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Published: December 8th 2010
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Up bright and early, Uncle Jeff (and Dad) drove us to the East Midlands Airport at 4am!!! Ouch, it was -10*C, ouch ouch... loving the heating in the car, pity they make you sit on a bus out on the tarmac with the doors wide open for at least 10 mins, in the FREEZING COLD before you are driven to the plane and can board.... We were shaking by the time we got to sit down!
On disembarking the flight we realised that we did not have our camera, Mish normally wears it on his belt but due to the security clearances decided to pack it today, unfortunately it fell on the floor and bounced under the bed so he didn't realise it wasn't packed... Lucky we have the video camera (which also takes good photos, you've just got to learn to stay still!). Love that Europe and UK are so close and that postal services are really fast, hopefully it will arrive in Rome the day after we do... we have a couple of days to spare....
After much heartache, we got on the metro line into the city (deciphering as much French as we could), and in the end,
got off at the right stop and walked around the corner, and there our hotel was! YAY!! And best part was, we arrived at 11am and our room was ready, so checked in nice and early, secured our bags, and off we went to explore this amazing city!!
So, first up, we grabbed a map and headed off towards a stop where we could exchange our hop-on-hop-off bus tickets to get around. This did prove more difficult then first thought, as the bus only comes every half-an-hour, and so after standing there waiting for it for 40mins (it was decidedly cold!!), we decided it wasn't coming, so started to walk up the street towards where we wanted to go!! The problem was that the bus then came halfway between the two stops, so we had to run to the next stop, flag it down at the traffic light and managed to get on!! Fun times as always on the Grummitt Adventure!! Once on the bus, we listened to the audio all the way round to Notre Dame, where we hopped off to take some photos, but more to book something to do at night at a nearby tourism agency!! We
managed to book a dinner and night tour that proved to be fantastic, but more to come!!
After that, it was a lot of walking, again!! We went into the Notre Dame, walked along the river Seine, and made our way to the Louvre - the home of miss Mona Lisa!! An amazing piece of architecture, not just comprising of the great pyramid, but the museum also extends underground and then up into the buildings surrounding the pyramid. Inside, there were exhibits from ancient Greek, Egypt and Asia, plus the history of the Louvre and of course the famous Italian artworks. We then kept walking along through the Jardin des Tuileries towards the Place de la Concorde. By now the sun had set, so what better time to get on a ferris wheel (La Grande Roue) to overlook the pretty lights of Paris. Next it was on to our dinner reservation at La Procope, the oldest cafe in Paris, founded 300 years before Jess was born (1686). It was delicious, superb service and tiny tables, the Parisian way. As we had arrived at dinner early, we were finished with plenty of time to make the starting point of the bus
tour, so we walked around, exploring back streets, buying some magnets and Jess got a new hat (see pics).
The Paris Illuminations Tour started at 9:30pm and finished at 11pm, with an accompanied audio guide in English which visited the sights of the city, including our first good look at the Eiffel Tower. By the end of the tour, Mischa was holding Jess' head up, so it was a quick 3 stops on the Metro back to the comfy bed in our hotel!! First 14 hours down!!
Day 67 - Tuesday 7th December
Breakfast was at 9am, simple but tasty. It included the obligatory croissants, and also a nice surprise, chocolate covered cornflakes!! We set off for the next part of our Paris trip, checking out and leaving our bags under the watch of the concierge, ready to come back at 5pm to collect and head to the train station. In between we managed to fit in a whole lot of other sights, and lots more walking!!
We headed off in the same direction as the previous day, this time entering the Catacombes. This is an amazing place, situated 20m under the roads and covering 2km of the old stone
mines used in 1700's and turned into an ossuary in the 19th Century, and holds millions of Parisians bones. They are all in placed neatly inside too, quite amazing (the pictures doesn't do it justice!!) After ascending back onto the top of the Earth, we made our way to another bus stop, hopefully getting it at the right time.
Luckily for us, we did. Just as the snow started to fall!! It was a beautiful site to see, unluckily for us, our next get-off point wasn't too far along, so we then had to walk in it!! As it wasn't cold enough to stay snow, it soon melted, making our shoes (and eventually socks and feet!) very cold and wet!! But we enjoyed it anyway!! We stopped off at Hotel Des Invalides, a hotel built to provide housing for 4000 disabled soldiers by Louis XIV. We made our way to the bridge of Alexander III with some very cool lions and elegant lamp-posts. We continued walking past the Grande Palace, down Champs Elysees and visited the Ice Magic exhibit. Inside the thermal tents (set at -6*C) were 20 displays by 14 artists of worldwide icons. We then turned around, and
walked back UP the Champs Elysees, had a 'Quick' bite to eat (French burger chain), walked around the Arc de Triomphe and hopped back on our bus to the Eiffel Tower. Unfortunately, due to the low cloud, the lifts up were closed (so were the stairs). The best we could do was walk underneath and around for our pictures!! By now our feet were cold and sore, but instead of jumping on the metro (we tried, couldn't get tickets), we then decided to walk 3km to Montparnesse tower to get the birds-eye view from there instead. It was 56 stories up, and the 2nd highest building in Paris, but again, low-lying fog tainted the view, but we got to see the majority of it!! We then made our way back to our bags (at the hotel) and then caught the metro to our major train station where our Rome train was leaving from. We found a nearby pub doing pizza for dinner, before jumping on the high-speed train to Rome, staying in a sleeper cabin overnight to get enough rest to then continue our journey through Europe!!
AU REVIOR!!
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