Day 36 Saturday morning early in the am I headed to the train station about a ten minute walk from my apartment so excited! After a three and a half hour train ride I arrived in Paris and headed to the public trams to meet Brian under the Eiffel Tower. Brian flew from Germany to Paris and got there about an hour before me. I get off the tram at the Eiffel Tower and I thought that I would see the tower right away but to my surprise I could not see anything of the sort so i walked down the street and once I passed a few buildings it just appeared in tremendous form. As soon as you see the tower you are aw-struck, jaw just dropped and I couldn't stop smiling. Then I reached the square and started to look for my American boy and there he was sitting there under the tower. =) Even though he didn't shave his crazy German beard he had been growing since he got to Germany I was still happy to see him and excited to explore Paris. We walked around below the tower and took lots of pictures and then headed to the Notre Dame Cathedral. Inside the cathedral was amazing all of the churches in Europe are beautifully ornamented and detailed with stained glass and gold. Inside the church I lit a candle for my pop-pop. After we checked into the hotel we went on a search for a basilica located on top a hill so from the top of the hill you can see all of Paris. It was just great to walk around Paris with Brian and actually get to talk to him in person without the internet making strange noises or dropping our calls. After the Basilica we walked around Paris hitting some of the most well-known buildings. We visited the Louvre at night and it was beautiful, we went inside to see how the pyramid of glass is held up and designed. We did not get to go in the museum and see the Mona Lisa because it was too late but when I go to Paris again with my class I will definitely seeing the museum. We also walked along the water through Paris from the Louvre to the Eiffel tower. It is amazing to walk such a long distance and still have the tower in the background the whole way. At one point while we were walking we came across a bridge that had all different types of locks attached to it with inscriptions of people's names and different dates. After we stopped at the bridge the Tower started to sparkle and we just stopped and watched in amazement. On every hour at night the lights of the tower start to flash like a real sparkler would on the 4th of July. We finally made our way to the tower and got to see it up close and personal at night, and let me tell you it is 100 times better at night then during the day. There is less people and it is more of a personal and emotionally private experience. It just felt like it was me, Brian and the tower.
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| Notre Dame Cathedral |
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| Lighting a candle for my Pop-pop |
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| View from the top of the hill where the Basilica is. |
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| The Basilica |
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| Inside the Louvre |
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| Bridge with all the engraved locks |
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| Sparkling Eiffel Tower |
Which do you like better?
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| The Palace |
Day 37 Sunday morning we decided to spend the whole day at Versailles, which used to be the capital of France and where King Louis XIV built his palace and gardens. The palace of Versailles is huge and just to walk through all the gardens is at least a full day experience. Once we walked through the beautiful palace we headed out to the gardens, little did we know that the gardens were more like their own village. The gardens lead to many little stops on the way such as Marie Antoinette's estate and Louis XV's daughters houses and many other places built over the course of history. Brian and I had learned about the palace and gardens heavily in class before and it was awesome to see everything in person, like the beautiful sculptures that also functioned as fountains. Versailles is known architectural for its extensive use of glass and its water. In that period of time it was a complicated matter to build fountains and have so many bodies of water and fountains because plumbing was not really in existence yet. Inside the gardens you could rent golf carts and bikes to travel to all the spots of the gardens. Brian and I chose to walk thinking that we didn't really need either a bike or cart and we discovered that we may have been wrong. But we stuck it out and enjoyed the gardens more because we could pause and look and take pictures as we wanted.
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Approaching the palace
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| Palace Gate |
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| Gardens and the Canal in the background |
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| A colosseum like building we found in the maze of the gardens |
The tram ride back to Paris was the part of the trip we had both been dreading. I was really hard to say goodbye. When we first met at the tower it was as if we had never been away from each other and nothing had changed and leaving a second time was harder then the first but we knew when we saw each other again in Switzerland everything would feel the same again. But we had an amazing weekend and I mean come on who can top a date in Paris, it was the best!
Day 36 Saturday morning early in the am I headed to the train station about a ten minute walk from my apartment so excited! After a three and a half hour train ride I arrived in Paris and headed to the public trams to meet Brian under the Eiffel Tower. Brian flew from Germany to Paris and got there about an hour before me. I get off the tram at the Eiffel Tower and I thought that I would see the tower right away but to my surprise I could not see anything of the sort so i walked down the street and once I passed a few buildings it just appeared in tremendous form. As soon as you see the tower you are aw-struck, jaw just dropped and I couldn't stop smiling. Then I reached the square and started to look for my American boy and there he was sitting there under the tower. =) Even though he didn't shave his crazy German beard he had been growing since he got to Germany I was still happy to see him and excited to explore Paris. We walked around below the tower and took lots of pictures and then headed to the Notre Dame Cathedral. Inside the cathedral was amazing all of the churches in Europe are beautifully ornamented and detailed with stained glass and gold. Inside the church I lit a candle for my pop-pop. After we checked into the hotel we went on a search for a basilica located on top a hill so from the top of the hill you can see all of Paris. It was just great to walk around Paris with Brian and actually get to talk to him in person without the internet making strange noises or dropping our calls. After the Basilica we walked around Paris hitting some of the most well-known buildings. We visited the Louvre at night and it was beautiful, we went inside to see how the pyramid of glass is held up and designed. We did not get to go in the museum and see the Mona Lisa because it was too late but when I go to Paris again with my class I will definitely seeing the museum. We also walked along the water through Paris from the Louvre to the Eiffel tower. It is amazing to walk such a long distance and still have the tower in the background the whole way. At one point while we were walking we came across a bridge that had all different types of locks attached to it with inscriptions of people's names and different dates. After we stopped at the bridge the Tower started to sparkle and we just stopped and watched in amazement. On every hour at night the lights of the tower start to flash like a real sparkler would on the 4th of July. We finally made our way to the tower and got to see it up close and personal at night, and let me tell you it is 100 times better at night then during the day. There is less people and it is more of a personal and emotionally private experience. It just felt like it was me, Brian and the tower.
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