Episode 92: The France Recap

Solo travel isn't just about the places you visit—it's about who you become along the way. My journey through France began as a work trip to the luxurious Champagne region and evolved into a personal pilgrimage back to Paris where my travel business dreams first took shape.

The adventure started with conquering my fear of driving in Europe. Navigating the chaotic roundabouts of Charles de Gaulle airport tested my New York driving skills, but once on the open road to Champagne, everything changed. The countryside revealed itself in sweeping vistas that made every kilometer worthwhile. In Champagne, I experienced the exclusive Dom Perignon cellars—a rare tour not available to the general public—where champagne bottles balanced precariously on corks in underground chambers that whispered centuries of history. The family-run Champagne Augustine Vineyard showed me how deeply connected these vintners are to their land and craft, creating an experience that transcended mere wine tasting.

When I returned to Paris, it felt like coming full circle. In 2019, I sat at a café table and announced my dream of starting One Girl Travel to fellow retreat participants. Now I was back as its full-time owner. I packed my days with unique experiences: dining at Madame Brasserie on the Eiffel Tower as lights twinkled across the city, attending the Nouvelle Eve cabaret where the performances dazzled and champagne flowed freely, getting professional photos taken through affordable Airbnb Experiences, and touring the city in a lime-green vintage Citroen convertible. Even my final day at Disneyland Paris (complete with dining at the world's only Ratatouille restaurant) brought unexpected joy.

Travel teaches us that life doesn't pause while we're away. I returned home to a leaking ceiling and my 99-year-old grandmother's fall—stark reminders that adventure and responsibility often compete for our attention. Yet this is precisely why travel matters. It strengthens us for life's inevitable challenges and reminds us that we're capable of navigating unfamiliar terrain, both abroad and at home.

Ready to elevate your own travel content? Grab my free Creator Toolkit with all the apps and software I use, or let's connect about how I can help make your brand visible to the world through my 12-week consulting program. Your travel story deserves to be told.

Get your copy of the Creator Toolkit here: https://alessialisa.com/creatortoolkit

Read the Blog: https://alessialisa.com/2025/06/26/solo-travel-in-france/

Watch on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLTP4RgPbRQ

If you enjoyed this episode of the One Girl Travel Podcast, then I invite you to follow me on Instagram. That's where all the fun is happening! @ONE_GIRL_TRAVEL

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Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to One Girl Travel Podcast
• 4:03 Balancing Travel and Life Challenges
• 10:43 Driving Adventures in Champagne
• 20:30 Luxury Experiences in Champagne

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:04

Welcome to the One Girl Travel Podcast, your passport to the world of solo travel with certified life and travel coach, alessia Tenebruso. Join Alessia as she shares her own journey of self-discovery through solo travel, while also focusing on topics such as life coaching insights and travel tips along the way. Now here's your host, alessia.

Speaker 2: 0:26

Tenebruso. Welcome friends, to episode number 92 of the One Girl Travel Podcast. It's been a while, I know I went to France. That's the thing with travel, right? You prepare, you spend months planning, you go on the trip. You're getting everything you need from that trip. For me, this was a work trip. I was attending the Luxury and Business Retreats Champagne France Retreat, where I attended as an attendee while also creating their social media for them, and I also extended the trip for myself to spend a few days in Paris, and it was incredible.

Speaker 2: 1:12

I have over 2000 pieces of content in my phone that I am ready to share with all of you. But returning home from that trip, I come home. I have a ceiling that's leaking from my upstairs bathtub, my grandma, who's 99, who I helped take care of she had a fall and got injured. So it's just like you come home and you're back to your regular scheduled events, plus some extra things that you didn't plan for, and that's the thing. It's okay. It's okay to take your time doing the things that you want to do, because sometimes you have to prioritize the things you have to do, and for me that's taking care of my home, taking care of my family, and then, once that's taken care of, it's time for the fun stuff, for the content and also the business that you don't see is getting done behind the scenes too. And I love doing this podcast. I truly do love it. But sometimes it takes a backseat and I apologize for that, because I do want to be more consistent with you with this podcast.

