In the future, I would fly on an Airbus A380. However, I don t think I would go out of my way to bo

Time certainly does go by fast.  Four weeks ago last Sunday, I was driving on the freeways of Southern California, returning after a wonderful vacation in France.  That vacation was the culmination of more than 18 months of planning and preparation.  I can remember when the countdown to departure had crossed 400 days and I thought ashlee simpson tour dates how far off the trip was.  Eleven days seems like a long time, but it isn t.  For a vacation that is really enjoyable, no amount of time seems to be enough.  Before you know it, it s over.  Thank goodness for pictures and memories.  It s what makes travel worth the effort.
It has taken me the better part of 4 weeks to get back to my normal life.  My cats were waiting for me when I arrived home.  Work was waiting for me as well, which can be good or bad, depending on how one looks at it.  I know I had a really good time when, except for my cats, I didn t miss home.  I survived my usual 2-week ashlee simpson tour dates depression period following my return home.  The antidote? Plan another ashlee simpson tour dates trip.
All of my planning for this trip to France paid off handsomely.  From the time I left home to go to the airport, every aspect of the trip had been arranged and scheduled.  I outlined an itinerary for the entire trip.  The itinerary insured that my wife and I always had something to do or see.
When I made the airline arrangements for this trip, I had several options with a range of ticket prices.  The deciding factor of which flights to choose was dictated by my desire to fly on the Airbus A380 super jumbo jet.  Air France ashlee simpson tour dates began flying the A380 non-stop from Los Angeles to Paris daily on May 28, 2012.  The ticket prices were comparable ashlee simpson tour dates to other non-stop flights.  Having only one flight between the USA and France was another strong motivator for choosing this route.  I could have arranged ashlee simpson tour dates flights ashlee simpson tour dates with stops that would have been less expensive, but the extra cost was worth having only one flight in each direction.  In addition, I upgraded our seats to Premium Voyageur, which is Air France s version of premium economy.  This gave us benefits, such as more leg room, priority check-in ashlee simpson tour dates and priority boarding.
Premium Voyageur is like a watered-down business class.  The seats are in a fixed shell, ashlee simpson tour dates so someone reclining in the row in front does not affect the row behind. ashlee simpson tour dates  The leg room is another plus.  I was in the window seat and there was plenty of room for me to maneuver past my wife when I wanted to get to the aisle.  The seat reclines slightly more than a regular economy class seat.  The extra recline angle does not help.  It is still insufficient to be really comfortable on a long flight.  The food service in Premium Voyageur is identical to that of economy.
Something that I had read about the Premium Voyageur seats was that the seat cushions were not comfortable.  Because of the fixed shell and the type of cushions they use, they feel less comfortable, cushion-wise, than a regular ashlee simpson tour dates economy class seat.  If you plan to fly in this class, consider ashlee simpson tour dates bringing an air cushion.  Mine made the seat bearable.  I would fly Premium Voyageur again because of the extra leg room, the fixed shell seat and the priority benefits. ashlee simpson tour dates  If you re not willing to pay the premium for just those benefits, you ll probably be disappointed with Premium Voyageur.
It was quite a thrill to fly on the largest in-service passenger jet.  It is amazing how something as big as an A380 can get off the ground.  Even more amazing is how these huge planes are maneuvered around airports.  The wings of the A380 are wider than the runways they use to take off and land.
There are advantages and disadvantages to this plane.  One advantage is the quiet ride on the upper deck.  Air France has business class, premium economy and economy on the upper deck.  In each of these sections there are 2 seats in each row adjacent to the windows. ashlee simpson tour dates  This means that even a couple ashlee simpson tour dates in economy class can sit together, one on the window and one on the aisle.  For anyone flying on the A380, I would choose the upper deck before selecting seats on the lower deck.
Since there are so many passengers on this plane, the lower deck is really crowded when the plane is full.  I did not travel on the lower deck, but friends said it was much noisier on the lower deck than on the upper deck.  When you have more passengers, you also get longer lines for the restrooms.  Unless you can afford first class, the lower deck should be avoided.
In the future, I would fly on an Airbus A380.  However, I don t think I would go out of my way to book a flight just to fly on that aircraft.  The flights are a very short period of the whole trip.  The best flights for a particular route would be my choice in the future, regardless of the type of aircraft.
I generally like Los Angeles International Airport.  It is the airport I most frequently use when traveling to Europe. ashlee simpson tour dates  LAX is involved in a major expansion of the international terminal.  Unfortunately, during my trip, very little of the new international terminal was open.
