Paris. What can I say to introduce this blogpost -- I was blown away. First off, by how expensive the place is. Second, by how exquisite the food ACTUALLY is. Third, by how identical all the buildings look and how cool they all are. And finally, by how much fun I had rekindling my French language abilities with locals!
Paris was incroyable. I travelled with my five roommates (which I was kind of skeptical about, seeing as you know, we live together, we're six girls, it opens up doors for bickering once we get there, 6 people are going to want to do different things, and oh ya, no one speaks French...) But, it turned out well! We travelled together on our first Ryanair experience. It was interesting to say the least. You will all be happy to know that I didn't get delayed, and I didn't check bags so my belongings got there on time too!! Ha what a bonus! We got into Paris around 12 and got to our hostel right around the corner from the LOUVRE! SO COOL! Typical French....put a hostel right in the heart of the shwanky district of Paris, 'cause that really makes sense. Ah well, cheap and cheerful. Je l'aime! Oh as a completely added bonus, there were about five crepe joints right around the corner, so this became the required snack/meal/dessert of the day for all of us!
Me and my five roommates on La Riviere Seine
We started off by trekking to Notre Dame -- which just so happened to be the only real reason I wanted to go to Paris.... To find Quazymodo (AKA Hunchy) and get him to sing to me with the gargoyles from the bell tower. (Hunchback of Notre Dame reference there if you didn't catch that). It was pretty legit; it looked exactly as I had pictured it would. But I mean, my imagination didn't have to tread far for that one. It was great though! We went inside and saw all the stain glasses that make the cathedral famous. They were literally unbelievable. Not sure how to describe them other than very stain-glassy and very artsy and very exquisite. They were also huge, bigger than I thought humans could make. Fascinating stuff.
Notre DameOn Saturday I went to Musee d'Orsay with three of my roommates which is home to all the Impressionist works (Renoir, Degas, Monet, Manet...too name a few). One girl had a scare and thought her passport had gone missing so she spent the day with her partner in crime trying to sort that out and didn't get to go to the museum. Turns out it fell out of her purse at the restaurant we ate at the night before, so all was fine there. She retraced her steps and found it. But anywho, back to my day. Musee d'Orsay was great. Lots to see; lots of petit-point (pointillism) and landscapes and Renaissance portraits. Impressionism is my favourite kind of art -- I should correct myself here...it's the only type of art I know. I learned about it at Joan of Arc in elementary school, so it was cool to think back about Madame Deussault criticizing me for my horrific paint skills in Grade 2, and the "pas-propre"s Mme. Lamoureux gave me during Monet month in Grade's 3 and 4. LOL that was great to reminisce about!
Speaking of Joan of Arc, I found her statue! Had to take this pic!
From there we went to the Eiffel Tower and l'Arc de Triomphe. We walked up Champs d'Elysees, which is the posh shopping street of Paris. Of course we made a trip into the 6 story Louis Vuitton. You'll all be thrilled to know that I did not buy anything, however was escorted down the staircase at one point by an employee in a garish maroon tux -- must have looked famous or something?! (Haha I'll get off my high horse now! Still a pretty funny experience...Can't say that's ever happened to me.) The Eiffel Tower was great, and the l'Arc de Triomphe was great as well. Thank God for all the walking we did. Paris is not small let me tell you! And to look the part, you have to walk everywhere to burn off the crepes and baguettes and cheeses and sauces! Ahh the food was so amazing I can't even begin to describe how great it was. But backtracking, the Eiffel Tower was cool, but it really is in the middle of nowhere of Northern Paris away from all the museums, so it's more like a "Glad I checked that off my list" feeling after being there.
Concorde Square; where all the famous French prisoners were guillotined in front of the public (Marie Antoinette, Louis XVI, etc)
Sunday was reserved solely for the Louvre. That place is ginormous. I swear I probably walked 5km INSIDE the museum. I bought one of the touristy headsets with guided tours of the museum's various collections, and took notes like a total nerd. If any of you care about art, I will gladly show you/send you them! I went on the Masterpiece Collections tour; the Monalisa was in this tour so me and all the other 58,000 tourists who bought the headset ended up in the same room at the same time. Cute. Lol but anyway, I then went on the French collections tour, and got a little bit sick of seeing portraits of Louis XIV and XVI, so I got lost in Napoleon's apartments and took in the riches found there.
The Louvre entrance!
Venus de Milo Statue
Da Vinci's Monalisa
Clearly, I am living in the wrong century...sign me up for this lifestyle. Wow! Napoleon's apartments
Staircases to the apartments
Sunday afternoon, my roommates left to catch their flight around five. I had a flight on Monday morning, so I booked it North, to Montmatre/Sacre Coeur area for sunset. The area is really cute; lots of boutiques and boulangeries (bakeries) and cheese/wine stores. Very homey place. There are less tourists and there was a lot to see and take part in. Lots of artists and musicians. It was really sweet. I took the Metro up to the Moulin Rouge street stop, took my tourist photo, and then power walked uphill to catch the sunset from Sacre Coeur. Totally worth the exhaustion. The view was fantastic. You can see all of Paris from this spot in town, and it was very peaceful and serene.
The Moulin Rouge; in the Red Light District of Paris.
The view from Sacre Coeur at sunset
Sacre Coeur Basilica at dusk
I headed from Sacre Coeur to a friend of mine's place in Paris, Christy Solomon, who used to be my PE teacher at Semi and was my teacher sponsor for Rugby in Grade 12. It was really nice to catch up with her and see how her European experience was going. She is teaching English to elementary students just outside of Paris, and plans to stay as long as she can. She's lovin it. What's not to love though. Great food, beautiful place, great people (from what I caught).
So at the end of the night, I headed back to my hostel, and crashed early as I had to be up for my flight at 5:30. CRAZY story. I was woken up by the sound of incessant dry-heaving and vomiting for about 25 minutes at around 12:30. Had no idea who it was and had no intention of going to give the guy help. He clearly had to much of the French Vino. Okay but moving on....Then around 1:15, this completely random guy barges into my room (with three other girls), and fell forward into my bunkbed and braced his fall with my face...Scared the living POOP out of me. He then proceeds to stumble across our room, faceplant into our sink, and rebound onto the second girl's bed. No one said anything in my room. Quite frankly I think we were so scared we didn't have anything to say. I had my covers over my head and could hear my heartbeat for cryin out loud!! He just sat on that poor girl's bed for about a minute, then she got out her cellphone for light and whimpered "Um, who are you?", and the drunk idiot just stands up, sways, takes a topple into our coat hanger cupboard, and then leaves. Good god, I was so scared I did not sleep the rest of the night. We locked the door immediately (The girls' who came in last didn't think we could lock the doors from the inside.....??.....okay, ya no comment...But seriously, what were they thinking????) My alarm didn't need to go off at 5:30, as I was still up out of trauma, and I headed out of Paris.
Although my last night was pretty damn brutal, I absolutely would not mind visiting Paris again. It did not waiver my opinion of the beautiful city. It was a great place, had such a great time. Anyone who wants to go back let me know! I didn't get to go to Versailles or the catacombs, so definitely need to repeat this trip!
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