Paris

Arrival
Today my passport was stamped again for the first time since leaving SA - so it feels like I am officially doing some travelling again. I didn't mention it in my last post but I managed to drop my camera into the Princess Diana memorial when Byron and I went for our walk. So the start of our trip was a visit to Currys - this is a electrical type shop not a bunny chow shop. Got a price for a new camera but decided to wait a bit in the hopes that my camera would miraculously start working again. Byron had a camera so we were fine.

Got onto the Eurostar and found ourselves in Paris at Gare du Nord Station - WAY COOL. Managed to find our way to the hotel and instead of mints on our pillow we had apples - how cute is that? First night in Paris we were not about to sit in the hotel doing nothing so we headed out on a walk in and around Parc Des Buttes Chaumont.

The first attraction on our walk was a public toilet well at least we thought it was kinda wierd, this was followed by a bicycle rack with bicycles to rent. You may think it sounds boring so far but it was quite interesting we thought. Don't worry it gets better. We walked through the streets of a very quiet area and found ourselves at a viewpoint of the city. First major sight in front of our eyes, Sacre- Coeur.

The walk then lead us to the Park which is 61 acres, and is absolutely gorgeous. My favourite part of the park would have to have been the man made waterfall, it was created inside a man made cave. The cave even had man made stalactites and stalagmites. It all looked very realistic except for the stalagmites. We then had a quiet dinner in an English Italian restaurant in Paris – go figure.

Day 1
Set the hair dryer on my camera last night and its working ... YAY!!Started our day with attempting to have some sort of plan of what to see and do, then headed off to Notre Dame. The queue outside was CRAZY so we stood in awe and took pics. During this time we were confronted by someone asking if we spoke English – we politely said yes and she proceeded to show us a letter about how she needs money. We later discovered that this happens regularly and by the end of our trip we just answered no.

We then headed off to the Louvre only to find it’s closed on Tuesdays so we headed up to Camps-Esylee. This street feels a lot longer than it looks but somehow the Arc de Triomphe still managed to sneak up on us. I know you are wondering, “How does a structure that big manage to sneak up on a person?” … well it did. We made our way to the top of the Arc de Triomphe and I got VERY dizzy – lots of stairs in a tight spiral. I got there though. From the top the view was awesome but what I thought was funny was the smart cars – they really look like toys from that high up.

Off to the Dome Church where we discovered Napoleans tomb and saw his coat – he was a REALLY little man. Then to Museum Rodin to discover “The Thinker” also saw a lot of other sculptures but they didn’t provoke as much thought. ;)

Our plan for today was to end off with a picnic by the Eiffel Tower – the weather turned kinda horrible though and we decided to head back to the hotel instead. Got back and went for a sauna to relax our weary bones.

Day 2
Today we woke up to rain – but its okay we just headed out prepared. We had jackets Byron had his umbrella but I had managed to forget to pack mine so instead took my makeshift plastic bag/jacket that I was given on moms and my bus tour. Good idea to walk around Paris with London written across your body. Anyways it would have worked fine but while waiting in queue outside Lourve the rain was coming down hard so thought maybe I should buy a brollie. He was selling them for €10 but I did my first ever bargaining and said €5 he said no and started walking off I did the same then he turned around and said fine. So I got an umbrella.

Inside the Lourve we saw a lot more art that I din’t understand much but the Egyptian stuff was pretty cool and we also walked through this old moat which was pretty cool. The Louvre used to be a castle or something like that. Since we were there we had to see the Mona Lisa. Wow – and I am not referring to the painting. The hoards of people crowded there was just ridiculous – it was like being stuck in the middle of a mob. The poor security guards did not know what to do cos no matter how many times they said no photos there were still flashes going off all around the room.

We managed to survive the mob and headed off to see the Catacombs. All the places we had been to up to this point had a special rate for people 25 and under – just missed the cut everytime. The Catacombs however offered the rate to people 26 and under, YAY we made it. The Catacombs were weird, basically these underground tunnels and the walls were covered in bones and skulls – pretty intriguing though.

We then went off to discover the Picasso Museum, its not really a very touristy area at least it didn’t feel that way. After getting some more art culture we made our way to the Latin Quarter but got interrupted as we were passing Notre Dame. We heard some music playing and went to check it out. There was a band doing some promotion work playing in the garden behind Notre Dame. We sat a listened and I even bought a CD – got them to autograph it as well. So when Wazabe become big I will have a signed copy of their CD.

We managed to get ourselves to the Latin Quarter to discover it should have been our local hangout for our stay in Paris. It has lots of vibe and cheap food.
Tonight we were ready for Eiffel Tower and any bad weather that was brought our way, we got there climbed the first 2 floors and then took the lift up to the top. Gorgeous view – by the time we got to the top the sun had gone so we saw Paris at night. Came back down sat on the wet grass and enjoyed a sparkly Tower for a bit, took photos and went back to the hotel. It was a great way to end our Paris experience.