Whirlwind

I know my fan club is dying to know what I did last weekend. (And by fan club I mean the four or five people who actually read this.) So here I present a very condensed version of my jam-packed 36 hours in Paris.

We took the Eurostar to Paris early on Saturday morning. When we got there, we hopped on a bus for a quick tour around the city. I think I’ve made my feelings about bus tours quite clear in a previous post…but this one was a little better. I actually got a couple decent pictures out of it. During the tour we stopped for lunch at a delightful little Parisian café (all 75 of us). Lunch was already arranged and paid-for, so we didn’t really have a choice on what to order. But the food was excellent! I suppose that is to be expected; after all, we were in France.

The bus tour ended at our hotel. We all got checked in, Jessi and I dropped our bags in our room, admired the bright orange couch and our view of the Eiffel Tower right outside our window, and five minutes later walked back out the door to explore the Latin quarter of Paris.

We went through a bit of an ordeal to get there…the Paris Metro is much more confusing than the London Underground. But maybe that’s just because we weren’t used to it. We got in line for the right train, but thought we were on the wrong side of the platform. So we went to the other side, got on, and then realized the train was heading in the wrong direction. So we got off at the next stop, turned around, and got on the train heading the other direction.

At long last we made it to Saint Michel, in the Latin Quarter. Jessi had done some research in advance and learned that this was where a lot of demonstrators would gather to set up barricades and protest wars. The Latin Quarter is considered the “intellectual” section of the city. It’s where the big universities are, and back in the Middle Ages, all the scholars there spoke Latin (hence the name).

Jessi had been to Paris before, so she had already seen a lot of the major tourist sites. Unfortunately for her, she had me as a travel buddy, and I haven’t been anywhere. I dragged her up to Notre Dame cathedral for a quick detour. What an incredible building! I’ve only ever seen it in Disney movies, but it’s so magnificent in person. So many ornate details. And that’s just on the outside. People just don’t build things like that anymore. It’s amazing.

Tip for travellers: If a fragile-looking woman with a forlorn look on her face approaches you and says, “spick English?” don’t respond. Gypsies are everywhere, and they like to take your money and anything else that is not carefully guarded on your person.

The rest of the Latin Quarter was amazing! I’m a sucker for cheap souvenir shops, and there is no shortage of those on the streets of the Left Bank. We went to the Pantheon and saw the crypt in the basement where famous people like Voltaire, Victor Hugo, and Louis Braille are buried. We got authentic French crepes, filled with nutella (the most heavenly thing I have ever eaten). We also went to the Luxembourg gardens and took crazy pictures of ourselves with the statues. Yes, we are American tourists.

We also visited the Shakespeare and Company bookstore. This was a great find by Jessi. It was a popular hangout for American expatriates like Hemingway and Fitzgerald in the 1920s. Very cool atmosphere. I felt so scholarly taking used books off the shelves, sitting down, and reading a few pages. I found myself an old edition of Dickens’ Great Expectations, a book that I started reading but never finished. I thought it would be worth another try, so I bought it.

We ate dinner at another great restaurant, and I’ll say once again that French food is AMAZING.

That night we went to the Eiffel Tower. We didn’t get there in time to go up, but we sat on the grass and admired the sparkling lights. It really was quite a sight.

On Sunday we started off by going down the road to see the Statue of Liberty. Ever seen National Treasure II? Yeah, there really is a Statue of Liberty in Paris. And it was right down the street from our hotel.

After that we took the Metro up to the Arc de Triomphe (with much less difficulty this time). We walked down the Avenue des Champs-Elysees (SHAHMZ el-ee-ZAY – Saying a name like that makes me feel very French…even when I really only know 3 or 4 French phrases). We did primarily window-shopping, because the stores along Champs-Elysees are comparable to those of Fifth Avenue in New York City: you feel unworthy to enter the stores because you know you could never afford anything for sale there without taking out a loan. I drooled over the purses on display in the windows of Louis Vuitton, only to glance at the price tag and see €2,100. *Sigh* I guess I’ll just have to be content with having seen them.

We spent the afternoon in the Louvre, though we only had 2.5 hours there. I knew before going that I’d never be able to see everything on all three levels of the 1.5-mile-long building. So I chose one section and spent all my time there. I saw the collections of Greek and Roman sculptures, including the Venus de Milo and Nike of Samothrace. I also stumbled across the Mona Lisa. I saw Gericault’s Raft of the Medusa, David’s Oath of the Horatii, as well as Delacroix’s Liberty Leading the People and The Death of Sardanapalus. I was overwhelmed by all of it. I got chills as I walked through the halls. I almost felt like crying as I stood in front of these works of art that I’d only seen pictures of in my textbooks. I never dreamed I’d get to see them in person. It was breathtaking.

We finished off the day with a visit to Le Sacre Coeur, a basilica on a hill that overlooks the whole city. Quite amazing.

After that, we were back on the train heading home. We did so much there, but I still feel like I barely scratched the surface of all there is to see in Paris. I hope to go back there one day (maybe when I’ve learned a little more French).

So much for making this a “condensed” version of my trip…

For more pictures, see here.