So it started off at the airport. We were very close to missing our flight cuz we were standing in the wrong line. Stupid, I know, but we made it! We thought we'd have to get our passport stamped, so we were in the line where passport control was, but apparently, you don't get your passport stamped for going from Spain to France (weird, huh?). So luckily, the lady at the Paris gate was like, "Transavia! PARIS ORLY!" (transavia being the flight company we were going to, and orly being the airport we were supposed to be landing in), so we rushed over to the lady, and we ended up being the last ones to board the plane. Sad, huh? But at least we made it. I actually kinda had the feeling there were a few people in the line we were in who didn't hear the announcement..I wonder if they made it...
So anyway, the flight was pleasant enough. It was relatively empty, so it was nice and spacey for Candice and me.
First shot of Paris from the plane. I swear we could see the Eiffel Tower. You can't see it in the picture cuz it's so blurry, but it's there =)
First picture of us! It took us a few tries and the people behind us shouted at us for the first picture (not here) and they were like, "NO FLASH!" but we took a few more shots anyway. I think that's why I look scared/surprised.
last minute on the plane, we decided that we should listen to some Beauty and the Beast songs cuz they have some french words..hahah we learned a lot of dessert names, i think..and "Sherie" ("..tie your *something* around your neck, SHERIE, and we provide the rest") =D
So we got lost getting to our hostel from the airport. The information they gave us wasn't too helpful. They had just told us that it was 5 minutes away from the airport, and so when we landed we asked information what would be the best way to get to our hostel and they gave us a bus number, but didn't tell us where to stop, so we got on the bus and we asked the bus driver (who didn't speak English) how to get to our hostel (we showed the address to all these people) and then he said he'd let us know where to get off. It ended up being the last stop of the bus and the bus driver was nice enough to sort of swerve off course to show us where we should go. We got off, walked up this stairway in the direction the bus driver had said, and then didn't know where to go next. So we thought, hm..let's just try to take a taxi. So we were actually at a train station, so there was a taxi driver in the parking lot of the train station, so we asked him how to get to our hostel and he drew us this really nice map to show us the way. he didn't speak English too well, either, but he got his point across. It was kinda fun trying to communicate with him, because with his gestures and whatnot, we would say an english word, and he'd be like, "YES!" hahaha and so we followed his directions, but apparently, I made a wrong turn somewhere cuz we ended up about, maybe 3/4 to a mile away from a bridge that we were supposed to cross. Luckily there was such a great landmark for us to follow. But I wasn't sure if there was more than one bridge, so I wanted to call the hostel and find out. I call them, turns out, they don't speak english all that well. First try, I say, "I'm trying to get to the hostel" really slowly so that maybe the girl could understand me, but all she said was "I don't know." and hung up on me. Well, we really needed to get to the hostel and couldn't really just figure things out on our own, so I called again, and the girl was avoiding my call! She didn't answer. Called again, she answered and this time I spoke really slowly with simple words. I said, "we're lost. How do we get to the hostel" and then she said "where are you?" and I tried to say the name of the street, but I have really bad pronunciation, and so either she couldn't understand me, or she didn't know where the street was so then she told me "reception is closed" and then I said "uh..does that mean we can't check in?" and then she said, "no, you can. Your key is on the desk." and so I was like, ok, so how do we get there? so I said to her "we're by the river" and then she said, "oh! first right after the bridge" and so I said "is there only one bridge?" and she said "yes." and so I said, "ok! thank you!" and so that was that. so we walked along the river to get to the bridge, and on our way, this car slowed down next to us and the driver said some things to us in french, but of course, we didn't understand, so it kinda freaked us out, so we walked closer to the river and farther from the street, but then there was this car parked by the river and the windows were all foggy...we were kinda like, "uhhh..don't wanna interrupt whatever's going on there..." we we tried to walk a far away from the car as possible, but we had to pass it, and as we were passing, the girl in the passenger seat of the car opened the car door and was like, "BITCH!" and it was just like, "ohhh, my gosh..we weren't even doing anything! that's really rude!" at that point, I was kinda like, "oh man, what they say about French people are true!" and like the girl kept shouting at us from the car as we walked farther away. I was kinda scared that the car would try to like, run us over or something! Luckily, it didn't, but after that, we walked up on the street again. So then we finally reached the bridge and this picture was taken as we were walking across the bridge.So once we finally got the hostel, we see this car driving out of the parking lot, and when we get us to the door, the lights are off and the door is locked =T and we look inside, and you could see our key riiiight there on the desk....Soooo, we start to get a little pissed cuz it's like, dude, we just talked to the girl..ok, maybe like, 30 minutes before, but still, she knew we were coming, what the heck..you know? and then we were thinking, oh man, that car that we saw driving out was probably her! She saw