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We were both tired after our first night in Paris but after sleeping in the hotel beds, we were refreshed and ready for the next morning. Both of us had showers, before we went downstairs for breakfast. Unlike the hostel that we stayed at in London, which had get your own cereal and toast, the hotel had a more cafe style, where you sit down and your breakfast is brought to you. We had a croissant each and a baggette each, with strawberry jam in both. The croissant was nice and I wanted more, but we weren't allowed any.
We went back upstairs and got our stuff, cameras, water and whatever else we needed, and went out to the local metro station, but Dad got distracted when I saw two French Fire Engines parked on a side street. We went to have a look at them, and found that they were really really small. Dad talked to one of the firefighters, asking him what firefighting was like in Paris, and explaining to him what it was like in Adelaide. That conversation took a while because none of the firefighters spoke very good English, and Dad doesn't speak very good French,
but he managed to find out that the French Firefighters also do health rescues, like an ambulance, but not completely taking over the ambos, and have lots of stations close together, 174 in all of Paris, and have really thin protective clothing compared to back in Adelaide.
We found the station, where we bought one way tickets for the train. We had to change trains halfway through, to get to where we were going, and because it was early on a weekday morning, the trains were crowded. The first train had the bus wheels like the O-bahn in Adelaide, but the second one had normal train wheels, so we were wondering why they were different and the advantages of using both.
The metro station that we got off at was called Trocadero. We emerged from the underground and got our first glimpse of the Eiffel Tower, or as the locals call it the Tour Eiffel. It was amazing, and as soon as we saw it, it immediately felt like we were in Paris, the same way that seeing Big Ben made you feel like you were in London, and not some other random city that you could be
in.
We made our way down the stairs with our necks craned upwards towards the tower. From the Trocadero round about, where there were several museums in 2 old buildings, with a gap through to the tower, it was a short walk down the hill and across the Seine, all of which we were looking upwards to the tower, putting a hand up to our face because of the sunlight. We walked underneath the tower and noticed the long lines that queued for the lifts to the first floor, and the relatively short line for the stairs. There were several workers painting the tower, with a safety netting to stop them from falling. We took several photos looking directly up from the bottom, and, as we were about to head off, we noticed that there was a sign that said top floor closed.
Looking back at the Eiffel Tower from the Esplanade des Invalides was amazing, and the best view of the tower from any point. We turned off into a couple of sidestreets, passing a kindergarten with alot of children in white hats running around in a space not bigger than an average Australian living room. Then
we found a small shop called Fat Tyre Bike and Segway Tours. It was from there were we would pick up our Paris Passes.
We were made to wait a little while before we could be given our Passes, so we had a look at the bikes and Segways that they had. we were called over and it was explained that the Paris Pass could be used for free entry into certain attractions, the Paris Museum Pass, which we were also given, gave Dad entry into 55 Paris musuems, however, I didn't get one because entry for Under 18 year olds to any museum is free. The last thing we were given was a Paris Metro Pass, which was a 2 day pass to any Metro, RER, or Bus service in central paris.
Before we said goodbye, we asked the people there if they knew why the top of the tower was closed. They were surprised and said they didn't know anything about it. So we waved goodbye and walked back to the tower, still amazed by it, and asked somebody else if they knew, and we were told that it was because there was a problem with
the lift, and they didn't know how long it would be. So we decided to come back and climb the tower later on. We walked back up to Trocadero looking back at the tower
From there, we walked along an Avenue towards the Arc de Triomphe. On the way, we noticed the amount of Smart Cars in Paris, small cars that have only 2 front seats and very little luggage room and are supposed to be good for the environment. Then we found a Smart Car next to a Mini, and it made the Mini seem like a Land Rover. It was weird, because the Mini is a small car anyway, but the Smart Car was even smaller. We also saw smart cars parked in a space at the end of a row of parks that was only about 1 metre big, and it overhanged the edge a little bit, but not much. The thing that we had noticed, is that there were alot of small cars in Paris, probably because they don't need the big 4WD because there is nowhere to use them. Then we saw another car being towed away, for parking where it shouldn't, and the
tow truck picked it up by the wheels, instead of on a hook by the back like we are used to.
As we got closer to the Arc de Triomphe, we managaged to see it more and more, from just the corner that was poking out of the trees, that slowly got bigger before we could see the whole thing. We walked around it for a while, looking up at it, before we found a tunnel that went under the roundabout that goes around it and into the middle, where the arch was. Inside the tunnel was the ticket booth, which had an extremely long and slow moving line, but because we had the Paris Museum Pass, we were able to skip the queue, and go outside, and stood under the Arc de Triomphe, and saw the Eternal Flame. We founded the entrance into the arch, flashed the museum pass, and made our way 50 metres up the spiral staircase towards the top. I love spiral staircases in old buildings, such as the ones in St Pauls Catheral and the Tower of London back in London, so we climbed these ones, admiring the smooth stone, and the stair that
were above us. We came into a large room at the top of the tower, that had information boards that were mostly in French, but there was also a camera looking down to the Enternal Flame and we could see all of the people looking at it.
