Paris, Ah, Paris (Part 2)

Days 9-10:

Paris Weekend, continued

Saturday morning I wake up, get ready, head back downstairs with all of my stuff (because the room I ended up in at 2am wasn’t where I was staying the whole weekend), and continue my scavenger hunt for beds.  This time, I get the help of one of the BSP leaders, which makes life way easier!  I get the right room, put my stuff away, and grab breakfast before heading off to Versailles for the morning.  Even though we had to get back on a bus after having been on a bus for so long just the day before, we figured getting to see the Palace at Versailles would be worth it!  As we are getting to the town, we notice black smoke billowing up above the trees.  We are looking to see from where it comes, and then we see that a car is on fire (not a little fire, a fully engaged ball of fire) in a parking lot! It was completely random!

Gates at Versailles

We arrive at Versailles and get in line.  We stand in line.  We continue to stand in line.  Impressively, though, the line seems to have organized itself into a serpentine line that works quite well and moves in an organized way almost like the Temple Grandin livestock lines do.  There are no barriers keeping people in line or indicating where the line should be.  There are no workers directing traffic, but still the line remains organized.  Clearly, we were in line a long time, because we had time to discuss this at length! 

Once we finally made it into Versailles, I saw the gorgeous gardens through the windows, but we didn’t have time to walk through them.  The rooms were elegant, plush, and ornate.  It was crowded, but overall the crowds moved well.  The only real bottleneck was in the Queen’s bedroom.   We probably could have spent longer at Versailles, but we had limited time and needed to get back to Paris for afternoon activities. 

Gardens at Versailles

Gardens at Versailles

Gardens at Versailles

One of our group members really wanted to see the catacombs, so we had decided to head there upon arrival back in Paris.  We had checked the website, mapped out our metro trip, and planned the rest of our day around that activity.  We start our marathon metro trip across the city, and the bad luck starts.  First, we realize that we had been looking at the wrong blue line, so one member of our group gets on the train thinking that she knows the right stop before we can tell her it’s not the right one.  None of the rest of us can fit on the train, so she’s on there by herself going to the wrong stop.  Another member of our group gets groped on the train and has to get off and catch the next train because she can’t get back to our car.  I almost get pick-pocketed walking down into the metro station the ONE time I have my bag on the back of my body instead of on the front of my body!  After riding an extremely crowded metro train for an hour, we arrive at the catacombs at 4:15.  They stop letting people in at 4.  Now, their website says they close at 5, but it says NOTHING about the fact that they don’t let people in after 4.  So, back on the metro, we go.  

We headed back across the city to the Hard Rock Café for dinner because one of the girls in our group had that on her list of “must-do” things.  By this time, we were all tired and ready to just sit, eat, drink, and enjoy some music and each other’s company for a while.  After dinner, we walked back toward Pont Neuf and around the Louvre, where we were able to see the Arc de Triomphe off in the distance.

The Louvre Pyramid at Night

Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel in front of the Louvre (NOT the Arc de Triomphe de l'Etoile which is actually off in the background)

That night we did make it onto our boat trip on the Seine, which was a highlight of my trip!  I enjoyed seeing all of the people just sitting along the river banks waving and hanging out.  I loved seeing the bridges and the Eiffel Tower from the river.  When it was over, we sat on Pont Neuf again waiting for the Eiffel Tower to light up and sparkle again.  

Eiffel Tower View from the Seine

Michelle, Amanda, Me, Christina, and Liz on the boat trip!

We had a little more bad luck on the metro ride home, because one of our group didn’t make it on the train and got left on the platform.  We got off at the next stop to let her catch up with us, and it’s lucky we did!  In the next tunnel after we all were together again, the train stopped and the lights went out.  I’m sure if any of us had been alone on a subway train in Paris at 11:30pm in a tunnel when the lights go out, we would have freaked out just a little bit!  However, we were all 5 together, and now it’s just a part of our adventure.

Sunday morning, we got up, checked out, and headed off to the bakery for breakfast.  We also went to the coffee shop across from the bakery for some incredible café au lait.  The owner gave each of us a chocolate bar to go with our coffee, and I actually melted mine into my drink.  YUM!!  I ended my time in Paris by sitting on the canal by myself journalling about my trip and listening to music and the city while others in my group went to Moulin Rouge or back to the catacombs. 

After another bus, ferry, bus trip, we finally arrived back at “home” in London around 8pm Sunday night.  I can honestly say that there were parts of Paris that were beautiful.  I am glad I went because I would have always wondered, but I don’t really have any need to go back.  Our little group laughed and had good times, but we definitely like London much better than Paris!!

Paris, Ah, Paris (part 1)

Night 7 and Day 8:

Paris Weekend Part 1

Our Paris adventure began the night of July 4^th at 11:15 as we set out by charter bus (or coach).  There were 38 total British Studies Program (BSP) students on the trip, and 5 from my specific library science class.  We rode a bus from London to the port city of Dover which took approximately 1.5-2 hours.  The first part of the trip was pretty typically filled with excited chatter, music, and sleep.  Once we arrived in Dover, we passed our passports forward for inspection and waited a few minutes to load onto the ferry.   We had to get off of the bus once on the ferry and head up to the lounge for the 2ish hour ferry ride (that was FREEZING!).  During this time, we attempted to sleep in chairs and on sofas.  Finally, we reached Calais and reboarded the bus for the remainder of our bus trip to Paris.  This final leg was the longest and lasted another few hours.  We arrived at our hostel in Paris Friday morning around 8am not-so-bright-eyed.  The hostel was St. Christopher’s Inns and it was located on the canal in the northeast part of the city.  We quickly dropped off our bags in a storage area, brushed our teeth, changed our shirts, ate the breakfast provided by St. Christopher’s, and headed to the atm and to a local bakery for my first taste of authentic French pastries.  At the bakery, I ordered a pain au chocolat (basically, bread with chocolate)—absolutely delicious!  

