Ever heard of the saying: “The calm before the storm?” Paris ended up being the polar opposite, more like storm before the calm.

I’m not really one for the whole Eiffel Tower cliche, but I really wanted to experience the art and architecture in Paris. After a long train ride to France from London, we certainly were not greeted by friendly locals and baskets of croissants. We barely set foot on French soil and we were immediately friendly manipulated by a taxi driver.

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After ten minutes stuck in traffic with a suspiciously friendly driver, he started looking very anxious. “Si la police demande de leur dire que le trajet est gratuit.” He kept repeating these words. His words barely had time to go cold, when a police woman was already opening the door of the taxi. Turns out our taxi driver was operating illegally and charged us 60 Euro for a trip which was only meant to be 14 Euro. We later found out that what he was trying to tell us was if the police comes, we must tell them that the ride was for free. Ever imagine having to write up a police statement in your first 20 minutes in a country? Neither did we.

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After having settled the whole police thing, our Paris dream could finally unfold.

Unfold into the next disaster!

You know the rom-com where it rains and someone is dramatically struggling with their luggage on the sidewalk (that was us). Waiting outside our AirBnB with the owner no where to be found. After a few hours of walking around with baggage in tow in the bustling streets of the rainy Paris nightlife we finally found a new hotel to stay while processing that we’ve just been scammed by the AirBnB host.

Barely spending twenty minutes in the hotel room the AirBnb host phoned us explaining that he was in a meeting the whole day and that the apartment was ready for us. So we left to go to the AirBnb we originally booked and no, the hotel did not give us a refund!

Either way we were meant to loose 60 Euro that day.

After walking up an old spiral staircase with soaking wet clothes we both fell down on the sofa and stared at the dinning table infront of us, a bottle of wine and some local desserts! What a beautiful calm after the storm.

ps: To the AirBnB host, thank you, that bottle of wine really made our day!

Bren