My First Tour

Finally the day came for my first tour... I woke up early that morning (mostly because I kept dreaming about French history), so I just decided it was best just to get up and go. Rode my bike into work (its only about 15 minutes if I don't get lost... not too bad). Finally got there and started getting ready... now my #1 fear at the moment is that I'm going to get a flat tire and not know how to change it and I'll have to run the bike 6 miles. I may have been able to do that last semester, but those days are long gone.

So then it was time to head out to the tower to pick up my group. Thankfully it was only 10 people... to make a long story short, it went amazing!! I could not have asked for a better first tour. They were nice and fun and loved me :-D In fact, about half of them came back and did another tour because they had so much fun!

Now, tour #2 was that same day - the night segway.

A word about Segways: they are awesome - but they are extremely nerve wracking on the tour guide. We have a profile of those who are good and bad on Segways.

• Good: under 30, active, skiers
• Bad: over 50, overweight, mothers

My first segway tour was 7 over-50 men and women. So automatically, I'm freaking out. Then we started about 30 minutes late because some of the group hadn't shown up yet. THEN as I'm training them, I think about 5 of them almost fall. It was terrrible... I think my hair is going grey. So finally, we start off - and its awesome. By the end of it, they were talking about how they were all going to lock me in the bathroom and steal the segways. Hilarious.

Oh... and we got to see the Eiffel Tower sparkle twice. :-D

So all in all, my first day of tours went fabulously despite the small mishaps at the beginning with the Segways. At the moment, I've done 5 (in 3 days), and I have 2 more tomorrow. I already feel so much more comfortable with the info and more importantly getting around Paris (although I still get lost going home).

A little note to the VC: As I got done with my first tour, I started thinking about my first tour at TAMU. My favorite comment I got the first week was from that little short overenthusiastic guy from Financial Aid who asked, "Are you new?" Thankfully - no one's called me out yet, and I am sticking to my story that I've been doing this for a few summers now.

PS: Rick Steves went on one of our tours yesterday. He is my hero.