From that room, it was another couple of flights of stairs to the top of the Arc de Triomphe. When we did finally emerge on the top, it was amazing. We could see all the way down the Champs Elysees, which I couldn't pronounce but was practicing heaps, towards the Lourve, and back the other way towards Le Grande Arch, which was a modern Cube arch. Underneath us we could see the roundabout that circles the Arc de Triomphe and saw the absolute chaos that was no lights or marked lines, a free for all where drivers had to make their own way towards the exit that they wanted to go trough, nudging slightly forward until the lane of oncoming traffic cant get past then zooming off towards their avenue.
There were alot of people on the Arc de Triomphe, taking lots and lots of photos, and so were we, off
into different directions and down different directions and towards the Eiffel Tower, but we knew we couldn't spend all day up there so we made our way back down again and admired the arch itself from the bottom looking back up at it. It was amazing, the structure and the grandness of it, and to have the roundabout around it was quite cool too.
Dad didn't want to walk down the Champs Elysees, so we caught a metro train two stops down the road. From our stop, we walked into the massive park infront of the Lourve, called the Place de la Concorde and could look back at and through the Arc de Triomphe, and all the way along the Champs Elysees. We were at the bottom of a fountain, and because it was a hot day, I drenched my head in the water and made it wet to cool my head down. We could see, and were very close to the Obelisque, which was a gift from the Egyptians which stood between the Arc de Triomphe and the Lourve. We weren't going to go to the Lourve on that day though, so we walked across the river to
the Musee d'Orsay, which was an Art gallery. The gallery was an old train station, and we didn't want to spend too long in there, because we had other stuff to see as well. Inside were many famous painters and paintings such as Van Gough and his self portrait, as well as Monet, who painted several flowers, and many other painters such as Courbet, Renoir, and Carpeaux. Several of the painting we saw, Dad remembered from seeing at other places and he showed me and explained to me the best of them.
As we walked off, there was an old lady who had picked up a ring off the ground, and offered it to Dad who had been walking passed. She explained to him that she wanted him to have it because it wouldn't fit on her finger. Dad thanked her for it and gave her 5 Euros, before she pleaded for 10, and we walked off and Dad realised it was a scam. Later on we saw a number of other tourists getting caught in the same scam, so Dad explained it to them, much to the beggars dislike.
We walked along the edge of the Seine
and found some lunch, a baggette each. Mine had salami and mozzerella and salad, while Dads had ham. We sat by the fountain at St Michel, in the Latin Quarter and watched some street buskers who were break dancing and drawing a large crowd. We were watching the people as much as the buskers. The baggette that we had was delicious.
After we had finished, we walked across the Seine to Notre Dame, which is a beautiful, old, Gothic cathedral. We were allowed free entry into the cathedral itself, and we walked around, looking at the faboulous stone architecture and wondering how they had managed to build the collums so straight and round, without the technology we use today. Dad was amazed at the stained glass windows, while we walked around the edge and looked at the displays. We stayed there for quite a while, admiring it all. It was incredible.
We spent a while in there and went outside and joined the line to go up the tower. It was a long, slow moving line because they were only letting small groups go up at a time. Dad stayed in the line while I walked off to
by a beret from a local gift shop, and came back and found him talking to an Aussie couple from Sydney. He was an architect, so we were talking about the role of architects and engineers in a company, which quite interested me when I came back, because I want to be a civil engineer when I leave school. Talking to them passed the time nicely as we waited and slowly moved forwards. Finally, we were let in and made our way up another spiral staircase, feeling like we were in a place like Hogwarts, to a room at the top, which was a gift shop, and there was no apparent way out. This confused alot of people, who were mingling around the gift shop wondering where to go next, and, once everyone was let up, a few people seemed to be heading down the stairs, and everyone else was following, so we tagged along and found that they were going further up the spiral staircase which had previously been roped off to make us go into the gift shop.
This spiral staircase was even longer and more exciting. When we reached the top, we emerged onto the top
of the roof of Notre Dame. There were lots of Gargoyles, all unique on this side of the cathedral, which was the side that people enter at, while on the other side, at the front of the church, there were 6 holy figures on the roof. I figured that was some kind of symbolisim of God keeping the devil away or something which was shown at the top like that. From the top we once again had some amazing views down to the courtyard infront of us. We stopped and admired every gargoyle, looking at its uniqueness and how there were so many. We made our way around the tower and up into it, where there was a large bell. We weren't allowed to see the the bell called Big Ben in the Houses of Parliment in London, but we were allowed to see this one and it was still very big. Every time it had rung, it left an indentation into the side of the bell, so at the four quadrant points of the bell, there was a big dent where it had been ringing for 800 years. Dad also admired the wooden structure that was the tower, because
it was so old, but so perfect in the way it was constructed.
