Parisian Chronicles

It’s been a week and let me tell you, things have been absolutely crazy! There’s so much to cover, it’s impossible to do in one blog. So I’ll be doing it in two.

I left off last time after our first day in Paris. We’d seen the Arch de Triomphe (easily once we found the secret underground entrance since it’s sitting in the middle of a very busy circle) and the Louvre (which involved a lot of asking for directions, seeing as it’s so big, one can’t help but get lost; also, did you know it used to house the French royalty?!) and retired to the hotel a bit early to sleep off the rest of our jet lag.

Day two we tried to set out for Versailles early in the morning. There were two problems with that plan. Number 1: I had control of the alarm and when it went off, I subconsciously turned it off, so we had a late start. Number 2: My checked suitcase hadn’t arrived at the hotel the night before like the lady at the airport promised. This resulted in a good hour of playing “how to dial out of the hotel and contact the correct person,” all of which was useless by the way; they just said it had gotten put on a later flight than originally anticipated.

Versailles was beautiful, although a bit crowded. I’m starting to hate Asian tours – I literally got swarmed by one! I’m really glad we took the walk down to see the Grand Trianon and the Petite Trianon, because their real-life-back-when-men-wore-wigs set-up was worth the painful journey in flip-flops. Also, the gardens were absolutely gorgeous. We even managed to discover secret houses on the property – they were built for various queens over the years and buried waaay in back. I hope I’ll get to explore the garden again while I’m here. More specifically, I hope I can find a way to explore the garden on bike this time!

Les jolis jardins

One of the Trianons. Marie Antoinette's touch is evident in this pink themed room.

The pavement at the end of our cobblestone tortured journey.

After Versailles, it was 7pm, and we were starved. We’d had breakfast, but that was it; reasonably priced food at Versailles is harder to come by than at Cedar Point! So we headed towards the Eiffel Tower, in hopes that we’d find somewhere to eat. Let me just say that there’s not that many places to eat late in a country that eats later than we do. Eventually we found a place and after a franglais dining experience, we headed toward the Eiffel Tower. It was too late by then to go up, but we wanted to see it lit up. And a lit-up Eiffel Tower did we ever see!

The next day we got up and returned to go up the Eiffel Tower. All seemed hopeless when, after having dodged the illegal miniature Eiffel Tower vendors (illegal b/c they ran when the police walked nearby,) “Top closed due to congestion” appeared on the screen. However, it all worked out in the end. By the time we got up to the second level (there’s three levels,) they’d reopened the top level. We even made some friends from Michigan there – a dad touring Europe with his son who’d just graduated U of Michigan. We made great picture buddies! And whether we sneaked a pic of them for the memory, that’s between us and our cameras ;)

After the Eiffel Tower, we headed to the highest point in Paris, Montmartre, named for St. Denis whom was martyred there. Somehow, we got our hands on a false Metro stop for Montmartre and when we got off, there were no sights to be seen. An elderly man stopped and asked us where we were trying to go. We asked if he spoke English, and after replying no, he spent 10 min trying to give us directions in rapid French. I speak French, but I’m not that quick! It was quite annoying. We did, however, comprehend which Metro stop was correct, and after we got rid of him and some more walking and Metro stops, we finally found what we were looking for. Once there, we passed by a square full of artists selling their works (I may have to go back there and look for something to bring home) on our way up – numerous stairs were involved – and when we reached to top, we came upon a beautiful church. As we walked around, we came upon some beautiful sights of Paris from our perch, happened across a public puppet show portraying Noah’s Ark, and found le Mur d’Amour (Love Wall) on which “I love you” is written in jillions of languages. I’m a fan of Montmartre.

La Mur d'Amour. That group of girls on the left? A very giggly bunch of bachelorettes who insisted on standing in front of the wall people want to take a photo of for eternity.

By that time, it was full out panic mode. My suitcase still hadn’t arrived and we were leaving the next day. It had been promised Friday evening and it was Sunday. Nobody would pick up the phone that could tell me where my bag was; what the heck! After more phone calls, it was suggested that we go down to the airport ourselves. So we gave up 2.5 hours of our precious time in Paris on a train ride and a chat with baggage claims. It turned out that the bag was being delivered as we were speaking and our trip had been for nothing other than the satisfaction that I wouldn’t leave Paris without my suitcase. The kicker of the story is that they told me there that my bag didn’t have any priority over regular bags and the story I got from my parents is that it was accidently sent to Italie – they called my house asking whether it was ok to send it to my US address since that’s what I’d put on my bag tag. Stupid airport, they don't even know what happened to it!

At this point it was getting dark, but Christine and I weren’t leaving Paris without one more adventure so we headed over to Notre Dame. Let me tell you, it was soooo worth the effort! It’s beautiful! After pictures, we realized our stomachs were angry at us for ignoring them again, and we went in pursuit of a restaurant. Numerous places were closed, so we ended up at an expensive restaurant, but hey, it was open! After dinner, we realized the metro might be closing soon and our hotel lobby closes at midnight – we had to book it. And book it we did: we literally ran from the metro to our hotel. We walked in at 12:00 on the dot and after knocking for a minute in despair, the lobby man came around and let us in. He even gave me my suitcase! We headed upstairs out of breath and glad to be back.

Now if anyone thought that our adventures were uneventful so far, just keep reading. We woke up at 4:30 AM to get out of the hotel and on our way. We caught the very first train out of where we were staying at 5:30 AM and rushed to the SNFC (the big trains for cross country trips.) We had 15 minutes to print out our ticket and board the train, when what happens? The ticket kosick acts like a butt. It was a touch screen and it didn’t like our fingers and when it asked for name, it mean last name only, not full name like any normal person would assume. With 4 minutes until our 6:10 AM train departure, we get the tickets out and start sprinting toward the train. A guy with an official looking hat told us to hurry and he kept blowing his whistle. My suitcase toppled over at one point and I almost cried. Somehow, don’t ask me how, we arrived at an open door and Christine threw our stuff onboard and we climbed onboard also. We’d made it! Christine and I have a new saying now: “It doesn’t matter how it happened, we did it!”