And we are off again! After a couple of months break from work, taking a much needed breather for my personal life, I’m back on the road for the final 6 weeks of tour season. This set will have me seeing some very exotic places, starting with Turkey, but first, a flight layover.

Getting to Turkey should be easy, but for some reason, Delta/Skyteam has only one rather unfortunate option—fly to CDG arriving at 8am and fly to Istanbul at 11:00 later that evening. A 16 hour flight layover would normally be a deal breaker, but we decided that it could actually be a feature rather than a flaw. So, we took a lightning day trip in to Paris.

CDG airport used to be a pain to get to, mostly connected by buses. Recently, though, they’ve connected the RER rail lines to the new Terminal 2. Taking the train into town is a snap, leaving you in under an hour at Gare du Nord for about $10 a person.

I bought round trip tickets, and dropped my bag at the Sheraton—a perk because my travel companion has frequent traveler status with Sheraton.

We came into town and did a loop of all time favorites—checking in on the progress at Notre Dame, buying books at Shakespeare and Co, Cluny Museum to visit the Lady and her Unicorns, lunch at Rue Cler, Eiffel Tower, and then coffee with my friend Julian Brown. A perfect little bite of all of my favorite things in Paris.

Back on the RER, it’s an easy ride even if I’m exhausted. The weather has certainly turned here in France, it’s chilly and autumnal.

From Paris, we will continue late tonight to Istanbul for a couple of days. I haven’t been there in a decade, so am very pleased to see it again.