Speaker 2: 2:22

But if you're considering a podcast, consistent with you with this podcast, but if you're considering a podcast, I understand how important it is to be consistent with the podcast. You want your community to know that they can depend on you to show up at a particular day and time each week. But sometimes it doesn't happen. When you are doing everything by yourself, when you are a solopreneur like everything about your business is on you, and sometimes, when you're taking on too much, things have to go on the backseat and that's okay. But if you have that desire to start something, start anyway anyway. Let it be messy, let it be inconsistent, but just start flexing that muscle. So then, when you are ready to be consistent, you're prepared and you've started already. And that's just my take on it. I know that some people might not agree with me. I know a lot of people will say you need to be consistent, you need to do things exactly the same way every week. I don't believe that. I believe life is messy. I believe things come up and sometimes you just can't show up for certain things, and to beat yourself up about it just prevents you from doing it. As you can see, I again I have been delayed with recording for a while, but I'm here now, so that's all that matters.

Speaker 2: 3:47

And now I want to tell you about my trip to France, because I know how much you all love France. First, let's start with Champagne. This was my first time going to Champagne, france. I rented a car for the first time in Europe. Yay, like it's about time, right.

Speaker 2: 4:04

But honestly, I felt intimidated by renting a car because I didn't know what to expect. I have never driven a car in Europe before. Thankfully, in France they drive on the right side of the road, so just like in America, so that was very easy. But things to consider when you're renting a car in France is that most of the cars are electric vehicles, so you need to know if your accommodation have access to the electric charging stations. Where I stayed for my retreat they did not, so I had to make sure that I got a hybrid vehicle. Also, a lot of the cars are manual, so if you don't know how to drive a stick shift, you need to get an automatic car. So those are two things I had to think about before I rented a car. Also, never realize this. There are so many roundabouts in France, so I think we hit about 20 going out to Champagne and it felt like 10 of them were just in the Charles de Gaulle airport. So expect roundabouts, maybe practice that before you go. I do recommend you're more of an aggressive driver, especially in Charles de Gaulle airport.

Speaker 2: 5:15

That was a crazy experience. I'm from New York, I'm used to traffic, I'm used to crazy drivers. Charles de Gaulle was an absolute disaster in my opinion. The way home, returning the rental car at the airport took about an hour just to return the car because it was an accident. Very confusing airport. So keep that in mind if you are planning on renting a car at Charles de Gaulle. Just expect chaos. Learn how to read some of the simple signs, know what exit is, know. Just maybe map it out before you even get there, just to be familiar with the layout of the airport, because it was very confusing and I am a confident driver, but it was a lot.

Speaker 2: 6:00

Honestly, though, I'm so glad we got the rental car. It was very easy. It was a beautiful drive also, so driving was no problem, very easy drive from Paris to Champagne, to the retreat house. It was so scenic, so green and beautiful and relaxing. I honestly enjoyed the drive. It took about two hours from Charles de Gaulle to our retreat house, which wasn't bad at all, and then that way we had a car if we wanted to leave the retreat house. But honestly, we really didn't use it very much, but it was still nice to have the ability to drive.

Speaker 2: 6:40

I am very much an Uber person, but I think after this experience I will consider renting a car for more remote destinations. I don't recommend it. If you're going into the city, you do not need a rental car. If you're going from Charles de Gaulle to Paris, just get an Uber. Also, something to note that I happened to be affected by was the taxi strike was happening when I was returning from Champagne to Paris. It affected the traffic, it affected the prices, the wait time. So keep that in mind also, and I do recommend ordering your Ubers in advance whenever you can.

Speaker 2: 7:21

But champagne Let me go back to champagne now. Champagne if you are a wine drinker, a champagne lover, you need to go to champagne. I will post the information about where I stayed. It is somewhere that you can rent with your family, with a lot of people. If you're hosting a retreat, it's a great space. But, oh my goodness, the experiences we had there luxury and business retreats. Um erin, she is the owner and she was the retreat host. She curated such an amazing retreat for all of us. The experiences were just five-star luxury experiences.

Speaker 2: 8:05

Like we, we went to the Dom Perignon Cellar Tour, which is not an advertised experience. We had a connection that got us in there and we toured the Dom Perignon Cellars and I've never experienced anything like that. It felt so special being down in those cellars and seeing all of the champagne. You wouldn't believe it. Like we weren't supposed to take videos. Of course I took videos. I will be sharing more of them, but if you're, if you're listening to this on YouTube, I will put in clips of the experience so you can actually see what I'm talking about. If you're listening on the podcast, go check out my YouTube channel. It's one girl travel and you can see it all there. But they had the champagne bottles just balanced on the cork. It was crazy, these towers of champagne. They were just balanced on top of each other with no framework. It was just amazing and we toured through all these cellars which just had so much history and you can feel how special it was. And then we got to do two tastings of Dom Perignon and it was just exhilarating it, just the energy that we all felt while we were there. It was just so incredible and it was a bucket list experience for us and yeah, so if you can get into the Dom Perignon Cellars, highly recommend it. It was an experience like I've never experienced before.