us!! *shakes head* so then on the door, there were a bunch of numbers for other hotels nearby. and So i called all of them to try to find a place to sleep for the night. Only two of the hotels answered. The first one was full, and the second, the last number on the list, had vaccancies, and the guy I talked to was really nice. I told him we'd come over. So then there were also taxi numbers, so I called those, and only one answered and when they answered, i was like, "i need a taxi" and then he said "for when?" and i said, "uh..right now?" and he was like, "no, not right now. bye bye!" yea....it was kind of a difficult night. So I called the hotel again, and asked the guy if he could called a taxi for us. I was like, "we were supposed to stay at this other hotel, but there's no one there, and we can't get inside." and he said "really? That's so strange" and i said "iiii know!" so then the guy gave me another taxi number and then he told me to call him back after. I thought it was nice of him to want to make sure that we got it ok. So I called the number, went through this whooole process, and when it was about done, this guy walks up to the hotel (just some guy who was staying at the hotel, but coming in late) and he knew the code to get in, so he let us in. So I was on the phone with the taxi driver, and he was saying, "there're no taxi drivers who want to go out there, but.." and then I said, "oh..it's ok. we'll find another way" hahaha but then he seemed glad of it. so then I decided that I should call the other hotel back and tell them that we wouldn't going there anymore, since he was so nice to me. So I called, and I was like, "we got into our hotel, so we won't be needing yours anymore" (haha, I know that sounds kinda rude, but then I said:) "but thank you soo much for being so nice" and then he said "you're welcome! Have a good night!" he was a very nice french man. hahah, oh and by the way, at the beginning of all these conversations, I said, "parlez-vous anglais?" which means "do you speak english?" and so I got very good at saying it. But anywho, yes, we got into our hotel finally, and went to bed. (ok, so I know so far it doesn't sound like a great trip, but there're bound to be a few bumps along the way, right?)
So first full day of Paris! we woke up early, and went down to talk to the receptionist, who was actually there this time, and asked her about maps and whatnot. She wasn't that nice...but whatever. Went down to the train station and on the way, we passed by this little bakery and picked up breakfast. I got a croissant and another little pastry. it was reaaaaally good. I was really impressed with the croissant. Our hotel was actually about 30 minutes away from the city center, so we had to take a train (3.50 euros one way) and so we get our tickets (with a little difficulty) and then we were on our way! Once we got to Paris, our first destination was the Bastille. We decided that for that day, we would just walk around a certain area, and save money on metro trips! Great idea, by the way!
Us in front of the Bastille.
Another stop on our walk: Place de Vosges.
Park inside Place de Vosges
I got excited to be in paris and took pictures with random things. I wanted to go inside the fountain (there's no water in there) but I didn't want to get in trouble. I'm about to fall in this one. hahah
Me with a lamp post =)
Next we walked down to Hotel de Ville. This carousel was right in front of it.
Building next to Hotel de Ville
Us with Hotel de Ville
Hotel de Ville
Right across the river from Hotel de Ville is Notre Dame, so this is us crossing the river...
And there's Notre Dame
Right across the street from Notre Dame is a whole bunch of Creperies and souvenir shops. the shops were actually reasonably priced (some things were even cheaper than things at the shops of Spain!). We were getting tired so we took a little break at a little cafe and I got a hot chocolate and a cheese crepe..mmmm, it was so good!
Candice never tells me when we're going to do silly faces!
More of Notre Dame
cool, huh?
So this was my lunch. And since I had already eaten the crepe, I just got a soup, which I was glad of because the soup of pricey, as was everything else in the restaurant. But our waiter was pretty nice. I started out by saying, "parlez-vous anglais" and he said "a little, but you speak very good french!" HAHA that was was very nice of him =) and since the moulin rouge wasn't on the map, I asked him if he could point it out for us, and that was our next stop!
there it is! haha, i was really excited! On our way there, we had to take a metro, and while looking for the metro, we were on a street corner and i was looking on my map, and some random guy on a bike stops and asks us if we need help! That was really nice. He was like, "you speak english? where do you want to go?" and we were like, "oh, just any metro" and then he points us in the right direction, and then he chats to us for a little bit" he asks where we're from and then we tell him that we're studying abroad in Spain and he's like, "oh! I speak a little spanish" and then he talks to us in Spanish. It was really funny. He was really nice though.
we basically just took pictures and then left. But the metro ride there was free cuz the entrance gate was broken and didn't ask us for a ticket =D
And then we were off to the Lourve. It was free that day from 6pm-10, so that's the time we decided to go. It was the end of the day, and we were dead tired, but at least it was free =) I was still really pleased with it. It was really odd, cuz one of Candice's friends was in paris that weekend too, and out of no where, we hear someone shout out Candice's name while we were on an escalator at the Lourve, and it turns out to be Candice's friend! Is that crazy or what? She was RIGHT behind us too! And she hadn't seen Candice until we were halfway up the escalator, so it was pretty crazy.