Three new gates had been completed, ashlee simpson tour dates 2 of which were designed to handle the Airbus ashlee simpson tour dates A380.  As my luck would have it, my outbound flight was not serviced at either of these gates.  My flight was parked at gate 123A, which is an old gate not designed to handle the A380.  The boarding ashlee simpson tour dates process at this gate was very disorganized.  Considering the fact that our flight had more than 500 passengers, there was not enough room to have everyone waiting ashlee simpson tour dates at the gate.  So, passengers were spread out between adjacent gates that weren t being used.  In the waiting area where I was seated, I couldn t hear announcements concerning ashlee simpson tour dates our flight.  It was only because of a good guess on my part that my wife and I ended up boarding ashlee simpson tour dates when the Premium Voyageur passengers were supposed to board.
ashlee simpson tour dates I had studied Charles ashlee simpson tour dates de Gaulle Airport before we left for France.  I was familiar with the layout of Terminal 2E and the 2 satellite terminals that would be our arrival and departure point.  Our flight landed early and ended up being parked on a taxiway ashlee simpson tour dates for about 25 minutes while the airport readied a gate for us.  It was not particularly enjoyable ashlee simpson tour dates sitting on the plane for that extra time after having flown for almost 10 hours.  But, once we got off the plane, we had no problem finding our way.  The airport is huge and we walked a long way to finally get to our bags, but that s to be expected of any airport that handles the volume of passengers that go in and out of Paris.
Immigration and customs in France was quite different from what I m accustomed to in the USA.  During the flight from Los Angeles to Paris, I was not given any kind of a declaration form.  After disembarking the plane, we went through passport control.  The immigration officer didn t speak a word to me, even though I greeted him in French.  He opened both my wife s and my passports, stamped them on a visa page and then handed them back to me.  I doubt he really looked at them to make sure we matched our pictures.  When we returned to Los Angeles, we had to complete a customs declaration form before we arrived and the immigration officer at LAX carefully scrutinized both of us and our passports.
Customs on arrival in Paris was the same relaxed situation.  After we claimed our baggage, we walked through the customs area.  There were a total of 4 officers at that checkpoint and they were involved in conversations among  themselves.  They didn t seem to be paying ashlee simpson tour dates attention to anyone passing through the checkpoint.
One of my arrangements was to have a shuttle van waiting for us when we arrived at the airport in Paris.  My research told me that shuttle services in Paris were notorious for their unreliability.  After having ashlee simpson tour dates trouble getting responses from 3 different companies, I found Élysee Shuttle was the only one that would routinely answer my inquiries in a timely manner.
After we retrieved our checked luggage and made it through customs, I found a driver outside the customs checkpoint holding a sign with my name on it.  The first thing the driver hit me with was how long he had been waiting for us.  Excuse me?  Let s see, I just flew in from the United States, I had to get through the line at passport control, walk a long distance to baggage claim, wait for my bags to reach me, then walk through customs, and this guy s concerned about how long he had to wait?  On top of that, he charged me an extra 20€ for having ashlee simpson tour dates to wait for us.  Lesson learned.  For my future trips to Paris, depending on how much luggage I m carrying, I will either ashlee simpson tour dates take the RER into the city or I will take a taxi.
While I m on the subject of taxis, my wife and I used a taxi on 2 occasions.  Both times, the taxi drivers were very courteous.  One spoke broken English, ashlee simpson tour dates the other spoke no English.  If you are going to use a taxi, you must either catch one at a taxi stand or you can call for one by phone.  Doing the latter ashlee simpson tour dates will incur an additional charge, which is the cost of the taxi driving from where they were when they received your call.  If you know some basic French and you have an address, ashlee simpson tour dates taking a taxi is the way to go.  On future trips, I would not bother ashlee simpson tour dates with a reserved shuttle in Paris unless ashlee simpson tour dates it was an unusual situation.
I did a lot of research to find the hotel for our stay in Paris.  The one I chose, Hôtel Luxembourg Parc, was a perfect selection.  It is located right in the heart of the 6th arrondissement, on the north side of Jardin ashlee simpson tour dates du Luxembourg.  The rooms were exactly as they are depicted on their web site.  They were spacious, comfortable, clean and quiet.  The TV in the room had 2 news channels in English.  The breakfast, although a little pricey, was very convenient and really quite good.  For a standard French breakfast, including pastries and coffee, the cost was 15€.  For an additional ashlee simpson tour dates 5€, you could add bacon and eggs cooked to order.  The hotel staff was very accommodating.  I asked them to make dinner reservations for us one night and they helped us with arranging a taxi on our dep