Once we had all reconvened back at the hostel, we left for a walking tour of the area to get our bearings and learn a little about the city.  We saw the canal, the Metropolitain (Paris’s subway system), and headed to Place Monge, which was our first stop.  The Paris metro system is similar to Rome’s—crowded, confusing, and not as clean as London’s.  It gets you where you need to go, and it’s easy to use in the sense that one ticket is one ride no matter how many stops you need.  However, there is no sense of personal space at all! On the other hand, you sometimes get surprised with an impromptu trumpet concert on your morning commute!  

View of the canal on our morning walk

Right around the corner from Place Monge, in the middle of the city, there is an ancient Roman ruin that was discovered  in the 1800s.  The area is called Arenes de Lutece and this particular day a group of boys was enjoying a soccer game.  We sat and watched for a few minutes while Dr. Mackaman told us a little more about the history of Paris and about our plans for the weekend.  I enjoyed the juxtaposition of sitting in such an ancient place watching kids do something so normal as play soccer.  I also really wanted to go join the game!

Arenes de Lutece

We continued our walking tour by wandering through an alley that held a few plaques commemorating different parts of Parisian and French history.  We talked about World War II and the Nazi occupation of Paris, Ernest Hemingway’s time in Paris, Rene Descartes theories about existence, and how all of that connected to us as students. 

As lunchtime approached, we headed toward Notre Dame.  We were released to get lunch on our way with instructions to meet at the cathedral later in the afternoon.  Our group found a little hole-in-the-wall restaurant that served paninis, falafels, and crepes.  I ordered a crepe.  I do not speak French, and I only recognize a few words (5 years of Latin can only help me so much in France!!) so I ordered my crepe with fromage (cheese) and jambone (ham).  It was absolutely divine!!!  This was without question, the best thing I ate in France.  We ate our crepes as we walked down to Notre Dame and then headed into the cathedral.

Notre Dame Cathedral

Notre Dame was beautiful.  The alcoves around the edges that contain statues and paintings are stunning.  I wish that it hadn’t been so crowded when I had been there, but I realize that it was a Friday afternoon.  They have signs everywhere telling visitors to be silent, but people still talked at a normal tone of voice (not even whispering).  They had announcements over loud-speakers telling visitors to be silent and respect those who were there for worship and prayer.  Because of this, I felt bad for those who weren’t there for tourism and who were there to worship.  I definitely enjoyed seeing the statues of the saints, especially Joan of Arc.  The cathedral is celebrating their 850^th anniversary this year, so they have displays about that around, as well. 

Joan of Arc statue

Following the visit to Notre Dame, we were off to the Louvre on a mission to see the Mona Lisa and Venus de Milo.  Those two were our “must-sees”, and anything else would be a bonus.  We missed the Mona Lisa’s room the first time, and ended up in the wrong place so we had to back track.  Finally, we found her, though; so we checked one item off of our list!  On our way to see the enigmatic Mona, we also got to see other Leonardo da Vinci paintings, an Athena statue, and many other paintings by Italian artists.  After Mona Lisa, we headed downstairs in search of Venus de Milo.  She was much easier to find and smaller than I had imagined, and on the way we saw a few other Greek pieces, too such as a piece of the Parthenon.  Because we still had time after seeing our two main items, we headed off into the Egyptian area, where we saw the Colossal Statue of Ramesses II.  We even saw part of the Medieval exhibit, which felt like the dungeon of a castle. 

Pyramid at the Louvre Museum

Venus De Milo

At this point, our small group split and three of us headed out of the Louvre to go shopping and get gelato, while the other two stayed behind to see more of the museum.  Ahh, the gelato was delicious!  After walking with our gelato for a little bit, we found a window sill to sit in and rest for a while before dinner.  We sat, talked, and watched a little part of the city go by. 

Dinner was a large group affair.  The entire BSP group met at a restaurant to eat in the basement.  We had ordered our meal earlier in the day, and we were supposed to go on a boat trip on the Seine afterwards to see the sights of Paris by night.  Dinner for me consisted of cheese croquets, duck confit with French fries, and apple crumble.  It was tasty, but it just couldn’t compete with that ham and cheese crepe from lunch and the gelato from earlier!  Unfortunately, we didn’t make it to the boat dock in time to take our boat trip that night, so we made arrangements to go the next night.  As we walked back across Pont Neuf (the New Bridge—which is actually the oldest bridge in Paris),  we saw the Eiffel Tower all lit up and sparkly. 

Back at the hostel, exhausted and ready for bed, we went to check in and they told me I would have to go on a scavenger hunt for beds.  I ended up heading to 3 rooms that night before I found the one I would actually sleep in at almost 2am.  (If you want the extended version of this story, you’ll have to ask in person.) 

Part 2 includes the rest of the weekend.