Paris

Uff da! 16 days + 12 cities + 9 countries = 1 unbelievable trip! Exhausting, but awesome! I filled up ¼ of my journal…far too much to write, so I’ll be as brief as possible (trust me, you would be reading for days otherwise..you may still be).

Tuesday/Wednesday, March 24 – took the red eye flight from Larnaca to Budapest, then to Paris. We got to Paris around noon, and headed in the center of the city to begin our exploration! While on the metro, all of a sudden this puppet show broke out, accompanied by song and dance...(pictured right). We saw the Egyptian obelisque that was put in the place where King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette were killed by the guillotine after the French Revolution. We walked through the park/garden by the Louvre and then down the Champs-Elysées to the Arc de Triumph! It was huge, much bigger than I thought it would be!

We then walked to the Eiffel Tower. There was only 1 working elevator…and the line was almost the entire length of the tower! So we decided to WALK up the Eiffel Tower…700-800 some steps! (My giant legs from Nordic skiing paid off!) Who says Americans are lazy (except we did sit on the ground while we were waiting to do the ultimate stair master…got some dirty looks, apparently Europeans do not, under any circumstances, sit on the ground - who knew). We walked up and overlooked all of Paris. The sun was just going down, so the entire city was bathed in golden yellow – beautiful! We walked back down the stairs…at this point my legs were shaking…literally! While we were waiting for the light show to start we met a nice Moroccan guy who taught us some French (contrary to what I have always heard, all of the Parisians we met were very nice!). The light show came on for 5 min, then we took the metro back and ate a torte at a little café. We were so busy seeing everything that we hadn’t eaten ALL day (except for the airline food), that’s a once in a lifetime thing for me! Day 1 in Paris = great success! :)

Thursday, March 25 – Had the best breakfast ever!!! Crepes, croissants, baguettes, fruit, brie cheese, jam, coffee, cereal, yogurt = Marie’s heaven! :D Then we went to the Louvre. We saw the Winged Victory of Samothrace, Mona Lisa, Coronation Crown of King Louis XV, Wedding Feast painting, Aphrodite statue, the medieval mote that used to surround the Louvre (the Louvre used to be the kings’ palace before King Louis XIV build Versailles), and the Code of Hammurabi (pictured right). The Mona Lisa is so small and not very impressive. Apparently it is so famous because after da Vinci painted it, it was stolen (brought to Italy because they thought it rightfully belonged to Italy because that is where da Vinci was born (I think); however, he had given it to the Louvre). So in order to get it back, they made thousands and thousands of copies to give to people, so they could recognize it and return it to the Louvre. But that is why it is so popular, not because it is an amazing painting by any means, but because of the story behind it and that everyone knew what it looked like. I also really liked the Code of Hammurabi (weird, I know). I had to read the entire code and write a paper on it my freshman year, so it was really cool to see it and see the writing/hieroglyphics (read from top to bottom and right to left). It was the moral code of conduct before the Bible – “an eye for an eye” or “if an adopted child says to his parents, ‘you are not my parents,’ the child’s tongue should be cut off!”

The Louvre

          We then went on St. Germaine’s Street to a little district in Paris – Odeon. It was very cute and quaint with the little shops and cobblestone roads – I loved it! Had my first real crepe with nuetella!! New favorite food! I’m buying a crepe pan thingy when I get home! :D

Back/side of Notre Dame

         We walked to Notre Dame. Once we got up-close to it we could see the gargoyles and the ornate decoration on the arches and all over the church – very pretty! And the inside was gorgeous!! It was HUGE. The ceilings were so tall, and the stained glass was amazing! We walked all the way around it, at this point the sun was shining and the sky was so blue – we were all loving life! :) We walked down by the river, then went into the Sainte Chapelle (after first failing at getting in for free, she believed me that I was under 18, but we didn’t have our “teacher” with us). It was under construction, so I couldn’t actually see the front alter, but it was unbelievable! The entire thing from floor to ceiling was stained glass! Then, off to see the Sacré-Coeur. After hiding in a little café to get away from the torrential downpour, we walked up to see it – so pretty! We walked around up there in Montmartre (another small district/part of Paris). It had little cobblestone roads, restaurants, little shops, artists, and men playing the accordion. This was probably one of my favorite parts of France – the quaint little part in this huge city with the Sacré-Coeur and occasionally you could see the Eiffel Tower. We walked back down (while being serenaded by these guys behind us playing the guitar as we overlooked the city), and had dinner – meat, cheese, bread, and hot wine – delicious! It was a perfect day/night!

Sacré-Coeur

Montamartre

Friday, March 26 = free day in Paris! We took a train to see Versailles; it was HUGE and very ornately decorated. We saw the hall of mirrors (right) - very cool to see because we had just talked about the Treaty of Versailles in my history class – yep, we do have class here, occasionally. We saw the bed that King Louis XIV (I think) slept in and died in and Marie Antoinette’s bed were she bore 19 children…in public…umm…no thank you! All of the beds were like the princes beds with a cover and drapes over the side, except they were square and it was only like 4 feet long. After our tour was done, we went out to see the gardens in back – very pretty! We walked around, and then made our way to Marie Antoinette’s Estate, basically like her little play house. I mean, what else does a queen have to do? Tough life. As we were walking back the sky had changed from the lovely blue and sunny skies to a dark and ominous sky – the entire atmosphere had changed! It was very eerie. Kind of made me remember that it used to be a place where decisions were made that changed the course of history. I can’t really explain it very well, but it was the strangest feeling.

We took the train back to Odeon and had another crepe, this time chocolate – best crepe EVER! While were ordering/eating the little store was blasting music by Pink, and there was this American woman (probably in her 40s-50s) and this Chinese man drunk, dancing and singing to Pink…just the two of them. Hilarious! We later found out that one of my roommates, Charlotte, and another one of our friends went to the catacombs and saw Katie Couric there; they walked around with her and her daughter, talked with her, and took pictures. Cool! They said she was very nice and really funny. Yay for Katie Couric not being a stuck-up snob!

Overall, I liked Paris much more than I thought I would! There is so much to see and do there, and it has a nice combination of big European city and quaint parts hidden in the city. I loved it!