I like to sum up places I've been in one or two words. Paris? Smelly. Unexpected. Lines. The entire city smelled like urine and rotten eggs. The metro was the smelliest public transportation system I have ever ridden on, worse than the subway in New York. I liked it though, not the smell, the city. I was not going to go to Paris because I needed to save money, but after speaking with my parents, I decided to go. I had the lowest of expectations, and I think that is what made the trip so amazing. I have heard so many horror stories about people hating the city because it is dirty, unsafe, overrated, so I was extremely nervous and apprehensive. After spending a few days there; however, I sort of fell in love with Paris. I was not a fan of the people and their attitudes or the dog poop on the sidewalks, and I certainly would never want to live there, but I appreciate it for what it is, and I loved seeing the famous sights up close and personal. The problem with these sights, though is that you are guaranteed to wait in a line. We waited in a line at the Louvre, Versailles, Eiffel, and would have had to wait to enter Notre Dame if we wanted to deal with it and had time. Parisians are experts with making the lines move, like in Disney world. Because everything has a line, they know how to get people in fast and it goes much faster than you would think. I did not mind waiting in lines one bit. My friends and I passed the time well and were exploring in no time.
To get to Paris, we took the Eurostar train. I was secretly ecstatic about this because we weren't taking a plane and quite honestly, I am sick and tired of airplanes and it would also be easier than any airport. After Lauren knocked on my door to wake me up 15 minutes after the time we were scheduled to leave school, we took the tube and arrived at St. Pancras train station. Once there, we just checked in, went through minimal security, handed the man our passport and we were off. Unlike the airport, the whole process took about 15 minutes. It was easy livin'. The train itself was ok. I didn't think it was worth the amount of money some people paid. We got our tickets on sale and paid £69 roundtip, but some other people paid hundreds of pounds. It was nice, but it wasn't as nice as I expected. It was transportation though, and I was happy. We arrived in Paris around 10, after a two and a half hour journey. We took the metro to the Louvre first because we didnt know where else to go. We walked through the archway of one of the wings of the museum and I was standing in front of the famous glass pyramid of the Louvre. Built in 1989, this pyramid was designed to handle the large crowds visiting the Louvre. It was beautiful, especially because it was the first famous landmark we saw.
My first sight out of the Metro. Back of the
Louvre.
There it is...
We walked over to the side of the square and to take our coats off because it was beautiful out and as soon as I looked out into the city, I saw my first glimpse of the tower in the distance. Emily noticed it at the same time and she grabbed my arm and the two of us looked like schoolgirls. I just took a deep breath; it was completely overwhelming. I realized in that moment that I was so glad that I decided to go to Paris. I would have regretted not going for years. Paris is the type of place that I would not purposely fly to Europe for, so I felt that this was my only chance. (After exploring the city over two days, though, I realized that I would come back, but only when I had a husband and a career and could afford to stay in an expensive hotel, eat fancy french food, and possibly take a day trip to the countryside.)
Aphrodite. (ignore the woman
posing with the statue. I hate when
people do that. Its so pointless, but that
is besides the point.)
Who's that lady??
Coronation of Napoleon. Remember this, it'll be
somewhere else later in the post.
Massive crowd swarming this tiny painting.
It is always mind-blowing to me how
something can attract so much attention.
Once we were done with that, we left. The Louvre was way too big and crowded to walk around, and, honestly, I would much rather go to the museums in London. The rest of the day was more relaxing. We saw some of the city as we went to our hostel, went out to dinner, met up with our friends who took a later train, and then we called it an early night.
My alarm went off at 7:45 am, and Julie and I got ready, walked to everyone else's hostel and we all took the metro then the RER train to the Palace of Versailles. We were treated to some accordion and saxophone train performers. We saw some the night before on the Metro and I thought it was the greatest thing ever. It sounded like we were at a carnival. So we went to the palace, and the first glimpse made me cringe a little. There was an abundance of gold on the gates. Is that much opulence necessary? I guess it is. It actually works for it. Once you got up close, it wasn't too much.
We walked through the palace and it was definitely one of those moments. I remember doing a presentation about the palace in freshmen year of college. It was converted from a hunting lodge into Louis XIV palace in the mid 17th century. In 1789, people raided the palace and took Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette to be guillotined. It contains 700 rooms, 2153 windows, 352 chimneys and 28 acres of roof. It housed 6000 members of the court, plus 5000 servants. The size of it and beauty is absolutely breathtaking. The art on the ceilings or hung on the walls and the engravings and sculptures are so intricate. The fabric is gorgeous and still vibrant even after hundreds of years. I can't believe that people actually lived in the palace and that it was built by hand. My favorite aspects of the interior were the chandeliers or the fabric. The chandeliers were massive and although they all generally looked the same, I couldn't help but loving them.
