Paris

Last stop on my trip through Continental Europe was Paris! City of love.. or something. Trust me, I saw soo many couples I could believe it, but I had fun by myself anyway.

My first day was the best, I took the metro to the Place de la Concorde and coming up from the subway station, I saw the oblisk at the Place de la Concorde, and the Eiffel tower along with the Arc de Triomphe down the Champs de l'Elysees.

 

I wandered down the avenue to the Arc de Triomphe, ate Crepe and got a bit lost when looking for food for lunch. Lesson - don't wander off the main drag! Anyway, I eventually went up the Arc de Triomphe and squizzed at the view. Pretty cool.

 

That evening I went to the Louvre which is free for under 26 year olds on friday nights. Yay! The Louvre was very cool, but sooo HUGE. I spent 3.5 hours walking around until my legs almost dropped off! I saw the Mona Lisa and the Venus de Milo like a good little tourist, but apart from the shock factor about how tiny it is and how much you can't see it, the Mona Lisa is unexciting. I much preferred all the sculptures.

Venus de Milo:

Mona Lisa (life size.. lol)

The Louvre is pretty at night though.

  

Sat I went to the Sorbonne and the university area. I went to a museum of medieval things, and spent the afternoon wandering around by Notre Dame (but not in, the line was HUGE) and around the Islands of the Seine.

Notre Dame:

Sunday my host took me up Montmatre (as featured in Amelie) and then down to the Moulin Rouge area, across to the Madeline and the Opera and then back through a giant park to the Louvre again!

We ended up sitting on the point of one of the Islands in the Seine (Ile de la Citie?) and hanging with our legs over the edge watching the light go down and all the lights of the city come up. Very cool.

Monday it was raining :(. Nonetheless I walked up the Eiffel tower and saw the limited view. I couldn't see ANYTHING from the top, except for the faint outline of the ground looking straight down. Lame. But, the Eiffel tower was cool, and the walk was fun. Pity about the rain.

         

The last thing I did in Paris was find the statue of Liberty. I lost my photos of the full size one in New York, so now I have photos of the smaller version in Paris.

Tuesday I hopped on the Eurostar to London and the English speaking world again. After 2 months I was sooo excited to go back! Byebye Euro and trains and motioning instead of talking, hello Pound and family!