I See London, I see France

Okay, I lied about the London part (That’s not for another few weeks.) But, this weekend I went to France and saw Versailles and so much of Paris. It was amazing. It was one of those trips where it ended and I knew I had to go back. With Dublin, I kind of just checked that one off of my list for the rest of my life. But experiencing Paris just made me want to go spend more time there. It was INCREDIBLE!

After an early morning of travel on Friday, we made it to our hotel (where we were sneaking 5 people into one two person room.) One thing about Paris is that everyone can tell you aren’t Parisian just based on looking at you. We walked up to the concierge and the woman said, “Good morning.” Being an idiot, I proceeded to ask her if she spoke English. She looked at me like I was an idiot, but I didn’t know how she could tell I didn’t speak French before I’d said anything…So, I just thought she was saying “Good morning” in English because tons of people know greetings in languages they don’t actually speak. But, anyway, we checked our bags into the hotel and lied about the amount of people there. Later, once the room was ready and we’d returned for the night, we discovered that the “Double Room” I’d booked for two people only had two less-than twin beds in it. For five people. (We made one giant bed and slept 5 to two twin beds. It wasn’t comfortable, to say the least. But at least it was better than my bed in Edinburgh!)

That first day, we met up with one of Riley’s friends from home who is studying abroad in Paris. We walked around Shakespeare and Co. and the shops around and almost got dragged in to 2342 restaurants because the hosts kept coming outside and trying to lure us in and we didn’t know how to get them to go away.

This is in Shakespeare and Co…I had to stealthily take this picture because they ask you to avoid taking pictures, since it’s such a small space and so many people are always there. But, being the rebel I am, I had to take a picture of a portion of Ray Bradbury’s section.

Speaking of food, this is all we ate in Paris (not pictured, more croissants)

Lots of carbs were had this weekend. But it was all DELICIOUS. Also, even their bad wine is good wine.

Later, we walked all around Paris and even ended up around Notre Dame.

We walked over 24,000 steps this first day and didn’t get frostbite.

Then it started pouring down rain, so we headed to the Louvre for free student night. We spent a whole 3 hours at the Louvre and everything was AWESOME. I didn’t even know I liked museums (That makes me sound uncultured, I realize. But, hey…at least I know I like them now. Am I right?)

We spent a whopping 3 hours (maybe more) at the Louvre and saw as much as we possibly could.

The ceilings were amazing.

Of course, we saw the Mona Lisa. And I was pleasantly surprised at how big it was. Everyone always talks about how it’s so tiny, so I honestly expected it to be the size of printer paper. BUT IT WAS BIGGER. Much bigger than printer paper. I was so enthralled by it. Star shock.

Everything in the Louvre was awesome. Even this room of statues was breathtaking.

This painting was just HUGE, so I posed in front of it with a woman taking a selfie. 

The Louvre was great. Take me back, please.

After the Louvre, we went to dinner where none of us spoke French and ordering was a disaster (I didn’t understand our waitress when she said the quiche du jour was ‘quiche lorraine’ because apparently I’ve never heard someone say that dish with a French accent. Also, that restaurant’s quiche lorraine was sub-par compared to La Madeline, but it was still great.)

The next day, we woke up bright and early to our dad, Diana, bringing us delicious fresh croissants for breakfast. We then rushed around to get to a station to get us to Versailles and learned that all of the Versailles trains were cancelled that weekend. We got lost in another metro station, and I heard a random family speaking in English and I nervously approached them and asked the dad if he “spoke american.” He didn’t even flinch when I said this, although I did, and we learned that they were traveling as a family because their son is taking a gap year and were also going to Versailles. I asked if we could follow them there, since we were lost, and they let us. We then learned that they are from San Jose and the nicest family ever. My friends later joked that I had been adopted into this family, because I kept talking to them. I didn’t mind this, they were super cool. That is, until we split up at Versailles and every time we saw them after this they IGNORED US. But it’s chill.

Anyway, Versailles was FANTASTIC. Way bigger than I ever could’ve imagined.

No one would take our picture?

I have decided that I’m going to design Atlantis (my house at SCU) to look like this. S/o, ladies.

It was HUGE and amazing.

After this, we went to Notre Dame and fell in love with the stained glass there.

It was beautiful.

Then, we walked around Le Marais and tried escargot (Surprisingly good. Not so good that I wanted more than one snail, but good enough to where I chewed and swallowed it and smiled, before I remembered I was eating a snail.)

Here’s a picture of our lunch–snails included.

The Eiffel Tower!!

Eiffel in love with Paris when I got to see the Eiffel Tower. When you’re walking around Paris, it actually is quite easy spot this beautiful figure in the distance. Seeing it from afar was endearing. Seeing it in person was shocking. It was so beautiful. I love Paris.

Later that night, we went and heard an orchestra performance in the Conservatory at Sainte-Chapelle. Adrienne completely stumbled on this, and asked us to tagalong. And we did and none of us have any regrets. I was worried I’d be immature and laugh at how serious the performers were, but they were so incredible and the acoustics were so amazing (At one point, one guy went behind a pillar to play his violin and I just thought he was doing that so the soloist would get more attention on stage. Then I realized that standing behind the pillar AMPLIFIED the sound of his violin, and made it sound so much more incredible in the song. I was and still am in awe.)

The next morning, we woke up early (again) after sleeping 5 to a 2 person set up (again) and had croissants (again.) Croissants in Paris are a beautiful thing. I am extremely bloated now though.

We went to the Opera house–which ended up being closed on Sundays but open after 2, according to a sign. It made no sense, but it was closed when we got there around 9:15, which was quite a bummer.

Then we went to Musée d’Orsay and saw Van Gogh. We also saw the Sacré-Cœur from the view outside of a clock. It was pretty rad.

After this, we went to Musée de l’Orangerie and saw American Gothic and got to see how the French people perceived the Great Depression through an exhibit about the age of anxiety in America. We also saw Monet’s room of waterlilies there. It was all quite interesting and beautiful. Pictures weren’t allowed of the exhibit, though. So I apologize for lacking these.

Then we went back to Sainte-Chapelle and saw what the stained-glass room we’d been in the night before looked like during the day. It was truly breathtaking, and all of my pictures turned out blurry because I can’t take panoramas well. But it was so beautiful.

Lastly, we went to the Eiffel Tower during the daylight (sans rain) and had hot chocolate and crêpes in a park looking up to it.

It was freezing outside, but my food was warm and delicious (and sugar filled.)

Then, we had to leave. Riley also found out that she wasn’t on our flight out of the city and had to book a flight last minute to get home, because hers had left 5 hours earlier. It was a bit of a nightmare, but I’ll leave her to cover that in her post. It all worked out and we’re all home safe now, ready for election week and hell-week (3 papers due next week.) Help.

I need to go back to Paris at some point. Someone go with me?