This fireplace was so massive
it had actual trees in it.
Hall of mirrors.
17 mirrors and 17 adjacent windows
This same painting was in the Louvre. The one in
Versailles was GIGANTIC!! Look how
small I look next to it. I bought it in a big print
to hang and frame in my room when I
get back to America.
Coronation of Napoleon
Mom- I loved everything on this table. I
I forgot France is the home of toile.
It was getting late so we went left the palace and took the trains to the Eiffel tower. I fell in love as soon as I got close to the tower. It is the most amazing color; I had no idea. I always thought it was going to be a rust color, but it was actually brown. The most perfect brown. I wanted everything I own to be that color as soon as I saw it. The pictures don't even show the true color, that is why I had no idea. I just wanted to hug it. It was one of those moments that I just wanted to un up to it and give it the biggest hug. I thought I was going to see it and be jaded and say "Yeah, I've seen it in pictures plenty of times", but I was not like that at all. I genuinely was excited to see it and was not disappointed.
We stopped for crepes before waiting on line.
Nutella and banana.
We waited on line to go to the tippy top of the tower and while on line we took pictures with John Cena. Let me tell you a little bit about John Cena...
My friend Sophie's boyfriend, Ben came to London a few weeks ago and brought with him a a little John Cena action figure. Ben takes pictures of John in random places doing random things. Like John Cena in a flour snow angel on Ben's countertop. So Ben asked Sophie to bring him to Paris with us and take pictures. So she brought him, and we took pictures. Lots of pictures. These pictures are of us with him, because ladies love John Cena.
Tour guide John
We took an elevator to the second floor.
I finally got to hug it.
Emily
The elevator to the second floor.
We had plans to go to the Arc de Triomphe at night to see the Eiffel tower at night, so we walked over there because I wanted to get some pictures with the Arc during the day. We walked up one of roads that leads to the famous circle, and I was amazed at how big it was, even from a distance. Then I realized we were walking up from the side, so when we finally reached it and saw the front, I was shocked. It was absolutely spectacular. It is in close running with Eiffel for the number one spot in my book. It was the perfect size and the details were so intricate. It was built in 1836 to commemorate Napoleon's 1805 victory at Austerlitz in 1805.
Mr. John Cena.
We went out for a nice family dinner then went to the Arc to make it up for 10pm so we can see the Eiffel tower sparkle, because like my dad says, "It's all about the sparkle".
We climbed 284 steps.
Sophie & Emily
Tomb of the unknown soldier
The next morning, Lauren and I ventured to Pére Lachaise cemetery, founded in 1804. I wanted to visit Jim Morrison's grave, so we went. This place was bigger than any cemetery I have ever been in, except Arlington. Not only was it big in acreage, but the graves were practically stacked on top of each other. It was extremely old, and as bad as it sounds, I really enjoyed walking the cobblestone paths. It was a very peaceful place. We found Jim's grave and saw that the barriers around it. In the Pocket Paris book I brought with me and have been getting all of my facts and figures from said that they had to put up a barrier because people would do drugs and have sex on his grave, so his amily complained and that was the solution. The same goes for Oscar Wilde's grave. People would visit and kiss the gravestone with red lipstick on and it eventually needed to be restored, so they put a glass box around it and more metal barriers to deter the ladies, but there were still kisses on the box. The way we found Oscar's grave was a little wild. After visiting Jim, we walked around this cemetery, that had over 92 sections from what I saw, and found Holocaust memorials and graves from the 1800s. After walking for over 15 minutes, turning down random pathways, not paying attention, I stopped in a four-way path intersection and said to Lauren, "I have no idea where we are going". I took a picture on my camera of the map earlier so I looked, but I failed to write down what number he was marked on the map. So I had a feeling it was 83, it sounded familiar. So when I checked the map, we were standing in front of the section we needed. Oscar's plot was four spots away. I got the chills. It was incredible. Oscar knew we needed help.
Lauren and I planned to meet up with our friends at Notre Dame to tour the church, but got a little spun around coming off the metro and ended up not having enough time to go in. We saw the outside though, which I was happy about. Its construction began in 1163 and was completed in 1345. This year marks 850 years since construction began. It is the center of Paris, meaning things are measured from that point when measuring distances from Paris.
I was so pleasantly surprised with Paris. It was an experience I would have regretted not taking part in.
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