PARIS!!!!!!!

Bonjour!!

I never thought I would say this, but five friends and I decided to spend this past weekend in PARIS! I would have blogged sooner but I had no internet access all weekend and then I was busy with classes/homework today. We got to our hostel late Thursday night. There were hundreds of other students staying there and it was a really fun (and clean!) place to stay. It was a bit out of the way from the center of the city, but it was very easy to get to the main locations using the Metro. 

So, not that this even really has to be said, but Paris is absolutely amazing! We started our first day off at Notre Dame, a 850-year-old cathedral. The gothic architecture and stained glass and all the gargoyles all make touring the cathedral very worth it. While in the area, we briefly visited the Latin Quarter, the area of Paris with some Roman influence from back in the day. One of my friends got a beret here, and we quickly came to realize that if you see someone wearing a beret, they’re probably not a local. 

Notre Dame!

All of us in front of Notre Dame

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Pretty stained glass :)

Seine River 

Latin Quarter 

Next stop: Arc d’Triomphe! Coming into the heart of Paris, we made a stop at the Arc d’Triomphe, a huge stone arc that Napoleon ordered to be built in honor of his victories. We climbed up the arc and came out the to the most spectacular 360 degree view of the entire city, Eiffel Tower and everything. The day was so clear (weather.com kept promising rain but I guess we just got really lucky!) and it felt like we were on top of the world. The arc is surrounded by the world’s busiest round-a-bout. There’s so much traffic that pedestrians have to use underground passages to get to the arc. The arc is also the meeting point of many main streets, most famous of which is the Champs-Elysees, the 5th Avenue of Paris. The street is wider than any other main streets I’ve seen, and it’s crowded with huge stores like Cartier and Louis Vuitton. We walked down the entire Champs Elysees (stopping at a creperie for lunch!) and ended at a huge plaza with beautiful buildings, the place where the guillotine once stood!!! (Now there’s an egyptian obelisk here that Egypt gave to France....not sure ho that’s related to the guillotine.)

Lisa and Kira on top of the Arc!

Champs-Elysees 

Lisa, Barbara, and I

Champs-Elysees 

Creperie 

Where the guillotine used to be

Sunset in Paris

From Champs-Elysees we continued our day by heading towards the direction of the Eiffel Tower. We went to Rue de Cler, a cobblestone street with fruit and meat markets and an array of adorable and very Parisian-looking cafes and restaurants. Apparently this is where Julia Child did her grocery shopping!!! We had a delicious French dinner, and yes, we did all try escargot. They were chewy. 

Rue de Cler!

Lots of fresh food markets...where JULIA CHILD did her grocery shopping!!! 

Yummy French dinner :)

Barbara's first snail! 

After dinner we walked to the Eiffel Tower, all lit up at night. No surprise that it’s one of the world’s most visited sites - it’s so overwhelming! I probably have dozens and dozens of pictures of it on my camera at this point. We were going to go up, but the line was insane - plus, nothing could beat the incredible view from the Arc d’Triomphe that we had seen earlier. We walked around the area near the tower and then just sat and looked at it for a while. It’s definitely one of those things where you don’t believe you’ve actually been there until later when you’re looking at the pictures on your camera. 

Me and five wonderful friends under the EIFFEL TOWER!

Last stop of the day: French dessert in a truly Parisian cafe! We went back to Rue de Cler and found a bustling cafe where we had the most heavenly desserts. I had creme brulee...so so so good! 

Agenda for day 2 - The Louvre!!!

On our second day in this magical city we visited the world’s most famous museum, The Louvre! It’s HUGE. I think it would honestly take days and days to really tour the whole thing. But we did see the essentials, including, of course, the original Mona Lisa! And Italian Renaissance paintings, French paintings, and at one point I got really lost and ended up in a room of portraits and crowned jewels of French monarchs from centuries ago. And as with every museum in London, it was awesome to recognize paintings we talked about in history classes in high school. 

Louvre!

Winged Victory of Samotrace

Artist at the Louvre :) 

Crown jewels

Louis!

Liberty Leading the People! 

Lisa holding Mona Lisa!

MONA LISA! 

After the Louvre two friends and I walked across the Siene River to Paris’s Left Bank, which is full of narrow streets crowded with boutiques and cafes. Definitely felt like a very typical place for Paris. We had lunch at a 102-year-old cafe and at every table there were French-speaking people, so it was nice to get away form the more touristy things for a bit. We walked around some more and then got delicious French pastries that we ate by the river. 

