Taylor hasn’t had the opportunity to travel very much in his life so far. Prior to his trip to France, the only experience he had being out of the U.S. was a trip to Canada in middle school. His flight to Paris was the first time he ever took a plane by himself, so to say he was nervous is a bit of an understatement.
"I hated flying because it's just so crowded," he said. "It was so nerve-wracking – I mean humans are meant to be on the ground ... it’s just unnatural to fly.”
To Taylor's dismay, he experienced the same lack of personal space on French soil as he did thousands of miles up in the air.
We did the typical tourist things together: took a boat ride down the Seine, went to the Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame, the Arc de Triomphe, Moulin Rouge and the Louvre. We also made a sincere attempt to go to the Catacombs, but we didn’t have enough time.
Taylor chose to write the date we visited the bridge on our lock the way the French do (day / month / year), which is something he's become fond of. Since his visit, he also started going strictly by military time. But that's not all he's adopted since his trip to Paris. He now loves putting hard-boiled eggs on his sandwiches and has a new found appreciation for French bread.
"The bread was really, really good," Taylor said. "It’s crunchy, but not break your teeth crunchy. It’s more like scrape your mouth crunchy, which I like."
After his stay in France, Taylor realized how much work traveling is, but said he looks forward to doing it again. Next on his list of countries to visit: Germany.