Paris day 1

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What a LONG day. After getting minimal sleep on our flight Tripmaster General (Di) showed no mercy. Starting off the fun, they have a convenient train that runs from the airport to within a few blocks of our hotel. Sounds great right? Not today. The rail workers are on strike so it took us about 2 hours to make what should have been one.

After dropping off our bags we went to grab a quick bite and walked to the catacombs. Not interested in waiting in a two hour line, we decided to come back to it tomorrow. We instead went to the Pantheon, Notre Dame, Sainte-Chapelle, l'arc de Triomphe and Eiffel Tower. Lots of walking but lots of interesting sights.

The Pantheon had crypts beneath with many influential people including Marie Currie, Lois Braille, and Victor Hugo. Notre Dame is huge with many small shrines around the perimeter of the sanctuary. We did not make it up to the roof viewing area. They do have an archeological crypt at Notre Dame across the square. This area contains some Roman ruins, pretty cool but does not come close to the ruins in Italy (would not pay to go in, but it was one of the places included on our Paris Pass so we had nothing to lose). I did find it interesting that there was a dock as part of the ruins that was the location of the river when the area was first settled; now it is 60 meters further. Saints Chapelle was quite amazing with stained glass everywhere! This was also included in the Paris Pass, but worth paying entry if you don't have the pass. From Saint Chapelle we headed to Museum Orsay. We walked about 45 min through rain then snow. By the time we reached the museum the sun was out and we had 50 minutes before the museum closed to run through and take a look, right? Wrong, they stopped letting people in because it was too close to closing! So we continued our walk past beautiful sights including Pont Alexander III (ornate bridge). Then on to Arc d' Triomphe, there is a passage beneath the road to reach the monument. Paris Pass gets you admission to the top, there are no elevators just long, tight, spriral staircase up. The views from the top are worth it including a nice view of the Eiffel Tower. From there the finale of the day, 8pm reservations (made 6 weeks in advance) to go to the top of the Eiffel Tower. There are 2 elevators you must take to the top, the first elevators goes to the 2nd floor (half way up) and after looking around there you take a 2nd elevator to the top. After reaching the 2nd floor it started snowing again and they temporarily were not allowing people to the top. We decided to wait it out and after 30 minutes made it to the top. The views were great, but we were so cold we did not stay up there long. Then it was time to head back to the hotel, 1 hour walk. We stopped for pizza and gelato on the way back. To tired and hungry to spend too much time looking for another place to eat. 37,592 steps for the day!

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