Paris

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  Paris, Île-de-France, France
Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Hey there,

I have spent the last four days in Paris!!  I will post pictures as soon as I can- it takes forever and then often freezes so your imaginations will have to do for now.

July 13:

Today I headed over to the Louvre.  It is unbelievably huge and there is no possible way to take it all in at one visit.  I spent the morning there and got to see the Mona Lisa and Venus de Milo and other interesting artifacts and old paintings and sculptures.  I went to a little cafe on my way out of the Louvre and paid yes the equivalent to $6 for a glass of coke.  My drink was more than my baguette!!  It wasn't listed on the menu.  It is funny though... you can pay $6 for coke but $2 for a beer.  I decided to walk to the Eiffel Tower after lunch.  I could see it in the distance and it was a good chance to see the streets of Paris.  I don't find the architecture much different from London; however, it is a dirty city.  The Eiffel Tower was bigger than I imagined and quite astounding.  I decided to go to the summit which meant waiting in a line for over 3 hours to buy my ticket.  You can see all of Paris from the top.  It was pretty crowded and ended up raining so I waited in another line to get back down!!  Lots of lines...!!

I am very glad I waited and went up to the top!  I got back the hostel and was just relaxing and a couple people from my room were heading out to a concert which was right outside of the hostel.... there was no going to bed early anyway, so I went.  We had a good time and didn't go to bed until late.  The atmosphere in Paris is very relaxed - except when fighting for the Metro and there are people playing french music on the buses and trains, kids setting off firecrakers along the river. 

July 14:

Today started out to be a pretty crappy day.  It unfotunately, or so I thought, was Bastille day which meant that everything was closed.  I had planned on going to Versailles and possibly Notre Dame depending on the time.  Instead I hung out with some of the people in my dorm.  We really didn't do too much and then went to grab some snacks to go check out this Bastille day and the celebrations.  It was amazing actually because I really wanted to see the Eiffel Tower lit up at night but didn't want to venture on the Metro at 11pm by myself.  There were four of us and we had a once in a lifetime experience.  There were over 55,000 people on the grass in front of the Eiffel Tower.  There was a live concert for about 2 hours and then around 10 the Eiffel Tower was lit up which was more than enough for me.  But at the end of the concert the orchestra started to play and there was an unbelievable fireworks show... yes... from behind the Eiffel Tower.  It was breath-taking and something I will not soon forget.  It was pure luck that I was in Paris today but I'm very grateful that I was!!

Now the end of the night was much to be desired because there were 55,000 people trying to get to and on the same Metro line... yikes.  The four of us held on for dear life and there were points when you were getting pushed so hard you weren't even touching the group...

July 15:

Today almost everyone in my room headed on to the next stop on there journeys, so I headed off to Versailles.  I stood in line for over 2 hours and got a nice sun burn.  It hasn't really been nice weather so I didn't have any sunscreen with me and hadn't thought of it.  After waiting in line I went through the Palace and state apartments.  The palaces etc are all fairly similar but have different stories so I have been getting the audio guides to help explain the rooms.  The gardens here were very extensive.  Flowers and trees as far as you could see.  A man made pond with boats on it, fountains and perfectly manicured trees and hedges.  Versailles is massive!!  I ended up spending the entire day there, so I didn't get to a couple places I would have like to but the fireworks were more than enough to make coming to Paris worth it!  I head to Berlin tomorrow morning... up at 5:30!  My french came back fairly well and you don't realize how much you pick up from being in Canada with everything in both languages...  my German however is not so great!

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