Last fall my mom declared: I'm XY years old and I've never been to Paris and we need to change that! Challenge accepted mom! (Not sure mom wants me to post her age to the world!)

She wanted to go in the Spring of 2023 but I wanted to follow my mantra "why postpone joy" and convinced her this fall would be better (It wasn't a hard discussion).

Travel advisor Mando got to work. I've found us great flights to Paris using Flying Blue miles (Air France) transferred from a variety of credit card sources. I'm not in love with our flights back but I have 90 days to figure that out. This year is the hardest I can remember to get great flights for low points but I just check regularly. We have something that will work booked, but I am hoping for something amazing!

Mom had some specific requests: Paris, Normandy, Lyon and the Riviera. As part of my ongoing training with my host agency (Uniglobe) I learned about AmaWaterways, a river cruise that sails from Lyon to Avignon, the timing was perfect and we're both excited to try our first river cruise.

In the end we're Flying AirFrance to Paris, then 4 nights in Paris, 2 nights in Normandy, 2 nights in a Chateau in the Loire valley, a one week river cruise, and 2 nights in Nice. After the trip I'll share some of the places we stayed, but for now I'm very excited to have our plan in place, even if it changes a little. Now we just need brush up on our French and keep dreaming of crepes and Champagne!