Paris Adventures

Today was a success. We woke up this morning and had a taxi called to whisk us away to the Eiffel tower. As we kept driving through the city I kept looking out the window and was wondering where on Earth (or Paris) is it! Just as I was beginning to think we were being taken the wrong way, I turned to look out the other window and there it was in all its glory! It was pretty amazing to see the tower that has been featured in so many movies and television shows. We arrived there around two in the afternoon and there was already a huge line to go up the four different elevators to go up to the top. We decided it would be best to not wait in line for the hour it would take to get into the tower, and headed along the River Seine.

We grabbed some tea and had lunch at a cafe on the corner on the other side of the Seine from the Eiffel tower. It's always an experience to order food in another country. I must admit having some anxiety over how to order and how NOT to stand out as being obviously American. I had a club sandwich with French fries (oh, yes!), and Sean got this amazingly huge omelet that smelled awesome. When the time came to ask for the check (another moment of nervousness), our waiter, who had been fairly short and cold during the rest of our lunch, suddenly became talkative and asked us about Walker, Texas Ranger, once he found out we were from America. (On a personal note, I still don't get the whole fascination with Chuck Norris, but to each their own I suppose.)

We decided to walk down and cross this amazing bridge that had gold ornaments adorned on it and walked straight to the Musée de l'Armée where Napoleon Bonaparte's tomb is located. We made it just a half an hour before the tomb was to be closed for the day. It was pretty impressive as far as tombs go, and the actual tomb of Napoleon was not what I expected. It was enormous and made out of wood. We decided to then hurry back across the river to try to make it to the Musée Du Louvre. We were walking along the river when Sean suggested that we cut into the city early before getting to the Louvre so we can see more of the city. We entered into this huge plaza and headed through a park, where we walked past this little food stand where this most amazing smell was emanating from it. It was a little oasis of wonderful aromas that managed to travel through the freezing cold air to call to us. The stand was selling crepes and waffles. Without even asking each other whether we should get crepes we found ourselves in line. Sean chose chocolate banana and I decided upon apricot since I have never ever been a fan of chocolate. It was absolutely amazing and warmed me up as we made our way across the park to the Louvre.

Just as we had passed a frozen fountain where many confused ducks and seagulls were walking around on the frozen surface wondering what on Earth they were to do with themselves now, we saw the Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel. As we passed through the Arc we saw the giant glass pyramid that marked the entrance to the Louvre. We went inside and proceeded down the elevator only to discover that tickets had stopped being sold for the day 15 minutes before we arrived. Sean and I were both a little disappointed by this but decided that it only meant that we would wake up early and make sure we had plenty of time to walk through and appreciate the enormous museum.

It was becoming dusk by the time we exited the louvre so we decided to call it a day and caught a taxi to take us back to the hotel. It's always fun to take a taxi ride because you get to look out the window and see all of the many shops there are. Once we were dropped off we decided to walk back down to the end of the street where our hotel is (de' Italie) to investigate the shopping mall that we had noticed in the taxi. We got a couple sodas and spent an hour wondering around the various shops. I tried to find a scarf since the one I had is far too thin for the type of weather we've experienced today, but had no luck. I will continue my search for a warm Parisian scarf while we're out and about tomorrow. After the mall, we headed back to our hotel and settled in for the night.

Tomorrow we're planning on making our way to Versailles and then will go to the Arc de Triomphe and the Louvre, as well as Père Lachaise cemetary. If we end up not having enough time for everything tomorrow we decided that we'd stay an additional day to make sure we don't miss out on anything. That's the wonderful apart about not having an itinerary, if you don't have enough time, you can make the time. After Paris, we decided to go to Venice instead of doing Milan and Florence. We thought that it would be an interesting Italian city to experience before we had to return to Roma.

Well that's our adventures thus far. We'll post again tomorrow!

~Chloé