We got to the Lourve about 2 hours before 6 cuz we thought there'd be a really long line, but that wasn't the case, so we had some time to kill. This picture was taken just before it started pouring rain...
So we went inside and had a little snack. The inside of the Lourve is like a little mall, which was pretty interesting. it even had a food court! And the prices were cheaper than the prices we'd been seeing at all the cafes we'd passed by, so we thought it was a good deal to take a break.
Crowd at the Lourve.
This is inside the Lourve
The Mona Lisa! Everyone says that it's so tiny, but it's not THAT small. I think maybe because i was expecting it be be tiny, I was pleasantly surprised at the size =)
I took a picture with it =)
So this is what all the fuss looks like. The Mona Lisa is in the middle of this room on a wall that's in the middle of the room, and it had a glass cover, and it's roped off at about a 7-8 feet radius. people are crowding all around it, but it wasn't too hard to get to the front to get a good look AND a good picture (as you can see from the pictures above this one). I was not disappointed by it at all.
So after the Mona Lisa, we decided that we wanted to see the Last Supper. We ask a worker, and we're like, "where's the Last Supper" and she says simply, "Milan" HAHAH Shows how much we know about art, huh? So then we ask about the Madonna and she points us down the hallway. So we go down the wall, and don't see anything called the Madonna. Now, keep in mind that we don't know what the Madonna looks like. All our information comes from the DaVinci code (ridiculous, I know, but it's true! haha) so at the end of the hall, we ask a guy worker, and he like, "what? there's nothing called the Madonna here.." but we know that the Madonna's in the Lourve, so we keep pushing it and so he asks us to write it down..so I write "la madona" (I didn't know if it was spelled with two n's or not) and then he looks at what I write and he's like, "OH!!! La Madonna! DUH!!!" hahaha, seriously, he said duh, or maybe the french version of it..hahha, but anyway, we points us in the direction that we came, sooo, we check the wall AGAIN, looking very carefully at the signs. Again, nothing called the Madonna, or even with the words Madonna in it! So again, we ask another worker, and this girl's a bit more specific and says after this, but before that. so we check in that section, and there's this crowd around a particular painting, so we're thinking that that has to be it, but still, we're not sure. So then I hear two girls talking in English, and one girl's like, "We had to redraw this in class" so I figured, these girls HAVE to know if this is the Madonna or not, especially if she had to draw it, so I go up to the girls, and I'm like, "This might be a stupid question, but is that the Madonna?" haha, yes, yes it was. So I took a picture and there it is =)
Statue. I thought this was the Venus de Milo, but it's not. man, I'm REALLY bad with art =X
Ancient Egypt portion of the lourve
tombs!
View from a window on the third floor of the lourve.
we tried to get a good picture. after 4 tries, this was the best one.
this was one of the works. I thought it was a real guy and I was wondering what he was looking at so closely! hahah, I think the artist was trying to make fun of people who look at art...
