I stayed in Paris for 5 days, it's been action packed and amazing. We were staying at a friends flat downtown Paris, a 15 min walk to the Eiffel tower and the louvre, among many other amazing sights. Definitely didn´t have enough time for Paris, so we may come back early at the end before I fly out. There wasn´t any Internet at our flat, so this is the first time I´ve used it for non-emergency. The neighbors\other guys in the apartment building were our age (they were so great to show us around, speak English with us and even make meals together. I am now in Madrid using my Hostel´s internet, but Madrid stories will be posted later.
Paris Day 1:
I was locked out of the apartment with no name of who I'm looking for, no baye(travel partner) and no functional cell phone. Looked like a bum to the locals (they told me this) and not a good thing in this area of town, which was right outside the government/parliament and many guards/police officers around the assemble nationale. It rained this day but we ate with the French neighbors, walked around to get to know the area, bought groceries and planned day 2.
Day 2:
July 14 was France's independence day. We saw the air show (fighter jets followed the Sienne leaving streams of blue white and red, France´s colours) and parts of the parade from the sidewalks before continuing to the Louvre (though we only took photos around the outside, I planned to go inside the next day because the lines were stupidly long-- it´s free on independence day). We walked all over Paris, along the Sienne, and took way too many photos. That night the guys who share the apartment cooked for us. We tried riette, which is a repulsive looking spread for toast/bread, but was delicious(tasted like turkey dinner!) and also had French style pasta (plain cooked noodles with sliced tomatoes and chunks of mozerrella stirred in, and add salt\pepper to taste). After dinner (which we ate like Parisians at 10pm), we watched the independence day fireworks from the rooftop of the flat. (You can see the Eiffel tower from the roof). The Eiffel sparkled in sync with the show, which was gorgeous, but also was ridiculously long; It was 35 minutes of fireworks. Baye and I, multiple times, clapped (and thought to ourselves 'ahh, now I can go in and pee') and then it would keep going ('f*ck!'). After the fireworks we had a few drinks with their friends (on the "terrace" or rooftop) then went to a nearby Paris night club, where I actually knew 90% of the songs cause they're all English. We stayed up way too late, went to bed at 6am (though this was much earlier than the Parisians) and got up again at 8am to try to beat the line for the Eiffel ...
Day 3:
We were dead exhausted but still thrilled to be at the Eiffel. Completely failed to beat the crowds because we left later than planned AND it opened earlier than we thought. Waited 2.5 hours in line (and it was also freezing cold despite our hopeful attire of shorts and tshirts). The view was incredible but you couldn't spend more than an hour looking around. It was very neat to see how different the city is than any city in North America. There was one very small area of high rise buildings off on the distance, but for the most part all you could see was the traditional white and tan apartments as far as the eye could see. Of course, on top of that, you can see all the famous monuments like the arc de triumph and churches and parcs, though what shocked me most was the lack of trees. Only one area, about the same amount as the city, was green of a forest. They have trees lining the streets and the sienne river, but other than that its all developed (and beautifully old).
It was Sunday, and the Bastille market is only open Thursdays and Sundays, so we then rented bikes and it took us 20 minutes to ride there, with the intention of picking up fresh fish to cook for the guys. Took us a long time to figure out how to rent a bike, and although navigating the city was a breeze (easy when you can follow the river) we arrived too late and the market had already closed :(. We still went to a grocery store and bought things to make a Canadian meal of maple salmon and rice and carrots. Walter (son of the host family) said it's very English to separate all the foods, in France they usually have the food groups mixed all into one dish.
Day 4:
By Monday morning I'd caught a cold. Go figure, as I had barely slept on the plane plus the lack of sleep from going out the night before the Eiffel Tower. Bright and early we bicycled to the Arc de Triomphe. It was STUNNING. Wish I could have seen it lit up at night. We then walked back to the Grand Palais and Hotel nvalides, which are both super close to the apartment but we hadn't yet taken photos. Around this time Baye and I started realizing how many pictures we were taking that were just of buildings whose names we won't remember (I was at around 200 photo count by then). So now we've started getting more of ourselves making goofy poses in them.
We walked along le rue Champs Élysées with crazy big brand names like Louis Vuitton, Armani, Dior etc along it. We then went to the train station to figure out our tickets. We weren't very pleases upon our departure despite the very friendly customer service rep. We already have a rail pass worth more than 500$, and the most cost effective route was to take the night train from Paris to Madrid... there was a booking fee of 77Euro! That´s about $100.00. We were so shocked that there was this much of an additional fee and questioned why we even got the rail pass in the first place.:( That night Walter´s dad was back home from Southern France and he took us out for steak frites. (Steak and Fries). It was SCRUMPTIOUS. We also tried this chocolate dessert, but I will have to come back with the name of it. Hard to remember so many things in French! After dinner he drove us around the city showing us everything from the streets again, with the covnertible roof down. It was a real treat. Both Walter and his dad knew so many facts, about what year Egyptian statues were given to France (and how there are now only 3 in Egypt when there should be 4), about history of the churches and parliament buildings. It was really nice.
Day 5:
Baye decided she´d rather go for a run than see the Louvre, but this was still a priority on my list, so we split up in the morning. Baye´s run was going to be shorter than my visit so she kept the key, but unfortunately I showed up to a CLOSED sign at the door :( No Louvre for me. I waited outside the apartment again until she got home. We packed up our things, tidied the apartment, and took one last stroll around Paris before quickly getting some advice on Madrid from Walter since he used to go to school there. So far his advice has been great!
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