Paris June 18, 2008 – July 9, 2008

This year our trip to Paris was just incredible. We were able to see so many concerts, ride our bikes (two dahons – packed away in their own special suitcases), be with friends Jack and Victoria, marvel at the sites and sounds of the city, eat fabulous food, buy some great clothes, incredible weather, and espeically have time to spend alot of time together walking, riding and just enjoying the whole day and night together for 3 weeks in our favorite apartment building. Here’s some pictures of our adventure this year. Everybody asks why we go back to Paris over and over – and I think the pictures tell the story.

We were able to see so many concerts this year in Europe:
Joseph Arthur – Café de la Danse
The Bravery – La Maroquinerie
Bruce Springsteen – Parc des Prince
Radiohead – Westerpark – Amsterdam
REM – Westerpark – Amsterdam
La Moche – World Premier – Chatelet Theatre
Richie Havens, The Foals – Soidays – Le Bois de Boulogn
Bike riding in Le Bois de Boulogn was incredible especially when we got onto the bike route around the Hippodrom and found ourselves with packs of other bike riders.
We didn’t get to see any of the Tour de France this yet but for what we saw on TV once we got back to the states, but the trip was the very best.

Radiohead and REM Amsterdam

When Radiohead announced it was going to do a tour for in Rainbows David and I said – “We have to go!” and hopefully we would get to see them in Paris when we were going to be there in June/July of 2008. I got on the ticket sites and started searching. On ticketmaster for the netherlands ticketmaster.nl I found the tickets I wanted. Radiohead was going to play in a park called Westerpark. Great – it was GA and we love GA – so we bought the tickets. Last year we were supposed to go to Amsterdam and Marshall our hairdresser told us all the fun he and Douglas had in Amsterdam – so we wanted to go – but for some reason – possibly cuz i was still stressing about my Mom being gone – I just didn’t want to do anything other than just sit around Paris after we had gone to Barcelona. So we didn’t go. But this year we had to go – WE HAD TICKETS FOR RADIOHEAD.

Westerpark is a great venue for a outdoor concert. The park wasn’t too far away from the hotel we stayed at The Times Hotel (Herengracht 137 Phone: 31 20 3306030 ) – it was clean, quiet and within walking distance to the park.

Amsterdam turns out to be a bit warmer than we expected. I went out and got a sweat shirt so I wouldn’t be cold at the concert – but never had to put it on. We got to the concert area about 2 pm – David likes to go early and we sat out in front of the venue with others who hoped to get a spot close to the stage. The nice thing about the venue is there is a restaurant near the entrance, bathrooms and the ticketbooth for upcoming concerts. When we walked into the area we noticed that there were tickets still available for the next nights performance which was REM – someone we enjoyed for most of the eighties and much like Springsteen we let drift away musically, but we had recently purchased their new cd and wanted to hear them and since we were in Amsterdam and there were tickets available – why not? While sitting outside the venue we talked to people, and enjoyed the sun and listened to Radiohead doing their sound check.

When they did finally open the gates we were pretty warm – the sun had been beating down on us all day, but it was well worth it – we got into the pit area and fairly close to the stage. Unfortunately there were these three morons who decided that they should sit in front of us and smoke pot the entire show like it was going to disappear. Their annoying smoke was irritating yet the over indulgence was the most exasperating – they used so much of the stuff – they all fell to the ground at some point in the show and were oblivious to the great music that was going on in front of them.

The music was great though and I am so glad that David was able to capture some parts of the show.

The next day we came back for the REM concert and although less crowded than the night before – these guys really put on a great show and declared that if it rained they would owe everyone a kiss but it did not come to pass – instead we had a brisk evening air filled with great music from a great band.