Paris Video!
September 3, 2006
We woke up this morning and walked to a nearby patisserie to get some breakfast. I got a little pastry that was basically a warm…pastry, with butter and sugar with more sugar. It was good…not mind blowing…but the bread was really fresh and different/French so it was good.
The weather was gray so instead of going to the Eiffel Tower to start we decided to go to Sacre-Coeur. This is a cathedral at the top of a hill in Paris. It was truly beautiful, it would have been more magnificent if the sun had been shining off its white roofs but it was still great. There were tons of steps leading up to it so we got a good work out on the way up. From there we walked around to a little artists district where they sold their art and offered to sketch your portrait. Some of the artist’s sketches were really good and it was fun to watch them do it. Then we headed down stairs and side streets trying to find the Moulin Rouge. This of course took us through the red light district of Paris…which wasn’t really sketch at all but just really decadent in a Vegas on steroids kind of way. It was fun to see the Moulin Rouge and the red light district was really an interesting experience but it was kind of like visiting Hollywood…which is kind of a let down from Notre Dame.
Then we went to see the Eiffel Tower, it was still gray but wasn’t really raining anymore. Since it was grey we decided to picnic beside and see if the sky would clear. We sat on the roots of a tree and made our sandwiched while the pigeons gathered. The Eiffel Tower was amazing. We had seen it from distance and it was awesome but up close it was so much more impressive. I was standing there thinking…”I’m in front of the Eiffel Tower…THIS IS AWESOME!” However it was still grey so we didn’t go up to any of the decks, swearing that we would return on our way back to London to experience it in the sun.
After the Eiffel we went to the Military Museum, which used to be a “hotel” veterans of the wars that France had fought. This blew my mind because it looked like a palace. It had a golden dome and gardens and art galore. However, I’m sure that the décor was redone when they decided it would also house Napoleon’s tomb. When we first arrived we had just wanted to see the golden dome but decided to see how much tickets were. They weren’t too expensive but we weren’t interested in anything else but Napoleon’s tomb (because beyond Napoleon are we really interested in France’s military endeavors? No.) So we were exhausted and were just sitting in front of the ticket booth resting. We sat there for a while and Michelle and Rose were falling asleep when the guy at the ticket counter asked if we had been to the museum yet. I said we hadn’t because we only wanted to see Napoleon he waived us over and gave us free tickets to the museum. We got to the exhibit and outside there was a sign that said “no free admittance to Napoleon’s Tomb.” Boo yah! The tomb and surrounding catacombs were really awesome.
After the tomb we headed out to look for dinner. It took us a while to find a place with good ambiance and affordable prices. Finally we did and got our table we had our onion soup (the “French” is left off since we’re in France…apparently) and our grilled sandwiches. The food was good but meals have just been amazing because the experience is so French and such a good time to look back on our day.
We sat at our table until the sun had almost gone down then we made our way back to the Eiffel Tower. Just as we were walking into the park in front of the tower it began its light show. And everything that I previously had said about the Eiffel Tower being awesome was out done. Suddenly my past experience with it paled and there before me was one of the most amazing things I have ever seen. I know I keep saying that but this trip has already been absolutely astounding. The Eiffel Tower at night is so much more beautiful than during the day and that experience alone out did everything else.
I can’t explain to you all how amazing this has been.
Paris Day 2: Venus is the Queenus
August 28, 2006
Today was an amazing day. I have never been so overwhelmed by beauty and happiness and just feelings of wonder. We started the on the metro heading to Notre Dame. But on the way we saw St. Michel’s fountain and St. Chapelle’s cathedral…and the police station, and this greenhouse, and this square, and a courthouse…and then NOTRE DAME! It was pretty amazing. There was so much beauty and grandeur in one place. It wasn’t as quiet as I most cathedrals are and it is super touristy now but at the same time it is really still amazing to think of how it must have been to visit this magnificent cathedral in times when you haven’t seen pictures of it in textbooks and seen it on TV. You were a peasant living in a poor village and you make the pilgrimage to the most amazing cathedral of all time. As amazing as it is, it had even more amazing then.
Oh yeah, and then as we were grabbing some crepes right next to Notre Dame Ben Stein walked by and made eye contact with me…I’m pretty sure he wanted me to get into his limo with him and then take his private spaceship to the top of the Eiffel Tower and party like it was 1999…but I said no with my eyes.
From there we took the metro over to the Louvre. Where yet again someone decided to give me free ticket…do I look that needy? This was one of the more overwhelming experiences of my life. It is so big and contains so much and you are so overly stimulated that time seems to evaporate and you have no time to do anything. Your mind numbs because you simply cannot take in everything that you are seeing. Out of everything we did see the two most famous were for sure the Venus de Milo and the Mona Lisa. Which again were things where I was just standing there thinking about how many times I had heard and read about these pieces and now there I was before them. And I love the architecture of the Louvre too, the fusion of classic and modern is beautiful to me.
After the Louvre we got on a giant Ferris wheel out side of it in the park. This was the best choice we made all day…even though I have a little fear of Ferris wheels and Erin knows what I’m talking about. Not only was the Ferris wheel fun but we could see EVERYTHING from it. Everywhere we looked there were beautiful buildings and statues and fountains. It was breath taking.
After the ferries wheel we went to dinner at an awesome little restaurant. The food and ambience and service and price we fantastic. There was even a little guy who came in and played the accordion…awesome.
Paris Day 1: Wow
August 27, 2006
I have arrived! Michelle, Rose, and I left our rooms at Roehampton (which now actually seem fairly comfortable to me after spending a few days there) this morning and headed out to Waterloo station. We were a little surprised that we had to pay 50 pounds to cross the chunnel…100 dollars are you joking me? But what were we going to do, because of our Eurorail passes we did get a 66% discount…but 100 dollars are you joking me?
The chunnel was shorter than I expected, I thought it was going to be about an hour or so but it was just probably twenty minutes. In the tunnels before the chunnel there were some crazy pressure changes so I thought the chunnel might be an ear/mind blowing experience but it was much better than the tunnels and wasn’t even stuffy. When we arrived in Paris I began to feel a little farther from home. I don’t know if it is the language difference or what it is but it certainly feels more foreign. It took us a little while to figure out the metro system but once we did our hotel was actually right at the top of the stairs of our stop, Oberkampf. Our hotel is actually pretty nice and not poorly located, since its so close to the metro no matter where we go it only takes us a second of walking when we’re on our way home.
After we dropped out stuff off at the hotel we went to see the Arc de Triomphe, which was really impressive. It’s one of those things that is so huge and so beautiful that you are just in awe and wonder of it. We tried to take pictures in front of it but could n’t fit it in the frame. From the Arch we could see the Eiffel Tower in the distance but we’ll go to see that later. Then we walked the Champs E’llysee…Tour de France style. After the chunneling, train rides and the hotel finding/site seeing it was pretty late but we found an amazing restaurant for dinner. The food was so good and the waiter was friendly and spoke English really well…until you asked him a question that wasn’t about something on the menu then suddenly he knew nothing. We are now back to the hotel, and looking forward to tomorrow.
Oh and Margie…there was poop in the subway station…but not in a cardboard box…FRANCE!
