Semana Santa Concluded: Part 2 - Paris

Paris: April 16-18

After barely an hour in the Barcelona airport I was on an outbound flight to France. This is when the itinerary on my trip got a little hectic for the first time but hey I made a bold decision and I´m taking more risks these days because hey why not! The time from my plane landing to the bus to the station leaving was about 10 minutes and the time from the bus arriving at the station to the train leaving was 4 minutes.

The first stop was Angers so that I could visit Angie and see how things were going in her world. I can say that Angers did a good job being the first destination I ever traveled to in France. I can say that paying 20+ euros for a meal is just plain theft but hey Europe is jammin to the beat of its own very expensive drum. I spent only a couple hours in Angers because I had another train to catch that night taking me into Paris. After a quick tour of the town and a short dinner I was off again into the sunset.

I arrived in Paris late, probably around 11:30, then I set off looking for the hostel. Luckily my phone hadn´t yet died and I was able to navigate to the hostel without issue using the citymaps app. It´s a great app and I recommend it to everyone. Got to the hostel and checked in a little past midnight and headed up to the room. This was my first dip into the world of hostels and now I can see where all the crazy stories/horror stories come from. My story isn´t so bad. I felt bad coming in that late when everyone there was already asleep and I felt especially bad for the guy on the bottom bunk below me because there was NO way he was staying asleep through the ordeal that was me climbing to the top bunk.

I made the leap though and I was in for the night. That wasn´t the end of the noise festivities though as there was another group of people arriving after me. Three girls got to the hostel later in the evening and then some drama ensued. Surprise surprise. (sorry ladies that drama stuff does tend to follow you guys around) Apparently three girls got to the hostel around 5 or 6 in the morning and only two of them had reservations for that night. They figured the third girl could just sleep on the floor until morning rather than searching for another hostel. This was apparently going just fine until one person in the room, there´s always that guy (but this time it was a girl), wasn´t ok with there being seven people in a six person room. So she goes down to the front desk and tells the manager and now I´m awake and not even really angry. I was more curious to find out why the door kept opening and closing. I was thinking ¨is this hostel life??¨ Turns out they let the girl with no reservation stay on the floor (how gracious) and that was the end of the debacle. However the three girls definitely had no love for the one that tattled on them. I would come to learn this later on as we chatted.

In the morning I would start my journey to see all the touristy things around the city and really embrace my inner tourist. I already stick out like a sore thumb so I busted out the camera and went on a little journey. I had it in my mind that with an entire day to kill I could avoid public transport and just walk from place to place. I'm really glad I chose this option as I got to see all of the sights along the way to the tower but you better bring your comfiest walking shoes because Paris is no joke in terms of amount of ground to cover.

With the touted tower being the last stop on my list of sights, I decided to start the circuit with the closest thing. This happened to be the pretty awesome Notre Dame cathedral. It was a beautiful morning, not too hot just yet, and as I walked I took my time to really take it all in. I knew I would only be in the city for a day so why not slow down the pace a bit.

I arrived at the cathedral and immediately realized why people rave about it so much. It really is quite an impressive building, and not just because it's really really big. The architecture is fantastic and it seems to have a sort of presence as it looms over the waterway. Not bad for a first stop in my opinion and a suitable introduction to the architecture of the city. 

The view from the front

I wasn't surprised to see a ton of people walking around but there was plenty of room for picture taking especially because it was still early in the day. What did surprise me were the armed guards patrolling the grounds. This was a common trend during my stay in France. I guess I'm just not used to guards walking around looking like they're ready for live combat. Oh well, not a big deal I guess.

The morning was off to a good start and I kept going on a circuitous path that I drew on my ipad using the city maps app. I saw that Paris was way too big to walk in a single day, but luckily many of the major monuments were in the loop I planned to walk. It was about half of the inner city but still a considerable amount of hoof it. The next stop as I walked to the Louvre was the "Love Locks Bridge."I totally forgot about this bridge, but I remembered seeing it in the movie Now You See Me. The bridge has thousands of locks on it of various sizes and designs. It's a cool idea I think but not so cool that if you put your lock on more than a year ago it's likely covered with the locks of this past year alone.


I stopped on the bridge for a little while just taking in the view from the bridge and also taking a moment to appreciate it. I read online that the city council might remove all the locks sometime soon so the bridge might not be as glamorous when I return to put my lock on =P.

Next stop, The Louvre. Now this building I had some idea about coming in because it's one of the more famous landmarks I think. It appears in plenty of movie fly over sequences or the like I'm sure. Seeing it first hand is a whole different animal though, as is most of the situations where you see a landmark that has been described to you in the past but when you see for yourself it really blows your mind.

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I didn't have a chance to go inside because I didn't feel like waiting in that really long line on such a nice day. There was a nice walking path leading to the spire across the street from the Louvre so I snapped some pics and then went on my way.