outside the lourve, eiffel tower in the background! =)
So we left the Lourve at about 8:30pm, and all the surrounding shops and stuff were closed! So we decided we would head back toward our hostel and look for dinner there. We hop onto a train and turns out that it's the WRONG train. The same train splits routes, and so we got onto the wrong route. We end up at the end of the line, and we're like, crap, what do we do? We ask a random guy, he doesn't speak english, so we point to the stop that we want, and he takes us to like, a little office where there are workers. At first, there's no one who speaks english, so the first guy that helped us, we was already leaving, but i guess he realized that no one spoke english, so he comes back and tells the people in french which stop we wanted. I thought that was super nice of him. And then they're trying to explain to us how to take the bus to where we want to go. But then a guy who does speak a little english comes out, and he tries to help us. he was really funny. I asked him if he had a pen so that I could write down everything, and he got really excited when someone found a pen, he was like, "good! very good!" and he was like, hopping around all over the place. he was funny. So then he tells us that we should take a train back to the center of paris, and take a different train back down to where we want to go. So he takes us to the train as he expains (cuz the train's about to leave) and he sends us off and is like, "good luck!" So he actually gave us a really good map, too (the other map we had didn't have all the stops listed, which is why were went all the way to the end of the line without knowing we were on the wrong train. So I look at the map, and I decide that we shouldn't go alll the way into town, just to the stop where the route splits, since it was only two stops away from where we wanted to be, and so if anything were to go wrong trainwise, we could just take a taxi or walk it, or something. So we get to that stop, and it's totally empty. We walk out, and wait about 15 minutes, no taxis stop by. We didn't have a number of a taxi company. So then we decide that we'll cross the street to get to a restaurant that was there and ask the workers there. The street was pretty big and kinda busy, well, not busy, but there was a flow of cars. so we were kinda hesitant in crossing. Candice and I were standing at the edge of the street, ready to run across, when I notice a guy standing in the station, so I kinda leave Candice hangin, and I'm like, "i'm gonna ask that guy" hahaha, so I start the conversation with the way I did the whole weekend ("Parlez-vous anglais?") and he says no. hhah, So I point to where we want to go, and he reads the schedule for us (cuz it was kinda confusing and we didn't know how to read it, but he did) and he says "do, twa, un, sect" hahaha, now Elaine has taught me very little of french, but I do know how to count! haha, so he was reading the time of the departure of the train for me and I understood! So then he was like, "un, b" that was the platform =) And he wasn't sure if I understood, so he took me to the platform. i thought that was super nice of him. So then at the platform, he was like, (and not so much in words, but in gestures) "ok, bye bye!" and he started walking back, but I started walking back with him cuz I had to go back to get Candice, and he was kinda like, "no, you stay here." hahaha, and I was trying to convey to him that I had to get candice, so I was like, "my friend" and I made like, motions to signal another person next to me..hahhaha it was difficult, but I think he got it cuz he was like, "ohhh." so yea, that was interesting, but fun at the same time. so finally, candice and I were on the right train and we got back to the hotel at about 1am, when we had started the whole trip at about 9pm..sad, huh? But it's ok. At least we asked the right people (that is, NICE people) where we should go =)
Day 2 was pretty much devoted to the Eiffel Tower.
So we decided that we were going to take the metro more the second day, and we found out that there was this day pass, called mobiles, and it's only 9 euros and you get unlimited rides for the day and it's totally worth it (it was worth it for us at least since we would've had to pay 7 euros already just to get to and from Paris city center from our hostel) but it we still saved money the first day by not getting it because we got all those free rides (score!). So then we took two metros to get to the Eiffel Tower and once we got there, I was pretty amazed with the view. I think the top of it isn't so impressive, but the base is. I don't know why. Maybe just cuz it's so big, but the four bases really look amazing. and being under it is pretty amazing. I know it sounds corny, but that's how I felt being under the Eiffel Tower. And so we walked over, and there were two or three different lines. I think it's cuz you could enter from any of the four bases. But one of the bases were closed, thus only 3 entrances. So then we sorta randomly got in a line, and we just happened to end up in the line that's the stair entrance. That's ok, though, cuz that's what we (at least, that's what I) wanted, cuz it's cheaper by like, 2 or 3 euros, which I know isn't much, but dude, anything saving is a saving. So then all throughout the waiting of the line, there was this asian group behind us and they were serious all up on our butts, dude. Well, like, you know, there were freaking tailgating us! I think they thought they could try to cut in front of us, but we didn't let them. So then we finally get to the front of the line, get our tickets and we were off!
Right under the Eiffel Tower
The Tower had just opened and there was already a crowd
and the journey begins..
There were a lot of steps. I was really sore by the time we reached the first floor. and we still had another few hundred steps to climb to get to the second floor, where we would then pay to take an elevator to the top (no choice between steps and elevator there). At the second floor, I had a problem. hahaa...I got my period. =X hahaha, I know that's embarrassing to post online, BUT I thought it was cool that I got my period on the Eiffel Tower =P Luckily I was prepared and LUCKILY there's a bathroom on the second floor of the Eiffel Tower (FYI, by the way, for future notice). I was worried cuz I was wondering how they were going to have a bathroom on the second floor..where does the...stuff...go? hahahah so yes, that was interesting. The second floor was really crowded. We took a break to get some snacks too. I got a cappachino, i think, some kind of coffee drink and we shared some french fries (we both had a craving, which was kind of weird, but they weren't expensive). and then we went into yet another line to get tickets to get onto the elevator, and then yet ANOTHER line to actually get ONTO the elevator. It was funny cuz there were a lot of British people there and they were like, *in british accent* "there are so many queues." And then Candice and I had a whole conversation about the word queue and I told her how I learned that word from Netflix..hahaha =D
Just before us, there was this little German family taking a picture like this, well, actually, the Mom and the older sister looked all serious, and then the littlest girl looked like this. I wanted to copy her. It was funny cuz the dad was trying to get the picture right, so the little girl was holding her pose like this for a while. hahaha
hello! see my reflection?
