So I have now been to Paris 5 times. I still managed to take over 100 pictures in just 3 days. Yes, half of them will be deleted because they were crap, but that's still a LOT of pictures of a city I've seen so many times. What keeps me coming back? The art, the beauty, the history, and the fact that there is always something new to see or do. Paris is different every time you visit. I LOVE PARIS. So let me start at the beginning...
Friday after work Kelly and I got the last of our packing done and took quick showers since we were on the night train. Our train left Ansbach at 9pm and arrived in Stuttgart around 11:30pm. Which gave us about a two hour wait for the night train to leave. As we got off the train, before we even made it to check out where our next platform would be, a girl camp up and asked "are you camp a's?" There were two other HUGE groups of Camp A's waiting for the same train! Half the girls were going to Paris and the other half were going to Amsterdam. We quickly got together and camped out on a nice spot on the floor to wait it out. The train station was hopping, it seems there was a big sports event or the end of a festival because the place was FULL of people. Kelly and I were the only girls in the whole group who spent the money to reserve a bed for the trip, 20 euro well worth it! We didn't see any of the girls once we were on the train but, I'm sure they didn't sleep much in the crowded seat compartments. Kelly and I both slept reasonably well on the beds, even with the snoring that was coming from the man beneath me. Seriously, he sounded like he wasn't breathing the whole time...sleep apnea anyone! I think Kelly was happy with our choice of transportation as well, we saw some of the seats on the way to our compartment..talk about cramped!
So, Saturday morning we get off the train right around 9:30am and begin to make our way to the hotel and then Disneyland Paris! From the train station we needed to take a metro to the RER line we needed. So we bought some tickets and got going! We bought a Carnet, a packet of 10 metro/RER tickets, it's cheaper than buying them one stop at a time. Unfortunately they didn't work on the RER outside the city limits. Our hotel was tops a five minute walk from the RER station. We stayed at an Ibis hotel, a European chain. It was cheap, clean, and half way between the city and Disneyland. Perfect! Once we got checked in and cleaned up we were on our way. Disneyland Paris...awesome! I wouldn't normally say a trip to Disneyland is a must do when spending time in Paris. There is already plenty to see in the city and it's surrounding areas, but this being my 5th trip I decided it was a must see for me. Luckily I only had one traveling partner and she was happy to visit as well. She has been to Disney World once, when she was 10, so she was looking forward to seeing it as an adult. It was kind of fun to see Main Street...looking so "all-american" in the middle of Europe! We decided to explore that on the way out and dive right in to the park though. First up was Space Mountain, which was so different! No little "bullet" cars for this ride. It was a normal seat with an over the shoulder harness. The ride was also a lot faster, it couldn't have been more than a minute and by the time we got off my ears hurt from being tossed between the restraint! I liked it a lot more than the original sorry to say. The worst part about that damn ride was the cars, I felt much safer in the Paris version. We also went on the Buzz Lightyear ride and had a blast, literally! :-D From there we moved on to Fantasy Land, which was pretty much the same as Orlando. But I finally managed to go on the Peter Pan ride. I really enjoyed flying in the "ships" rather than just being pulled along in cars or boats. I now understand why that ride has a FastPass. We probably had the last of the good weather this weekend! Which would have been perfect for going on my favorite ride, Splash Mountain, but no such luck. Disneyland Paris doesn't have Splash Mountain! Instead it had Indian Jones and the something or other ride. Which I got in line to ride, but saw that it went upside down and left by way of the "chicken exit." With a big, "I'm Sorry," for Kelly I skipped out on that ride. We went to the Pirates and It's a Small World. Both were up to standards. We went to the Haunted Mansion and found it dull and disappointing, a much better ride in Orlando. The best part was the castle! Sleeping Beauty's Castle! Unlike Orlando there are rooms that you can go through in this castle. They have the book from the opening of the movie as you walk up the stairs and as you go through the book is open to different parts of the story. There were tapestries, props, and stained glass windows all about my FAVORITE movie giving you the story! It was awesome. However, I've read that the dragon from the movie is in the "dungeon," however Kelly and I never found a dungeon. Oh well, next time maybe. :-D It was a fun day and I liked seeing how everything was done up for Halloween, even though we were in Europe. We got there around 12:30pm and didn't leave until around 10pm, when the park closed. It was a long day! We slept great that night for sure.