So many accordion players in Paris

Left Bank

La Pellette - 102 years old cafe in the Left Bank

beautiful pastries :)

Dessert by the Seine River...not a bad life!

Lisa, Sarah and I

Next stop: Montmartre! The Montmartre area, according to my tour book, is famous for street artists and a very bohemian vibe. We got there in the late afternoon and headed for Sacre Coeur, a very beautiful church up on a hill from where you have a lovely view of the entire city. We watched the sunset and when we went back down into the main areas of Montmartre the only places that seemed to be open were its sex shops....definitely an eclectic area I guess. But thanks to my tour book, we found Moulin Rouge, a really famous cabaret. And also this area is where Edith Piaf first performed “la Vie en Rose.”

Sacre Coeur 

View from the top of the hill

Sacre Coeur at night

Moulin Rouge!!!

I should probably mention that two of my fearless friends spent Saturday night sleeping (or at least attempting to) under the Eiffel Tower and returned to the hostel safe and ecstatic about the experience. 

A friend and I began our third and, sadly, final day at the Musee d’Orsay, full of impressionist paintings. All the classic Monet and Renoir paintings (my favorite Renoir painting is still in Boston’s MFA though, even after having been to Paris) were in there, and I especially enjoyed Degas’ paintings of all the ballerinas. The museum isn’t too big or overwhelming like the Louvre, just a very nice place to relax. The museum building used to be a train station so the interior looks really cool.  

Afterwards, thanks to the maps and suggestions of my tour book, I had my own individual adventure in Marais which seemed to me like a bit of an even more upscale neighborhood. My adventure began at the plaza where the Bastille used to stand, in fact the outline of the building is marked on the cement of the plaza. Then I got onto a main street and followed the typical Parisian streets with cute little shops, neat and well-dressed French people, cafes, even more cafes (Marais had some very nice cafes), and, very unique to Marais, a lively Jewish quarter. I’ve been to a lot of Jewish quarters in European cities and usually it’s more of a “this is what’s left” feel but here it truly seemed like there was still quite a strong Jewish community. The kosher pizza places, kosher bakeries, and falafel places were all overcrowded. Even the Judaica stores we swarmed with mostly French-speaking customers. My walk through Marais brought me right to the Pompidou Center, Paris’s modern art museum. The building is hideous compared to it’s surroundings....the interior is cool but on the exterior it’s all pipes and metal. I don’t usually particularly enjoy modern art, but there were a lot of Picasso paintings, and it was interesting to see the room with the Dada art (I specifically remembered learning about that in my 10th grade history class because it was just so strange), and they even had a Marc Chagall painting in one of the galleries. The escalator in the museum is right near the glass front of the museum and as you go onto higher floors you have great views of Paris...that was probably my favorite part of the museum.

Inside Muse d'Orsay

Where the Bastille used to stand!!

Kosher bakery

Jewish Quarter - Rue de Rosiers

Front of the Pompidou Center

View from escalator

Back of Pompidou center

Another view from Pompidou

Dada!!

Marc Chagall :) 

For our last dinner in Paris my friends and I went to a nice French restaurant right on the Seine River near the Louvre and walked around for a bit. Paris really is such a beautiful, romantic city with very rich culture and history. Even though it was way too short I think this weekend was one of the best trips of my life! I could never imagine studying abroad here though - I’d never get anything done!  

Julia, Sarah, Barbara and I near Pont Neuf

me and Julia on our last night of wandering around Paris

One of the things that surprised me about Paris is that even though restaurants, stores, and streets may all be really crowded, it’s still always really quiet (with the exception of the Jewish quarter which was very loud, naturally). Tourists are always the loudest people in a given area. Also, I was kind of nervous about the whole “they hate Americans and won’t speak English to you” thing, but that wasn’t a problem because it’s not true. Every native French person I asked for directions was very nice and helpful, and since first of all, everyone here speaks English, and second of all, french signs are actually pretty easy to follow, the language barrier was never much of an impediment.

Anyways, now I’m back to reality in my room in London, finishing up a history essay and daydreaming of the next time I can go back to Paris. What a beautiful, delicious, romantic city!

xoxo,

Sarah