Jerry and Dorothy Peterson spent a full day touring Paris Friday and then went to sleep in anticipation of an early morning return trip on their way home to Baxter.
By 1:30 a.m. in Paris, Dorothy Peterson's iPhone was filling up with anxious messages. Friends and family tried to call. No luck. They sent unanswered texts and messages. Still no response. Finally a message via Facebook made it through as Dorothy Peterson woke and happened to check her phone.
Here in Baxter, Peterson's daughter Darcy Walkowiak was among the growing number of worried family members.
The Petersons were staying in the heart of Paris at the Mercure Paris Centre Eiffel Tower Hotel. Friday's terror attacks were about 4 miles away from their location, five minutes from the famed Eiffel Tower.
Walkowiak received messages from her parents seven hours earlier in the day as they toured the Eiffel Tower and the gardens at Versailles. The Petersons, both retired, had been in Europe for more than a week and in Paris for the last two days. It's their first time in France's City of Light.
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Walkowiak was keeping in touch with her parents via emails. They were watching an English-language TV channel to keep up with the violence swirling around them. The concert hall where so many died is about 20 minutes east of the Mercure Paris Centre Eiffel Tower Hotel.
It was Walkowiak's aunt, who was supposed to make the trip but wasn't able to go, who first contacted her with the news of the terror attacks in Paris. Together, they tried to reach the Petersons.
"Thankfully we were able to track them with their iPhone," Walkowiak said. They set up the app before her parents left for Europe. The tracker let them know the phone was in the hotel.
"I was pretty confident she was in the hotel with her phone," Walkowiak said.
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Read More: Baxter couple returns safely from Paris (click to read)
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She said her mother doesn't go anywhere without her phone so she thought her parents must be in the hotel as well, which wasn't noted as one of the spots for the terror attacks. The question before the Petersons as they watched the news in their Paris hotel was whether they'd be able to fly home Saturday.
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Paris was the last stop on their tour of European cities - London, Brussels, Amsterdam, Heidelberg, and Lucern.
Walkowiak was helped when the news broke of bombs and shootings in Paris by having her parents itinerary close at hand.
"Hopefully, they'll be able to fly out in the morning," Walkowiak said. "I'm praying they can get out safely and get home uneventfully."
RENEE RICHARDSON, associate editor, may be reached at 218-855-5852 or renee.richardson@brainerddispatch.com . Follow on Twitter at www.twitter.com/Dispatchbizbuzz .
