Paris-Ooh La La!

Hi readers! Hope you are enjoying my blog so far. I just returned from a wonderful weekend in Paris and am still completely exhausted. The Eurostar is an absolute dream to travel on and I couldn’t believe how easy it was to take the “chunnel” as it is called. I went to Paris with a large group–eleven people total, including all of my flatmates! The first day we went on a Seine river cruise, visited the Louvre after 6pm (because it was free then, gotta love the deals!) and had a very nice three course meal at Cafe Med, a cute little restaurant on Ile Saint-Louis. The night was capped off with a visit to the Eiffel Tower at midnight for some great photo opportunities! We returned to our hostel that evening completely exhausted and slept in a bit the next morning. On Saturday, I grabbed a chocolate croissant at a patisserie on the street we were staying and jumped on the metro. Our first stop was the Arc de Triumph and the Champs-Elysees. It was very beautiful, but I still prefer Fifth Avenue to the Champs-Elysees! We walked down the entire Champs-Elysees to Concorde where Marie Antoinette was publicly executed. That afternoon, we checked off the number one thing on our list of things to do in Paris–have a wine, cheese and bread picnic in a park! Luxembourg Gardens was our desired picnicking site. We traveled there by metro, which is actually very similar to the New York subway system–in both cleanliness and efficiency! We arrived in the gardens after gathering the ingredients for our picnic in little grocery stores and bakeries along the way. It felt lovely to finally sit down and relax! Paris had us running around like lunatics as we tried to see all of its major attractions in a weekend. That evening, I attended mass at Notre Dame. Although the mass was in French, it was an incredible experience. (Dad, I hope I made you proud!) After mass, our group sans Kim who was with a family friend, went to Le Precoupe, the oldest restaurant in Paris. Chris, one of my classmates and travel mates, described it as “having the air of being someplace really fancy, but it was like going to an Olive Garden in Italy.” Hahah! I thought it had a nice atmosphere and that the “poulet” was great, but perhaps that was the wine talking. By the time we had paid for dinner and left the restaurant, it was 11:30 pm. Mustering the little bit of energy we had, we decided to go to a club on the Champs-Elysees. We (attempted to) dance to the techno beats until about 2:00 am before heading back to our hostel and calling it a night. Sunday, our final day, was spent in the Montmartre district of Paris. We traveled to the top of Sacre Coeur, an incredible basilica on top of a mountain that has sweeping views of the city! I was a bit disappointed I couldn’t see the Eiffel Tower from the mountaintop though. After Sacre Coeur, we walked down the main promenade to get the quintessential photo-op in front of Moulin Rouge (some of my travel mates would beg to differ). We had a quick lunch of crepes from a street vendor and relaxed on the main promenade for a bit. The City of Light was unbelievable, but it felt so good to go home to London and actually get some sleep. I can’t believe how used to London I have gotten. It’s going to be hard to leave this place!