The very top of the tower. It's not THAT impressive, but it's an experience. It was very chilly too. And very crowded. I took a video of us going up. It's on the bottom. =D
So yes, after the whole going up the Eiffel Tower shebang, we went to the classic grassy area to take pictures! Although, they fence off the grass, so you can't actually sit in the grass...
jumping pictures!
We found a nice couple to take the picture for us. They were really nice and patient, especially since we wanted jumping pictures, but actually, we got this in one shot. Oh yes, we're good. =)
I really like this picture =D I set up the camera the way I wanted it, and had Candice hold it, and then I walked into the picture the way I wanted. hahaha, I'm so smart =P
Then we took a metro to the Arc de Triumphe. We didn't even cross the street to see it. Just took pictures from right where the metro lets you out. You can pay to go in and go to the top, but we're on a budget! =D
Then we headed over to Galleries Lafayette where we were supposed to meet up with Andrew, a friend who's also studying abroad in Granada and who happened to be in Paris at the same time, too, but it turned out that there are two Galleries Lafayettes. Bummer. So then he said that he was going to eat dinner at the Red Light District with the friend he was staying with. We thought, oh maybe we can meet up with him there, but when we tried asking workers where the Red Light District was, they had no idea what we were talking about, which I suppose isn't too surprising. I don't think French people would call it the red light district. Anywho, the lady we asked was really nice and suggested some other streets to look for restaurants. So we decided to head toward the Moulin Rouge to find a restaurant.
Moulin Rouge at night!
turns out, the area by the Moulin Rouge WAS the Red Light District. We thought so, but we weren't sure until the next day when we met Andrew at the airport and he told us. So yea, there were a bunch of sex shops and everything. But it was actually a really cool area.
We found this really cool restaurant called Le Cine. we decided we'd splurge a little since it was our last night in paris and since we didn't have dinner the night before. the dinner only cost 20 euros for each of us. that's like, 10 euros for each night, if we had dinner the night before, so I think it wasn't bad.
We shared an appetizer, a salad with duck and salmon. realllly good.
The main dish was steak with salad and french fries. yummy! I haven't had steak in so long. it was a nice change.
Then for dessert I got a French Cheese Platter and Candice got Creme Brulee. We shared the two so that we could get more variety and taste more things. the Creme Brulee was soooo good. The cheese was ok. There were three varieties, but I only liked the last one that I tried, and then I ended up dropping it. So very sad...
Then after dinner, we headed back to the Eiffel Tower to see it up in lights (since we had that all day metro pass anyway!) haha, so yea, it was actually a REALLY good idea to do that too, cuz it was sooo pretty!
And then it started sparkling for us!! I had no idea that it does that! Everyone was like, WHOAAAA. And got out their cameras. We were like, Quick! Take a picture! Cuz we didn't know how long it lasts for, but apparently, it does it every hour for 15 mins. haha, I'm surprised that no one ever mentioned that! I thought it was the coolest thing ever! [There's a video at the bottom, cuz it's hard to capture the sparkling in a picture]
While we were taking pictures, we met some Hawaiian girls who were just on vacation. It was pretty interesting because I thought they were from California at first, but once they said that they were from Hawaii, it was obvious. Interesting how that works, huh? But they were nice. They took this picture for us. =D
As we were walking back from the Eiffel Tower to the Metro station, Candice got really annoyed at the sketchy people trying to sell Eiffel Tower products, and so she said she was going to hiss at them. hahahaha, it was kinda funny. I video tapped it, but something went wrong, and I didn't get the whole thing. But what happened was Candice hissed at the guy, and he was kinda surprised, but I was walking behind Candice, so while she was ahead, I was walking by the guy, and I heard him hiss back! Hahaha, kinda funny, too bad I didn't catch it on tape, and Candice didn't hear him hiss back =T
And that sums up the trip! It was awesome. Thinking back on it, I think one of the things that made it really great were the people that we met along the way, the ones who were so nice to help us, so in a way, the getting lost and stuff made the trip better. But really, Paris is my favorite city of Europe right now. =D I wanna go back!
Hope everyone's doing well! I'll be home in 2 and a half months! =)