Speaker 2: 9:38

We also went to a local champagne house. It's called Champagne Augustine Vineyard. This is a family-run business. They are just so in tuned with their products, with their champagne, with nature, with their vineyard, the vines, every detail they have considered, and they are just so intuitive for what their grapes require, their soil, and it's hard to explain unless you do a tour yourself. Highly recommend going there and doing a tour, do a tasting. I brought home a few bottles of their champagne. It was fabulous. It is so cool seeing how these families operate their businesses and operate them so differently from each other, but it was an incredible experience. Again, that champagne house is called Champagne Augustine. Definitely recommend checking them out.

Speaker 2: 10:38

Now, when my time with the retreat was over, I decided to extend my trip to spend some time in Paris. If you don't know, paris is actually where I had my epiphany for One Girl Travel in 2019, while I was on a retreat with my mentor, and it was just such a full circle moment, returning to the place where I dreamed of this business and I announced it to the other women at the table with me in Paris in 2019. And now I'm returning as the full-time business, owner of One Girl Travel, of this idea I had and it felt so special being back and I had such a great time. I planned. I am a planner. If you saw what I created, if you saw what I created, I personally I use Trello. It is a free app. It's T-R-E-L-L-O. I use Trello to organize when I am traveling, when I am shooting content. It is just how my brain works and if you're interested in seeing it, I will show you. I'm actually considering hosting a workshop on it because I think it's such a useful tool.

Speaker 2: 11:53

But when I was in Paris, I did some amazing experiences that I want to share with you because I want you to maybe put it on your bucket list of things to do, because these were really unique and fun experiences. First, I stayed at Hotel Chouchou. It was a very fun hotel, very like my vibe. It's boutique-y, it's unique, it's fun, very cool hotel. It was in the 9th arrondissement. I really would recommend it. The rooms are very small so I was able to find a room for one person. Now, this room was tiny, like getting in the bathroom. Bathroom. I like just fit in between the sink and the wall. But I think it's part of the charm. Europe hotels aren't always the biggest, but I loved Hotel Shushu. Definitely check them out. I have a blog post up about them that you can check out in the show notes.

Speaker 2: 12:44

But my first night that I arrived in Paris I went to Nouvelle Eve. It's a dinner and cabaret show. It is a sister company of the famous Moulin Rouge. I could not get into Moulin Rouge except for the 11 pm show. I'm sorry that's too late for me. I want to be winding down by 11 pm, not just getting started. So I found the Nouvelle Eve dinner and show. It started at, I believe, 8 pm. It was great. I thought the food was excellent. They had a great menu. I had a wonderful seat. They gave me champagne. I had two bottles of wine at my table. It was amazing. That was just the meal and the show was fabulous. I did attend Crazy Horse the last time in 2019, which was a very fun cabaret a little more risque than what I've heard about Moulin Rouge, but I thought the Nouvelle Eve show was for everybody. They had male performers. They had male performers. They had female performers. They were sexy, but it wasn't as risque as the Crazy Horse. It was very entertaining. Highly recommend checking that out if you're looking for a unique cabaret experience. Very fun.

Speaker 2: 14:03

I also used Airbnb experiences for the first time because I was looking for a photographer. I you know me. I love getting professional photos done when I'm traveling and I'm like let me check out Airbnb experiences, let me see what local you know talented people are offering, and I found this photographer. She's amazing. I can link her information in the show notes also for you, but her prices it was so inexpensive. I believe it was like 80 euros for a photo shoot. It was a 90-minute photo shoot and we shot for one and a half hours. She took videos and photos for me. Her name was Julia and it was so much fun. We had a great time and before I even went on my first photo shoot, I booked a second photo shoot for the next day. So I'm like it's so inexpensive why not? Usually I pay around 400 euros for a professional photo shoot when I'm traveling, so I thought it was well worth the money and it was such a great experience.