Sunday we got up early so we could get to the city and make the most of our only full day in Paris. We got to the Ile de la Cite and found St. Chapelle right at 9:30am when it opened. We took some amazing pictures and wandered around. After that we made our way to Notre Dame, with a quick stop at the weekly flower and bird market. That got us to Notre Dame right 11am, just in time for the 11:30am "international Mass." When they say "international" it means there will be three, count them three, sentences in English and two other languages. We were really excited to go to Mass but it was really hard to stay awake listening to a French Mass, it's such a liquid language! It was literally putting me to sleep. So I decided to concentrate harder on picking words that I knew, which helped me stay awake, but I still don't know what was being said. The bulletin did have the English translations for the readings so that was good. It was a neat experience. After that was done we looked around and then headed to find some lunch. We decided to eat across the bridge on the side of the Latin Quarter. We stopped in at Shakespeare and Co. before heading towards the Musee d'Orsay. My very favorite museum in the WORLD was a bit of a let down this time around. They are doing some renovations and so everything was out of place and weird. More than half the Monet collection was on loan to the Grand Palais, and Starry Night was in the states! It was a train wreck, I was upset that I hadn't been able to find this out from the museum website, which I visited two days earlier when planning the trip! Once we were done we decided to walk across the river and down the street just a little bit to see the Louvre. We walked through some of the Tuileries, gardens in front of the Louvre, and took lots of pictures as we came up the the glass pyramid. It took a bit for Kelly to understand that the whole building around us was the museum and yes, it was all FULL of art. :-D She was in awe of the size! So we went down to the reception area, I picked up a map but we decided not to go in. We just didn't have the time. So we wandered around the museum shop, looked at the underground shopping and the Da Vinci Code point of interest and were about to leave when we ran into some of the Camp A's from the train station! They had just gotten done with the museum, after getting there at open! They had gotten carried away and spent the whole day in the Louvre. We chatted for a bit and were parted, but came away very happy we had decided to skip it. From the Louvre we went to the Arc de Triomphe. At first the plan was to get a picture and leave. But once we were there Kelly really wanted to go up. But it was 284 stairs and I wasn't sure I could make that So we decided I would wait at the bottom while Kelly went up on her own. It was just dusk and getting a little chilly. I'm so glad she went up, she got some excellent pictures of the city and the Eiffel Tower and the sky was just beautiful! I made a Spanish friend while waiting at the bottom. A nice looking older lady, she was waiting for her daughter to finish looking around and started a conversation. Which was funny because she barely knew English, but could speak French. But I could barely speak French! Her daughter came over and she spoke English very well. It was a nice way to pass the time. Our plan had been to go to the Hard Rock for dinner, just for the American menu! But I wasn't sure which Metro stop I needed so instead we decided to head all the way back to the hotel. We dropped our bags and went back out to Disney. The Disney Village had a Planet Hollywood and Kelly really wanted to go. So we did. It was a bit of a long ride and a long wait once we got there but we had a good time. We didn't make it home until after 11pm! Crazy, but fun!
Monday morning came all too soon! We got up at the same time as the day before thinking we could make it to the Eiffel Tower at open. But we forgot to add time to check out of the hotel! And then our train left late after somebody almost got stuck in the doors (everyone was fine). The Metro we took, was the most direct, but had way too many stops. We didn't make it there until 10:20am, about an hour late. The line was HUGE and we just didn't have enough time. So we took pictures in front of it and decided to do something else with our time. We needed to be near the train station by 12:30pm because our train was leaving at 1pm. We walked down the garden to the Military school. Then we took the Metro to the Place de la Concorde. My favorite spot to start a walk. We didn't have time for the walk, but we did take some nice pictures! After that we headed towards the train station. We got there just after 12pm. I had been hearing about a train worker strike all weekend and was worried about our train, but nothing seemed out of the ordinary and our train was on time and still running. However, we did run into a technical difficult at some point and had to wait for 45 minutes to get back on our way. Which completely ruined all our connections to get home. We were supposed to get into Ansbach at 8pm, but didn't make it back to the train station until 11pm! It was a VERY long NIGHT! But totally worth it. Next time I won't take the late train back!
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