Sunday, March 13, 2011

A weekend in Paris

After a long week of classes and barely any time to recuperate from vacation, La Slashette and I decided to take advantage of our 3-day weekend and go to Paris. Our French friend who studied at USC last semester happens to live in Paris she let us crash on her couch and showed us around the big city.


We started our tour by the Palais Garnier, the opera house where the Phantom of the Opera takes place. On the walk there, we stopped by a macaron shop, Pierre Herme recommended to la Slashette as the "best macrons in Paris." From the Opera House we attempted to visit a Salvador Dali exhibit at a museum but when we arrived, we learned that the exhibit had already closed and the museum was closed while they were putting up the next exhibit. Oops. Thank you tourist office for not letting us know the exhibition was over. Anyways, we decided it was then time to walk up the Champs Eysees to the Arc de Triomphe.

Palais Garnier

We first walked along the Seine near the Louvre and found a pretty bridge with lots of "Love Locks" on it. I'm pretty sure that it was the Pont des Arts bridge but I'm not 100% certain.

Place de la concorde

Obelisk

Statue

Tuileries Gardens facing the Louvre






You can see the Eiffel Tower in the distance!

Close up on the locks


We found the largest Sephora store I have ever seen, a Louis Vuitton store with at least 5 levels, and a Toyota store with innovative designs and a spotlight on their hybrids.

Yes, the car IS on the wall!

I'd like to see one of these in a Bond film!


And then we finally reached the Arc de Triomphe...




Tomb of the unknown soldier


After the Arc de Triomphe it was time to take a boat tour down the Seine. While we waited to get on the boat we took a few photos of the Eiffel Tower!











And then on to the tour. There was an Italian family sitting in front of us with an adorable little boy who kept turning around and making faces at us. La Slashette eventually started making faces back. The tour was interesting and we were able to see a lot of the famous sites from the boat.

This little guy was passed out in line as we waited to board the board.

Slashette listening intently to the audio tour

The boy in front of us making being a bear!
And of course we ended up back at the Eiffel Tower.

Then it was time to begin our climb up the Eiffel Tower. The view at the top (ok so it was the second floor) was worth the 600 stairs that we had to climb.













After all the Eiffel Tower fun, we decided to go to the Musee d'Orsay since we thought it was open late. When we got there it turns out that it had already closed for the night. So we walked over to the Louvre which was open but decided not to go in because of the entry fee. We decided to try out restaurant Angelina for a cup of their famous hot chocolate. Well, turns out they had just closed for the night so we were not doing so hot with our activities. So we walked some more to find a bar or cafe to get a drink and on the way there a bird decided to relieve itself on my head. I was not a happy camper. But I got over it a few minutes later when we were seated at a bar enjoying a nice glass of the house wine.

By that time we were getting hungry and we met up with our French friend for dinner. She booked us a reservation through this website that gives you discounts on meals when you reserve through them. We ended up having a great meal for half price including an entree and main course or main course and dessert. I ended up getting French onion soup which was amazing and something that was like a Shepard's pie only it was duck meat. So yummy! By the time we finished it was already 11 and time to head back for the night.



Saturday we woke up to walk around the Montmartre neighborhood. We stepped off the metro in front of the Moulin Rouge, the erotica museum, and lots of sex shops. Once we passed the main drag we were in a really pretty area surrounding the Sacre-Coeur church. We toured the inside and walked through a square where artists adorned the streets trying to get your attention and draw your picture. Little cafes and restaurants surrounded the square and with the sun out, people were everywhere. We walked over to a Salvador Dali exhibit (this one did exist!) and the artwork was amazing. Sculptures, paintings, photographs, it was all really incredible.



Our awesome host, tour guide, restaurateur, perfume expert

After seeing the exhibit we headed back by the Opera House to go to the Fragonard Museum of Perfume. I went there with my parents in 2004 and bought a perfume that I really liked. I have been waiting for about 5 years to get more of it and I finally had my chance! We took a guided tour of the museum all in French where we learned about how they make the perfumes and saw all the old perfume bottles and sampled their specialties at the end. Of course you end up in their shop where I refilled my supply of Soleil. This bottle should hopefully last me a while.

Our French friend retired to her house to do some work while Slashette and I headed to Centre Pompidou to see some modern art. The building itself is really interesting and looks very industrial. The special exhibition was very phallic and included a lot of large glass balls configured in different positions. It is always fun to look at modern art- for me the new exhibits seem to test the boundaries and can be quite shocking.

We headed back after our full day for sushi (I know, not French at all) but it was delicious and a nice change. We headed to a party with students from the school our friend goes to and met people from all over the world- Argentina, Germany, France, USA, Canada... Everyone there was very cool and it was nice meeting more students. It really makes me want to do a semester abroad next year.

I'm back in Clermont and back to working on internship applications, working on my report for school and getting ready for Mike's visit. I'll finishing updating spring break slowly but eventually it will be up here. Stayed tuned for more...