We walked back out onto the roof, and were let up another set of spiral stairs sot the very very top, which was thin and had alot of people crammed into the small space. From the top, we could see all around Paris, and took as many photos as we could, but so was everyone else, and the officials were trying to move us around but everyone was taking photos and they were struggling, It had reccomended 5 minutes only at the top, but we spent more like 15 because there was no way we could have got out. We didn't mind that though, the more time the better.
The way down was the same spiral stairs, one of the reasons that they were having so many difficulties, then that continued down to the bottom in a very long spiral staircase, which I enjoyed immensly. We came out the bottom and looked back up and saw how high we had been and how far we had come down in such a short space of time. Then we looked back at the cathedral from a distance
and just admired it.
We took the metro back to our hotel, where Dad sat down and planned out the next day and the rest of that day. We didn't stay for very long because we headed back out again on the train to the Tour Montparnasse, which was a tall office building that had been built in Paris in the 1970s but once it had been finished it was decreed that no more that high should be built in Paris, so it stands there, alone and sticks out into the skyline amongst the old and beautiful buildings. We found our dinner in a small pizza place near the Tour Montparnasse, where we ate a French Pizza, which had lots of melted cheese, ham and capsicum on a thin dough, not like back in Australia where the thicker the better and the more topping the better. It was very simple and very delicious. It also had several herbs and spices as well, but not too many to take away the flavour of the ham and cheese. Dads pizza didn't have mushroom. Instead, it had 4 anchovies spaced out evenly, unlike pizzas where everything is placed randomly.
We found
the entrance to and then the lift to the Tour Montparnasse, which was 200 metres high. From the top, we looked down at the city, and the sun slowly set, meaning it got dark. By this time, it was late, almost 10 pm, so when I tried to make a panorama shot on the camera, it didn't work to well. Then, at 10, the Eiffel Tour lit up with thousands of lights flashing in an amazing show of light. It had already been shining yellow before hand, as it does in the evening, but all of the flashing lights were white and were twinkling in the darkness, flashing on and off several times. The show lasted for 5 minutes, after which we headed downstairs again and found a Metro train back to the Eiffel Tower. In the Metro station, we stopped and listened to some street buskers, who were playing in the tunnel a mixture of wind flutes and ukelalies, playing a nice song that sounded amazing inside the tunnel. We stopped and listened to them for a while before leaving. We walked along the river towards our boat company. On the way, we passed through a group of people
who were coming from the big TV screen that had been showing the FIFA World Cup Match between Spain and Portugal. There was alot of Spanish people celebrating, so we assumed that Spain had won.
We arrived at our boat which would take us along the Seine for a late night cruise. We arrived 7 minutes before the last boat left, and showed them our Paris Passes, but the lady at the counter groaned and sighed and said that she had just packed up the Paris Pass stuff because she had never had somebody come with a Paris Pass so close to closing time. She got it out again, passed the cards through the machine and let us on board.
There was probably more people on the boat than we had realised. The front was covered with glass, with seats on the side, and the back was open. It was a low boat, like alot of others in the Seine, to fit under all of the bridges. There was a running comentary in 6 languages in the headset, but we opted not to use them and just stand towards the front and look at the passing sights in
the dark. The Eiffel Tower had turned into a Lighthouse, showing a beam of light circling around the top. At 11, when our boat left, it lit up again for 5 minutes, and it was even better
We went up the river, waving to people on bridges and getting to see the sights such as Notre Dame and several museums in the dark, lit up by lights. On the way back there was a group of hooligans who gave the passing boats the unpleasant sight of their bums. Some of the girls screamed, others thought it was funny. The whole boat trip lasted 40 minutes, and afterwards, we walked back up towards our Metro station. which was Trocadero. However, on the way we passed the big screen that had showed the World Cup, and there was so much litter in the park around it, it felt like we were walking through a rubbish tip. The entrance to the metro that we found was closed, so we walked around to another one, thinking we would have to get a taxi. Fortunately it was open and we walked in, finding smashed glass all over the place from the Spanish football supporters.
Because most of the metro closes at 12.30, we were in a rush to find a train. When we arrived, the train was still 6 minutes away and a nice man sitting next to us on the seat played us a song, which was "My way" by Frank Sonatra. He was very good, and we talked to him until the train arrived, then on the train until he had to get off. When we arrived at our stop, we walked out and found the exit closed, so we walked around to the next one. That was closed too, but a whole group of people who had come from another exit arrived at the same time and we realised that all the exits were closed. Dad found a button by the door and pressed it, and it opened and everyone piled out onto the streets, with no acknowledgement for Dad. We quickly made our way back up to the hotel room and into bed.
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Jamie
non-member comment
sounds like you're having a good time!
Hi Ben! Hope all is well over there in Paris! The Eiffel Tower looks so cool from the photos and I bet it's even better in real life! But I thought Tori told you not to do the "Hey-look-I'm-leaning-on-the-Tower" thing... so watch out for the meat cleaver! :) See you in a couple of weeks!