Speaker 2: 15:07

I highly, highly, highly recommend checking out Airbnb experiences. They had so many things to offer. I didn't have enough time to do it all. I wish I did, but I had two photo shoots I booked through Airbnb experiences and I booked a vintage car tour.

Speaker 2: 15:21

Now, this vintage car, it was a lime green, vintage Citroen. I'm definitely not pronouncing it right, but it looks like one of those little beetles. But it's convertible and my host's name was Clem. He was the sweetest guy and he picked me up in this lime green car and it was such a vibe and we just drove around, we toured, he took photos of me, shot a few videos which is, you know, right up my alley and we just got to explore Paris from such a unique perspective and in 2019, I've done the Paris Retro Tour, which was a motorcycle sidecar tour, which was very cool experience Also definitely recommend checking them out.

Speaker 2: 16:05

But I was looking for vintage car tours and they were pretty expensive. And then I found Clem on Airbnb experiences and the price was a little cheaper and I saw in the reviews that he would take photos also, which was usually an extra charge from the bigger brands that were hosting these vintage car tours. So I'm like, let me try him out. So glad I did. He was amazing. I had so much fun with him. So I did that, also from Airbnb experiences.

Speaker 2: 16:35

And then another thing I did that was not through Airbnb experiences, but my best friend for my 40th birthday. She purchased a gift card from this app called Tingly and what those are. They're bucket list gift cards, so you give it to somebody and they can exchange their gift card for the value you gave it as, and they can exchange it for experiences all over the world. And so I was looking up different experiences that they offered and I saw that they had dinner at the Eiffel Tower and I really wanted to do that anyway. So I booked my Madame Brasserie dinner experience. That is on the first floor of the Eiffel Tower, which was such a cool experience going up on the Eiffel Tower and you got to like tour around for a while waiting for your seat to get ready and it was so cool, like you're just looking down at Paris and you're seeing it from such unique perspective.

Speaker 2: 17:40

Highly recommend, even if you don't want to have the dinner, just go and go up on the Eiffel Tower. I didn't go to the top, I just went to the first floor and I thought that was good enough. I thought that was perfect. I got great views, very, very cool. The dinner at Madame Brasserie it was okay, it was fine. I didn't think it was that special. Honestly, you'd probably get a better meal from, like a sidewalk cafe in Paris. But it wasn't about the food, it was about eating at the Eiffel Tower, while the Eiffel Tower is just glistening and beautiful and it was just a really great experience. So I did hear that the restaurant on the second floor, which is a Michelin rated restaurant, is better, that it's actually very good. I did not experience that no-transcript it was. It was a nice experience. The food was not amazing, it was nice, but it was more about the overall experience, which I would give like a 10 out of 10. That was amazing, so that is something that you can add to your list of things to check out.

Speaker 2: 18:49

A place that I returned to while I was in Paris was the Okari Spa. It is a Turkish hammam and it's female only the one I went to and it is a unique experience. It is not one of those like super relaxing spa experiences, because you're going into first of all. You're going to the spa. They give you a piece of paper thong, like, with some string on the side and they're like here put this on. The first time I went, everybody was in that. This time I went, people were in their bathing suits too, so keep that in mind. If you do want to go to a Kari, to a Turkish hamam, bring your bathing suit, because they will allow you to wear it. So I ended up I didn't bring my bathing suit and I had the paper thong on and it was not comfortable at all. So I just like put panties on and called it a day.

Speaker 2: 19:45

But you're going into a sauna first and it's hot in there. You're like they want you to sweat it all out. Then they scrub you down with charcoal soap and they have multiple packages. I booked a two and a half hour package. They exfoliate your skin. You walk out of there like a new person, like you don't have any old skin on you. After that they scrub you down, they make you feel like new. I did get a massage too. It is such a unique and I will say it was relaxing. But it's also just like a revitalizing experience because you are just you know, getting all the travel scrubbed off of you and just you feel like you're walking out as a new person. So you can add that to your list and I will put this whole list of my itinerary in the show notes also to make it easier for you.

Speaker 2: 20:39

But finally, the last unique thing I did on my Paris trip I went to Disneyland Paris. Now, I am not a Disney person, but I really enjoy amusement parks. I can appreciate Disneyland and Disney World. I just don't have that emotional connection like other people who are really into it do. But I appreciate it and I wanted to do something on my last day of my trip where it required really no planning. I just wanted to show up, have fun, because I know if I was left to my own devices in Paris, I would just spend a ton of money shopping and I really didn't want to do that Like. I just wanted to go and have experiences on this trip and I went to Disneyland Paris.

