga or spin, no need to bring shoes!)
Pajamas
Underwear & socks & bras (duh)

Other necessities

Passport
Converter / power adapter
Kindle
Chargers (phone, watch, Kindle)
Journal
Ear plugs
Eye mask
Sleeping pills (for red eyes and adjusting to a new time zone)
Water bottle
Jewelry
Toiletries
Hair tools

Lots more to come here in terms of city-specific recommendations, but hopefully this is a helpful start for anyone planning their trip to France! :)

Sights Seen:

Sacre Coeur
Montmartre
Opera
Hotel de Ville
Notre Dame
Love Lock Bridge
The Louvre
Arc de Triumph

Jax posing with her Great Great (etc.) Uncle Richard #familyresemblance

Foods Consumed:

Tuck Shop: Delicious soup, sandwiches and coffee
Angelina's: World's best hot chocolate, hands down
Refuge des Fondues: Swiss cheese fondue, wine out of baby bottles, amazing ambiance
Ari's Bagels: Cheese bagel with cream cheese and veggies. Unreal recovery food.
Loustic: Cappuccino's and a beautiful man I shared some intense eye contact with.
Random cafe: Croque Madames - look it up
Pierre Herme: The most incredible Madagascar Vanilla, Lavender and Salted Caramel macarons I've ever tasted
Farmer's Market: Savory crepe wrap, including (but not limited to): spinach, basil, olive oil, prosciutto, fromage blanc. Still salivating.

Otherworldly hot chocolate at Angelina's in Galleries Lafayette. Note the mountain of cream.

Appetizers to the boiling vat of cheese that came next. Cheers!

Memories Made:

The fun times began to roll even before reuniting with two of my best friends in the City of Love. On my 7-hour bus ride from Amsterdam to Paris, I happened to find myself sitting in front of a fellow passenger rocking a bright red USC backpack. It turned out he was from Brussels, but had just finished four months at USC as a Marshall exchange student! It's so cool, the people you meet when you travel solo.

We talked for the rest of the bus ride and when we finally arrived in Paris, him and his girlfriend (also a former USC exchange student!) helped me navigate the metro, even sitting with me until we arrived at my stop. Super #blessed to have met you, Ben and Angelique. Fight on, dudes!

After greeting me with red wine and a liter of Smirnoff Ice (I can't even chug a normal sized one, so that was a lol), the roomies and I got ready for a night out. We met up with a bunch of other USC and CIEE kids to pregame, then headed to a place called The Social Club. Playing that night was the group Klingande, and we had the most amazing time. We pushed our way to the front and danced to their set for hours. If you're unfamiliar with them, do yourself a favor and acquaint yourself now.

We got on stage shortly after this photo was taken.

The next day was filled with good food and awesome sightseeing. However, thanks to some low-key sexual harassment from the locals, separation of the group, and a failed attempt to get into Le Titty Twister (<-- a real, and apparently, sick club), I went to sleep missing the safe, comfortable streets of Amsterdam.

Saturday was a new and killer day. Obvi more good food and sightseeing. Notable events include posing as the modern-day hunchbacks of Notre Dame and pretending to be high-class beggars on the Love Lock Bridge. Possible "you had to be there" moments, but by the end of the day, I think our stomachs hurt from laughing as much as our feet from walking. We all agree that we're best friends because we make each other feel hilarious. Touche.

Like, we're super poor. Can I have your iPhone?

From there, we sought out my first incredibly delicious Croque Madame. Sadly, all of the cheese, butter and cream of the Parisian cuisine I had consumed voraciously since arrival caught up with me post-croque. I developed a horrible stomach ache for the last half of the day, cutting our tour of the city just short of the Eiffel Tower. There's nothing worse than complete debilitation by your own stomach. Bad tummy.

This is what Parisians call a "snack." I think the American word for it is "obesity."

A true social chair at heart, I slept off some of the pain and drank off the rest in order to go out for the night. Big USC pregame, a new club, you know the drill. After 4am pizza, I finally made it to sleep at my now semi-normal bedtime of 5am.

Okay, le final!

Sunday morning is a slow one, duh. No one wakes up before 11am. I have plans to leave for my bus at 1:30pm, along with a burning desire to eat an authentic crepe before I go. At 1pm, Linda, Jax and I finally set out to find said crepe. Linda leads us halfway across town to this cool farmers market, where we end up waiting over 45 minutes for these uber gourmet crepe-wrap-sandwich things. I'm freaking out, because it's well past 1:30 and we are still in line, so Linda offers to run back to her place, grab my things and meet us at the metro. It was a great idea, until both Jax and I realized we left our iPhones at Lindas.

SO, along with having to self-navigate to the metro at Republique, we had to use my little Dutch phone to text Layla to text Anna to text Linda to communicate our lack of communicative ability. LOL STRESSFUL. Finally, at 2:20pm, Linda finds me at Republique, runs my backpack to me, and I take off sprinting down the metro steps. I wont bore you with the anxiety-ridden details, but I ultimately got on my bus with three minutes to spare.

This was a major victory of the weekend, although I do find myself embarrassed by the lengths to which I will go for some good-ass food.

Worth the 45-minute wait and narrowly missing my bus? Yeah.

Okay, I'm not that embarrassed.

P.S. Shout out to Linda and Jax, who both missed their train/flight later that day, due to reasons completely unrelated to mine and largely with poor planning. This happens on the heels of them assuring me that they "always show up to things late and have never missed a form of transportation!" Lol, the irony. You girls keep me young.

P.P.S. I really miss you guys already. Au revoir!

France Itinerary: 10 Days Plus Packing List