Paris, days 2,3,4,5 (Sam)

Monday 1st November 2010

Today we woke up early and went to get our Indian visas.   When we got there, we asked the guy at the desk for papers to fill out.  He told us there were a few copies at the back but we had to photocopy them ourselves at the 20 centimes a page photocopier.  12 sheets later (3 pages each) we filled them out and managed to hand them in.  We were told it would take two to three weeks for them to process the applications.  After that we went to Père Lachaise cemetery and saw famous dead people such as Chopin, Jim Morrison, Oscar Wilde, Edith Piaf, Gertrude Stein and Molière.  The cemetery was beautiful with graves inches apart all over the place.   Jim Morrison’s grave was the first I’ve ever seen with three security guards and a barrier in front of the grave. 

We also went to see the Louvre courtyard and its pyramid.  It was beautiful in the afternoon light and our pictures don’t do it justice.  Although we decided that we would rather forego the hour and half long line up to enter the museum.  On our way back to the hostel we stopped at Centre Pompidou, a building with all the pipes and vents on the outside rather than in the walls.  The building was cool but the fountains were better. 

Photos: Père Lachaise; Grafitti near Jim Morrison's grave; Pompidou Center.

Tuesday 2nd November 2010

Today was day three in Paris; first we climbed the staircase up the Eifel tower.  The views were amazing and we could make out all the Parisian landmarks.  My favourite view was that of Sacré-Coeur on top on Montmartre.  When we got back down I bought some key chains from one of the many street vendors.  We then took the bus 69 to Ile de la Cité.  We had lunch beside Notre Dame then joined the crowds inside the Cathedral.  The inside was nice but not that amazing because for one, it was full of tourists like us, and also I have seen more Cathedrals in the past two months than I have in my entire life.  The outside was amazing though.  Especially, the judgement day Portal, the carvings of the devil torturing the newest editions to Hell were interesting, but very gruesome (boiled alive, starved, fed to the alligators).  We then went to Ile St-Louis and bought some world famous Berthillon ice cream; it was delicious.  On our way to the Latin Quarter we walked over a metal bridge with padlocks all over it.  When couples start dating they put a lock on the bridge.  If they break up, one of them goes and takes the lock off the bridge. 

In the Latin Quarter we got some frites for a snack and my Dad bought some new hiking shoes, which he is very proud of.  Then we walked up to the Pantheon and sat on the curb in front for 15 minutes doing nothing but watching students from the University of Paris faculty of Law and take pictures of Dad’s new shoes. 

Photos: Sacré-Coeur; Notre Dame judgement day portal; Lovers' Locks; Students outside the Pantheon.

Wednesday 3rd of November 2010.

Today I was very reluctant to get out of bed, luckily I was hungry enough to make myself get up so I could have breakfast. The breakfast at the hostel was great, they have a granola cereal with coconuts and raisins.  When we had fuelled we went to Montmartre a famous artist neighbourhood.  We saw Sacré-Coeur, a marble Basilica, with views over the city.  There was a mime there but he was not very good.  In the streets it was very touristy and there were artists everywhere asking to sketch you.  After a while it got annoying so I was tempted to start asking if they wanted me to sketch them.  There was also a guy who grabbed my finger and started weaving a bracelet onto it with the intention of making me buy it when he was finished.  We decided that we wanted more good views so we went to the Tour Montparnasse the tallest building in Paris proper.  It was so unpopular that just after they built it, the city made a law restricting building heights within the city.  It has the fastest elevator in Europe, 56 floors in 38 seconds.  The views from the rooftop were amazing.  When we got hungry we went to the market and bought a French specialty – Falafel!  Next stop was the catacombs.  Deep underground tunnels with walls made form the bones of millions of dead Parisians.  They were built because cemeteries were poisoning the water so the city told the Priests to move the bones underneath the sewers into abandoned mines.  The bones were neatly stacked and they had even made hearts and crosses out of skulls, creepy, but cool.  The tunnel went on for two kilometres and that is only the tiny section that they have open to the public.  It is impossible to describe how many bones there were.  You were allowed to touch the bones if you liked.  A fun game to play is to guess the name of the person you are looking at and his or her life story.   With time to waste, we relaxed at the Jardins de Luxembourg.   Then my Dad and I went to La Defense, a modern skyscraper district.  The main attraction there was gargantuan arch(basically a big hollow cube).  I felt completely dwarfed.  It is probably taller than the Richardson building for all you Winnipeg folk.  If you ever go to Paris avoid riding the RER.  It is like going to a rock concert in a labyrinth full of people and impossible to navigate.  The metro is fine though. 

Photos: View of the Gare from the Montparnasse Tower; View of the Luxemburg Gardens from the tower; Thats Jim in the centre, he was a plumber; More bones; Grand Arch de la Defense; Notice the guy on the steps.

Thursday 4th of November

Our last day in Paris...  We had two more things we wanted to see today, the Musée d’Orsay, and the Musee Rodin.  The Musée d’Orsay is the national museum for impressionist and post impressionist art.  The museum is housed in an old train station but it looks more like a palace.  There are carvings on the wall and an ornate gilded clock in the main hall.  The best parts of the museum were the Van Gogh section and a special exhibit on an artist named Gerome who painted historical paintings.  He had one painting that was set in the coliseum that showed the Christian prisoners in the middle and the lions and tigers coming out from underneath the ground.  In the next painting, the guards were bringing the cats in and slaves cleaning up the mess.  Very Gruesome. Later, while we were waiting at the bus stop to catch a bus to the Musée Rodin, a parade of soldiers in their ceremonial outfits came by on horseback.  They were a brass band as well and they played us a tune while trotting along. While they past us one of the horses stepped out of the line and stopped to have a pee, the soldier’s face turned bright red, it was hilarious. A street cleaning crew followed the horses, they managed to clean up the street quite effectively.  Later we found out that the parade was to welcome the Chinese president.  We got our bus across town and stopped for lunch in a small park, where a homeless person was ripping branches off trees.  A woman notified the park officials and 10 minutes later security had arrived and threw him out of the park.  Paris is never boring.  Anyway, when we finally got to the museum after those couple of delays we found out it was well worth the wait. It was dedicated to Auguste Rodin, a famous sculptor.  We saw lots of well-known works including the Thinker and the Burghers of Calais (City Official). 

Later that night, while my Dad and sister stayed home, my Mum and I went back out to the Latin Quarter for supper. We found a Greek place and we each got gyros with frites for four and a half Euros a piece. They were delicious and, by the end, we were stuffed. Then we went to the Champs Élysées. While we were walking by we saw a Mc Café, yes a café run by McDonalds. We went in, but just to look and sneak a photo.  We were too stuffed to buy anything.

Photos: The Thinker; Statue of Victor Hugo; The Brass Band; How embarrassing; Playing with the exposure (no tripod);  The Troubador; Oh oh, he's noticed us.

 McPatisseries