Speaker 2: 21:24

They did offer a round trip shuttle that you can book with your Disneyland ticket and the shuttle has, I think, three or four stops in the city center of Paris and thankfully I was staying right by the opera house. It picked me up at the opera house, about a four-minute walk from my hotel. I think it was like 65 euros, let's say. Round trip Picked me up, brought me to Disneyland right in the morning. I decided to buy one of those fast passes that I can skip the lines. It literally went on every single ride I could with my fast pass plus some extras.

Speaker 2: 21:58

I dined at Chez Remy, which is the Ratatouille restaurant it's the only one in the world. Very fun. It was very nice to sit down in air conditioning, have a nice meal and break up the day a bit. You definitely book that in advance because they only had like one time slot. My time slot was at 445, which honestly, I thought was perfect because I ate like a light lunch earlier in the day and then I had um, I had like a late lunch, early dinner at Remy. But Disneyland Paris add that to your list of things to check out when you're there. It was very easy to get to. You can do a rental car, you can do the metro, you could Uber or you can do the shuttle, which I recommend the shuttle. It was so easy, so cheap. It was nice knowing that I had a way there and back. But Disneyland Paris was so much fun. I'm so glad I did that.

Speaker 2: 22:55

The last day of my trip. I was exhausted. I walked about 10 and a half miles that day. They have two parks. I toured both parks multiple times that day, so it is very easy to see everything in both parks in 24 hours. It was amazing.

Speaker 2: 23:14

It was such a great trip and that's why, like, I came home and I was so eager to get started on all the content and share everything with all of you and to do all my posts. But then you come home and your ceiling's leaking and you need a new bathtub and then my grandma falls, like it was just one thing after another. So I'm here now. I'm ready to share everything about the trip and more. There's so much more going on besides a trip, but I am actually getting ready for a few more trips coming up. I'll be going to Napa, california, with my sister next month. I'll be going to Vegas in August and then I'll be going to Sylvania in September with luxury and business retreats on my final retreat of the year. Very excited about that Never been to Sylvania, never even really thought about Sylvania. So if you have been there, please let me know your favorite things to do or stay. I would love suggestions from y'all, but I can't wait to take you with me on that journey.

Speaker 2: 24:21

And in the meantime, you know I'm talking about content a lot on this podcast episode, because that was really the theme of this trip. I was there to work, create content. I was creating content for my business and, as I do these experiences right, I'm doing them for me because I enjoy them and I love doing unique experiences, but also I'm creating content for One Girl Travel to share with all of you, to share all of these fun experiences so you get exposed to new things that maybe you didn't think about doing. So I really was focused on the content creation process for this trip. And if you already have a social media and you're ready to up-level it, or maybe you're considering starting a social media, a podcast, a blog, whatever. I do have my free creator toolkit that I created, where I share every app software and I added all the tools that I personally use to create content, and, again, it's free. So click the link in the bio in the show notes. You will get a copy of my creator toolkit.

Speaker 2: 25:31

Please reach out to me with any questions and, of course, if you are ready to go all in and creating your content and showing up online, making yourself visible with a website, a blog, a podcast, social media, I am the person that can help you get there. I love doing it. I love working with my clients to help them just make their brand visible to the world and to show up and feel confident about what they're putting out there. And I do offer one-on-one consulting. You can book a discovery call with me and we can talk about your needs and put something together where you will, you know, in 12 weeks, walk away with a fully functional website, social media, blog, podcast, whatever it is you need. We will get it done in 12 weeks, easy, all right. So thank you for tuning in. Stay tuned for more episodes to come. I promise I will be back soon and I can't wait to share more about everything that has been going on in the one girl travel world, in my world, and I will talk to you all soon. Have a great day.

Speaker 1: 26:36

Bye. Thanks so much for tuning in to this episode of the one girl travel podcast. If you're enjoying the show, please feel free to rate, subscribe and leave a review wherever you listen to your podcasts. You can find out more about your host on our website, one girl travelcom, or follow her on Instagram, facebook, pinterest and Tik TOK. Thanks again for tuning in and we'll catch you in the next episode.