After surviving our final long train ride from Interlaken, we arrived in Paris on Friday around dinner time. Our hostel is very new (St Christophers Inn) and very nice. It is a bit north of many of the main sights but the metro access was pretty easy to follow. This was our first experience with a full 10 bed dorm that was at full capacity, but luckily the hostel rooms very really big so it did not seem as crowded as you would think.
Our first day we took another walking tour of the city which gave us an informative glimpse at many of the main things to see in Paris. We walked to and around such places as the Notre Dame Cathedral, the Louvre, the Siene River and its many bridges, The Grand & Petit Palais, and many more. Needless to say the tour was very worth it and lasted almost 4 hours.
After the tour finished we took a stroll down Avenue de Montaige and took a peek at all of the designer shops that lined that street. At that point we were all touristed out for the day, and decided to do some shopping, along a different street near the latin quarter, with stores that were actually in our price range.
We returned to our hostel and headed out for a late dinner with one of our roomates Alex, and his friend Kim. Since Alex had newly moved to Paris and been living out of our hostel temporairily he knew of a great authentic French restaurant nearby. The food was incredible, Jenna even tried duck for the first time which was met with great approval by her.
Since the weather was a bit overcast on Sunday morning, we thought this would be a great time to see the famous Louvre. The line to get in was not as nearly as big as we had feared, and we got into the Louvre around eleven. Since the museum is SO big, and its impossible to see everything in one day, we decided to just focus on seeing some of the highlighted pieces as outlined in our map of the museum. Some of our favourite things we saw there were the quarters of Napoleon III and the Venus de Milo statue. It was very overwhelming and after a few hours we decided to just find the Mona Lisa painting and make our escape.
After lunch we headed to Montmare to see the Moulin Rouge, the Red Light district and the Sacre Coeur. All of which were unique in their own way, with one exception being the names for many of the shops in the red light district, which lacked some creativity...
The Sacre Coeur was a very cool place as it is the highest point in Paris (church on a mountain) and gives you some extraordinary views of the central area of the city. We then took the subway back to the hostel for an hour break, before heading to the Eiffel Tower to see the sun set. We climbed the stairs to the first platform, and then to the second platform. It was at this point that Tyler made the executive decision that we would not be taking the elevator to the top, citing his fear of heights. Nonetheless, the views from the first and second platform were amazing. It was really neat to see many of the sights we had seen from the ground, now from up high in the air.
We then descended down the stairs to the ground just in time to see the tower all lit up for the night. We then grabbed some crepes and ice-cream and took a seat on a park bench in perfect view and enjoyed the spectacular site in front of us.
Which brings us to today, where we started off our day in the Latin quarter to explore many of the used book shops. We then walked back to the Notre Dame Cathedral and went inside and toured around it. We then hopped on the metro and headed back to the Eiffel Tower where we found a boulangerie and grabbed some baguettes, cheese, and wine and had a picnic lunch underneath the Eiffel Tower. The weather was incredible and the park was filled with people.
Our last stop was the Arc the Triomphe which was a really interesting monument that is the meeting point for 12 roads in the centre of Paris. Interesting fact we learned on our tour was that there is a car accident on the giant round-a-bout surrounding the Arc once every thirty minutes, and that no insurance company will insure a car while driving on this round-a-bout, you do so at your own risk. To our astonishment, we even saw a few cyclists amidst the cars.
Overall, we have very much enjoyed our time here in Paris, however we have had our fill of the metro here and its many mysterious smells.... so we are ready to bid it farewell!
Next we are off to Breda in the Netherlands to visit a good friend of Jenna's from highschool, Kristen, who is currently spending 10 months there as a live-in nanny, as we make our way towards Amsterdam.
Jenna and Ty
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