Paris Day 1

Well, the first thing we did in Paris was go to the Musee D'Orsay. But before we went in, we found this amazing pastry shop on the street right next it. First of all, I would have to say that Paris has the best food out of all the places we went, by far. You walk down the street and there are pastry shops (called patisserie) all over the place. They have the most amazing looking desserts, plus an assortment of breads, pastries, croissants, quiches and sometimes pizza. Almost every meal we had in Paris we got from a Patisserie. Anyway, so we got some pastries and ate them on some doorstep across from the Musee D'Orsay and then we went to the Museum. I love the Musee D'Orsay. For one thing it is absolutely beautiful. It was made from an old train station and the building's inside is absolutely stunning. Plus, it has probably the best collection of Impressionist art. We got to see Van Goghs, Monets, Manets, Degas, Renoir, Turner and all kinds of other people. I was in pure heaven the entire time. I'd have to say that my favorite painting in the entire Museum was probably a self portrait of Van Gogh. So much better in real life than in books, unlike the Mona Lisa. After the D'Orsay, we walked along the Seine to where the Louvre is, which is also where the Tuilleries (a garden/park thing) is and kind of where the Main Champs Elysees walk begins. Well, we started there and walked all the way down the Champs Elysees to the Arc de Triumph. The Tuilleries were absolutely gorgous and just how I imagined Paris to be - every bit as beautiful. Not too far along the Champs Elysees we came to the Place de la Concorde which used to be Called the Place de la Revolution and is one main place where the Guillotine was set up during the Revolution. It's a big round area surrounded by a roundabout with lots of cars going around it. It's interesting to stand there and imagine it during the revolution, with a guillotine set up in the middle doing a few beheadings each day with crowds gathered round to watch. There is also an Obelisk in the middle of the Place de la Concorde which was gift from Egypt and which is 3,300 years old. The rest of the walk was nice, but it was very long and there was quite a bit of wind and some rain too. By the time we got to the Arc de Triumph our feet were killing us. We took some pictures in front of the Arc and then tried to find our way to the actual Arc. See, the Arc is in the middle of a square surrounded by a roundabout just like the Obelisk is and it is such a busy intersection that you have to take a pedestrian tunnel underneath the road to the middle of the square. Well, so we went down these steps that we thought would take us to the middle of the square. We come back out the exit and we're like "there it is! wait a second, it doesn't seem any closer!" Yeah, we definitely took a metro entrance to another metro exit and ended up basically in the same place. However, the correct entrance was right in front of us then, so we found it. We were laughing and joking about how it could totally be used in a talk like "sometimes you have to make the wrong choice and go the longway to see what was right in front of you right along. So we got to the square and looked around underneath the Arc for a minute before climbing the bazillion steps to the top. The top had an amazing view of all of Paris and we absolutely loved it. Also, we got a pamphlet that told us all about the monument as well. After the Arc, we decided to go home and see if Shannon had arrived yet. Oh and i can i just say that the Paris metro system is amazing. It is sooooo easy. It pretty much has a tender place in my heart. Anyway, so we left a note for Shannon and headed over to the Sacre Coeur which was really close to our hotel and which you could see if you just walked around to the other side of the block. Unfortunately it happens to be on a hill, so we ended up walking up this huge hill and taking a bunch of steps before we finally got there. We were planning on just going in the crypt and saving the actual church for when we could go with Shannon, but the crypt was closed due to the whole terrorist scare thing so we just went in the church anyway. I thought the Sacre Coeur was one of the most beautiful buildings we saw on the whole trip. I mean, the building itself is beautiful, plus it's on this big hill overlooking the whole city. The inside was better than most too. Pretty and not too gaudy. We walked around the inside of it and then decided to go find some food and then come back for the evening mass. Close to the Sacre Coeur was probably the most touristy place we saw in Paris. I mean, everyone on this little block was a tourist and there were souvenir shops everywhere. It was kind of random that it was next to the Sacre Coeur of all places, but that's where we ended up eating. Mass was pretty cool. I think other religions are fascinating and so I love to go to things like that - and it was my first mass. We ended up going a different way home because we found this cool tram thing that took you up or down the hill and we had to try it out. By the time we got home, Shannon was indeed there, so we picked her up and took her to the Musee D'Orsay for our second go around. We didn't get to see nearly everything the first time, or even the second time. She used to be an art major, so she was like giddy whenever we went to art museums. I don't blame her. By this time Marina and I were so tired that we were slap happy and Shannon kept looking at us wierd, so we just went on back to the hotel.