Paris

Bonjour! 

This weekend my mom came to Rome and then we flew to Paris really early on Friday morning. The very first thing we did was go to the Louvre to see the Mona Lisa, Venus de Milo, and my favorite, Victory. Among other things we saw there. I got in for free because I am a student a European student (kind of). After that we went to the Museum of Rodin. This was a beautiful museum. It was free to get into the gardens which had the Thinker and a lot more of his bigger sculptures out there. The grounds were beautiful with a pond and trees and green grass. Then we went inside the museum (which was once again free for me because I am a student) and saw 3 floors of Rodin's sculptures. I took a million pictures of everything. As we were walking out of the museum, we saw the Eiffel Tower in the distance and decided to go see that too even though we hadn't eaten anything all day and it was 6pm. So we went straight to the Eiffel Tower and bought tickets to go up in the elevator. We took the first elevator up to the platform in the middle of the tower and then took a second elevator all the way to the top. We stayed at the top long enough to take some pictures and to gift shop but it was actually pretty chilly all the way up there so we took the elevator back down. After that we went to dinner at this little restaurant across the street from our hotel. I had steak and mashed potatoes but the mashed potatoes were basically cheese with a little bit of potato in them. They were really good. The steak was too. By the far the best meal I've had in Europe so far.

The next day we had a very French breakfast with croissants and baguettes with jam and nutella. Another great thing about France is the way they drink coffee. I can't get used to drinking little tiny cups of espresso and cappuccinos in Italy but in France they actually serve you a decent sized cup of coffee with milk in it. Also there are starbucks all over Paris! And the best thing is they have the American coffee drinks but French pastries. Best of both worlds. After breakfast we walked about 5 minutes to get to the French Pantheon. The main floor has a lot of sculptures and a gigantic pendulum that measures the degrees the earth turns every second or something like that. Below the main floor is the crypt where all the famous French people are buried. The ones that I recognized were Marie Curie and her husband Pierre, Voltaire, Henry Rousseau, Alexander Dumas, and Victor Hugo. Just as we were about to leave the Pantheon, we noticed there was a guided tour to the top of Pantheon that had just started so we jumped in with that group and go to up to the balconies around the main floor of the Pantheon and go up to the top of Pantheon and go outside. Here we saw some wonderful views of Paris. After we tour we left the Pantheon and headed towards the Catacombs. On the way we stopped at the Luxembourg gardens. The gardens were the grounds of what used to be some sort of a palace. There were trees and flowers and a pond and a lot of chairs and tables everywhere and people were just relaxing. It was nice. There was also and Orangerie where they had orange trees growing and more statues. It was very peaceful. After taking some pictures and hanging out here for a bit we started walking to the Catacombs. The Catacombs is an underground cemetery that is long passageways with piles of bones lining the sides of the underground tunnels. The bones are arranged artistically though and they are made into neat designs. Also at the beginning of the tunnels there is a section that used to be part of an underground prison and they have preserved the carvings of one of the prisoners that was held there. He carved huge castles and famous landmarks of Paris out of the rock in his prison cell. It was very interesting. After the catacombs we walked to the Arch of Triumph that Napoleon had built in his honor. It was in the middle of the busiest roundabout in Paris it seemed like and the only way to get to it was an underground tunnel that came up in the middle of the roundabout where the arch was located. Every night at 6:30 pm they rekindle the torches in the arch and we arrived right at 6:30 just as a marching band paraded around the piazza playing the French national anthem. After that we walked down Champs-Elysses, the street leading up to the arch, which is the major shopping district of the city with really fancy stores like armani and gucci. We looked inside H&M. There was also an Abercrombie & Fitch located inside a castle with gigantic metal gates leading to it that were guarded by 3 bouncers dressed head to toe in identical A&F swag. It was pretty ridiculous. Definitely got some pictures of them. Finally, we went and had dinner at a creperie. We had dinner crepes with spinach and ham and cheese in them which actually were not that great. I had a chocolate dessert crepe after and my mom got sorbet, both of which were delicious.

So here's the funny story about the pictures I took. My mom finally brought me a camera that actually works so now I've taken a ton of pictures but unfortunately I do not have the USB cord to connect my camera to my computer and upload them...so unless I can find someone with the same camera as me, I can't upload those pictures until I get back to the States. Sorry!

Au revoir!