The walk leading up to the spire was very nice and relaxing. I didn't realize how much I missed the feel of being in a park with a nice walking path until I was in one again. It's one of my few gripes about Spain but even the kids agree with me that they wish there were more parks. With the spire in the distance I made my way only stopping for a picture swap encounter with this nice old lady who I met along the way.

After the Spire, began the long trek to the Arc Triumphant (yes I renamed it). It didn't look that far on the map as it was a straight shop from the Spire but boy it was a true hike. Slightly uphill and probably near two miles in length it proved to be a formidable pre lunch task.  I decided to stop and take a picture of the view on the bridge to the left of the Spire/Obelisk as I was getting ever so close to the main attraction.

Getting closer to the finish line.

Along the way to the Arc you can definitely see the surroundings change from more parks and greenery to the hustle and bustle of the shopping district. It was store after store on the way up the street as the views around me completely changed. I wasn't interested in shopping, nor have I been for a long while since european sizes are not my sizes, but there was one things that caught me eye like on oasis during a desert excursion. There was a Mercedes Benz store. Not like a dealership but an actual store. I didn't even know these existed. There were cars on display and you could buy bags, cologne, jewelry and many other things all emblazoned with the Benz logo.  

 There was even a security guard at the door and he stopped the lady next to me at the door because you can't have food or drinks near the cars. Talk about high class living huh. I don't regret at all taking some time out to tour around this place a bit. I may or may not ever own a Mercedes supercar but at least I could take some time to gawk at the floor models. Not enough leg room anyway. Now for the food adventure to begin. During the long walk up to the Arc I was beginning to get quite hungry so thus began my first experience ordering food in France. After that 22-23 euro fiasco in Nantes I wanted something a little more reasonable for my lunch session. There was a burger place that I hadn't seen before and I thought to myself that maybe it would be healthier than McDonald's (I ended up getting McDonald's anyway but bare with me).

I walked in to the place and was delighted to see that they had the easy checkout kiosks in front of the counter. I appreciate that places have these know especially in places where tourists that don't speak the language will have trouble. I was one of those tourists. The ordering process went smoothly enough but when you chose the option to pay with cash the machine wouldn't give you a receipt nor was there a receptacle for bills or coins. After some head scratching I figured I would take a step back and watch some locals do it, but time and time again they were paying with cards which led me to believe that the machine was mislabeled or just incredibly complex. Or that there was a new form of currency specific to this fast food joint. Either way I was getting more and more hungry and feeling pretty incompetent. Luckily there was a family next to me having the exact same experience. We exchanged glances and gave those universal "hey do you know how to work this thing" hand gestures but to no avail. So with that I left.

Enter McDonald's. Luckily a few stores down there was a McD's and I thought surely this American establishment would be more foreigner friendly. However I had the same problem with the kiosk. There just didn't seem to be a way to pay without a card, but then it dawned on me that I had multiple cards I could use to complete the transaction. So I whipped out the Visa and was done in a flash. I'll chalk this one up to a case of overly advanced fast food digital terminals. Scarfed down the meal and then I was back on the road.

Conveniently the Arc was mere minutes away and when I got there I was stunned at how large this stone monument was.

Way bigger than the Arc in Barcelona

The Arc sits in the middle of a huge roundabout so getting a good photo is difficult at times. There was a sizable crowd on the sidewalk so that only added to the issue. With some patience and some breaks in the roundabout traffic there were some opportunities for a good shot. I didn't know how it would compare to the replica in Barcelona but this one is much grander. I didn't realize why the roundabout needed to be so big but then you see the Arc and realize that the thing is gigantic so it makes sense to have the mother of all roundabouts encircling it. I still had plenty of walking left to do though and I set off for the crown jewel of the city, anxious to get some good photos.

The walk to the tower didn't take long and I'm glad I walked the way I did because the observation deck behind the tower is pretty cool. There were people everywhere taking pictures of course. I think the view from this side is better as opposed to the grass lawns on the other side because you have a higher vantage point. Anywho I started my picture spree from the deck and proceeded to get closer and closer taking multiple pictures from a lot of different angles. Embracing my inner tourist I wanted to get a lot of pictures because it was a beautiful day and I'm sure I won't be back in Paris for a while...at least I think.

I really enjoyed getting to see the tower up close and personal and I wasn't too bummed about not being able to go up the lift. It seemed as though the wait in line would have been quite long anyhow. I think that you have to book tickets at least a few months in advance if you want to move through expeditiously. Maybe next time I'll go that route. My day of sightseeing ended with the tower and I did some exploring in the surrounding area. There were some tents set up and it was a little market of sorts with vendors and food items. After a few final pictures I decided to head back to the hostel because I had a long walk ahead and I wanted to take a nap. The tourism part ended there but there were some more adventures back at the hostel as well.