Paris

    First trip outside of London, Paris. Its a quick Chunnel ride, and while the tickets are expensive we got an ok student/youth discount on them We got in late on Thursday and after wandering around Gare de Lyon we passed out in our tiny hostel room. We were up bright and early on Friday to get to the Louvre by the time it opened at 9:30. The Louvre is a little overwhelming, it has a lot of stuff, but its not as cluttered as the British Museum. Getting there early in the morning was a good call, we skipped the line and was almost a block long by noon. The Mona Lisa is a lot smaller than you would think and you can't get very close to it, in fact a lot of the other paintings might be considered more impressive until you take into account DA VINCI painted the thing. The Venus de Milo was also really cool, and had less of a crowd around it than the Mona Lisa. The other galleries are equally impressive, especially their French paintings which have some really good Delacroixs. 

Then we, you know, solved the Da Vinci Code

     After the Louvre we went up the Champs Elysees to L'Arc de Triomphe, then south from there to the Seine and the Eiffel Tower. We walked the whole thing, the city is really pedestrian friendly but we still walked close to 15-20 miles between the two full days we were there. The Eiffel Tower is everything its cracked up to be. It was cheap to take the stairs up to the 2nd "floor" meaning the second level that you can stand on and that is 43 stories high. Really great views of the city, and walking up means you dont have to wait in three hour long line for the lifts. Pictures really don't capture whatever it is that makes the Eiffel Tower so impressive, all the crisscrossing beams make it look hollow but its really solid. Every time you get a view of the city the Eiffel tower is there somewhere and it weaseled its way into probably half the pictures I took that weekend.

Sneaky...

     That night, instead of going to an expensive bar or club we decided to get wine and drink along the Seine. There are walkways right on the Seine everywhere and we just happened upon this one that was really well lit and full of people. There were guys with drums, a guy with a guitar and some people with stereos on different parts of the quay. We sat by these people who played swing music and danced near the river. When we ran out of wine we ran over to the nearest group of French people and asked where we could buy some more and they invited us to join them. My highschool French actually did really well and the Parisiens aren't as nasty as they're made out to be. They gave us French wine and even brought out some cheese for us to try and we swapped stories and talked about what French people thought of Americans and vice-versa.

Right by the Seine

    The next day we took the Metro up north to the Sacre Coure church. The church was pretty but up a big hill, and the Metro is terrible in Paris. It's slow and smells really bad. They don't give you a lot of information either. We were all excited when we got back to London for the British public transportation. Anyway, the church was great and the views worth the hill climb. We were assaulted by these men calling themselves artists who would make a bracelet on your wrist and wait till its done to charge you. They got us on the Champs Elysees so we knew to avoid them at Sacre Coure but they were stubborn and a little rude. From there we went down to Notre Dame and waited in line for an hour to take a tour up the towers. It was worth the wait and really cheap for students. The gargoyles are really cool up close and there are parts of the church you can't see from ground level. The inside is Gothic medieval architecture at its finest, the windows are beautiful and the ceiling crazy high.

    That night we went out for a fancy French dinner, I got a starter of duck pate and my entree was tomatoes stuffed with beef, rice and as a table we shared a cheese platter and a bottle of wine. It was delicious, also the girls all got desserts so I got to try those as well. Then we saw the Eiffel Tower all lit up at night and then we hit Notre Dame again to see it all lit up. The city is gorgeous at night, everything is well lit and people are always walking around.
Glad to be back in London though, especially to a place where I can shower and have a much more comfortable bed. When you hostel you really get what you pay for, not much.