It pretty much took two days from start to finish. Laura left Vancouver at 7:20 am and we went to sleep the following night at 10 pm, local time. Here’s what happened. 

We left Toronto and arrived in Paris. Did not realize that Air France does not do announcements. Some nice lady came out and nodded and 200 people boarded cattle style. Jesus. Off we go. 

Our seat mate was a nice man named Jim. Between he and Laura the first 4 hours blew by. While everyone else slept we had a great time. 

We wizzed past the nice smelling shops at CDG and straight to our terminal area waiting place for 4 hrs then again, a nice lady nodded and off we went on the next leg. I did notice that shiny pants are all the rage in Paris. Not satin shiny, but more like oil cloth shiny. This we will see in oh, say, 2 years. Its coming so be prepared for the shiny pants trend. In my experience, shiny pants means slippery pants and slippery pants and bar stools do not go well together. Get a firm hold of drink because it is NOT acceptable to spill on your way down. But I digress. 

The most notable thing about the Paris to Casa route was two things. Everyone on the plane was a damn Yanky. The LEAST exotic thing that can happen on your way to Casablanca is to feel like you are on a Washington to New York commuter….The other most notable was that when we landed on the upper most sliver of Africa to humid high temperatures, the people next to me got their parkas on. Fur lined hood parkas. Seriously. 

Then we hit the distracted passport agent. He stamped my passport then sent a text, made a callm talked to his buddy, and 4 minutes later I was allowed through. Only notable because two couples ahead of me …”he” went through and both “she’s” waited a looonnngg time. Ladies, you are in a Muslim country. Take note. 

Immediatetly through the gate, Laura walked right up to a very handsome guard, and in her best “I’m not even going to pretend I speak French” french, she said….” OOOO, EH, LAH, GARE”. Handsome pants laughed. Out loud. Right in her face. It was very endearing and super funny. Really. FUNNY. Then I remembered suddenly that I was getting the giant suitcase and maybe la Gare was not the way, if we could just get a taxi. So I said….PPPSSSSTTT, Ixney on the Gare-ey…..because pig latin is always a good substitute for any language. 

We went downstairs and bought dataplans for the whole month,  got new SIM cards, international texting, 6 hrs of calls and 3G of data for 30 days for 150 dh. About $20. Because Canada is the ONLY NATION ON EARTH that pays real money for data service. ggrrrrrrrrrrr. I hate you Rogers and Bell. 

Then we moved on to the ground transportation portion of our journey.