Paris

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Pre-Paris

Paris is our last city on my Contiki Tour and what better city then the worlds most touristy. There was a shit load to see and hardly any time to see it as we were only staying there for a day. My plan for the day was to go up the Eiffel Tower, Climb the Arch De Triumph, See the Mona Lisa and go up into the Notre Dam bell tower.

Eiffel Tower

We got dropped off at the Eiffel tower at 9am, it opened at 9:30. Because we got there early, the line wasn't very long and there wasn't too many people there thank god.
While we were in line, there was these stupid gypsy's trying to sell Eiffel Tower souvenirs. As soon as someone would go to buy one, another two of the greedy bastards would surround the person and try to sell theirs. Whenever the Police showed up, apparently (I didn't see it) they would just scatter and hide.

I got pretty scared going up in the lift. I get to the second level and was like "Woah..what am I doing up here, this is high" then went in the elevator to the highest level thinking "Why the fuck did I put myself through this again!"
The view was totally amazing and well worth the 12 Euro ($24) I spent to get in. Bought myself a Tower Souvenir to symbolise my last day of tour and being up there obviously.

Arch de Triumph

Next up was the Arch de Triumph which was built to honour those who fought for France, particularly during the Napoleonic Wars. I climbed up the top of there for 5.5 Euro ($11) which, although it was cool, was a bit of a waste of money after being up the Eiffel Tower.

The Louvre

We then walked down the most expensive street in Paris on our way to The Louvre Museum, where the Mona Lisa was. We stopped for food on the way and I leant how tricky it was to get a cheap vegetarian meal in Paris. Eventually ended up with Pizza which has basically been my food for the majority of the tour as it's usually cheap, filling and easy to identify as being vegetarian.

Paid 9 Euro ($18) to get into The Louvre, which wasn't bad considering it was 10 Euro to get to see The Statue of David and that was a tiny museum.
Went and saw the Mona Lisa, which was significantly smaller then i thought. I was stoked it didn't take us 3 hours to get to it like the Sistine Chapel. We also went and saw the Venus De Milo statue as well, simply because it was close and then off to Notre Dam.

Notre Dam

In 1163 Bishop Maurice De Sally laid the first stone of Notre Dam which would then take about 200 years to complete. It was the largest religious building in Western Europe until the mid 13th Century.

The novelty of going to Notre Dam for me, aside from it being a badass Gothic church came from "The Hunchback of Notre Dam" which was a story originally written by Victor Hugo and turned into a movie later.

I climed up the Bell Tower for 4.8 Euro ($10) and saw the bell that Quasimodo would swing from.


All in all, it was a big day and I was really happy getting to do all I wanted to do in Paris (for one day anyway) especially since we walked everywhere.

French Dinner

After that, the Contiki Group met up and we went to a French Dinner. On the way there, we walked through this park which had gypsies who ask for your finger. They then trap your finger and won't give it back until you pay them money. Scumbags.
No-one from our group got caught because Mecha had pre-warned us, but still. I was the first person they tried it on.

Dinner was average, not bad, but not worth the money. I got a mushroom pasta for my main.

Nouvelle Eve

After dinner we went to a Cabaret show called Nouvelle Eve. It was cool for about the first hour, but I started to tire of it after that. This was probably because I was sick, it was our last day of tour and it went for ages. It probably wasn't worth the 70 Euro ($140) I paid for it, but it was definitely a wicked experience, plus you got to see boobies haha.

Final Drinks

I've been sick for the last few days, so I went back to the camp site and had a few drinks at the bar there with some of the group. Mark, AKAS 'Squirrel' was so drunk that he walked up to the bar and started serving himself while the bar tender was outside.

The guy then busted him, but was cool about it as Squirrel gave him 10 Euro (which was probably more then he should've paid). Squirrel continued to serve himself through the rest of the night. It got to the point where the bar tender just gave up and started showing him where the drinks where haha.

Well, last night of Contiki, back to London tomorrow.

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