{"id":319,"date":"2016-07-27T16:37:26","date_gmt":"2016-07-27T20:37:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/travel.laughinglyeverafter.com\/?p=319"},"modified":"2016-07-28T14:56:43","modified_gmt":"2016-07-28T18:56:43","slug":"paris","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/travel.laughinglyeverafter.com\/?p=319","title":{"rendered":"Paris"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tuesday June 28 – From Lucerne, Matt and I caught one of the high-speed trains out of Basel to Paris. \u00a0The train ride was about 3 hours but the scenery was pretty and I read a book.<\/p>\n

We arrived in Paris a little after 1pm and after sorting out our metro tickets, hopped on a train to the hotel. \u00a0Luckily for us, the hotel was right across the street from the metro stop! \u00a0We checked into the\u00a0H\u00f4tel Observatoire Luxembourg<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0\u00a0had a cute (small) room with a nice spacious bathroom. \u00a0We both agreed the shower in Paris was fantastic!<\/p>\n

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Our hotel<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Stairs in the hotel.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Once we were settled at the hotel we decided to take off and check out the city. \u00a0Our hotel was about a mile from Notre Dame, so we started there. \u00a0The line to go in was pretty long so we decided we would come back later. \u00a0We walked down to the Lourve to see it. \u00a0Again, we didn’t go in but just walked along the outside and down through the Jardin des Tuileries to the Big Wheel. \u00a0We crossed the Seine and headed back towards the hotel. \u00a0At this point, I was getting hungry and needed a break. \u00a0There may have been a small meltdown before Matt finally stopped for a drink. \u00a0He was saved by the popcorn they provided with my glass of wine! \u00a0After food and drink, we made our way back to the hotel for a rest.<\/p>\n

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Notre Dame<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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The Louvre<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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My first view of the Eiffel Tower!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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Where wine and popcorn saved Matt’s life, bc it saved mine! \ud83d\ude09<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We ended having dinner at the hotel restaurant that night and my dish was amazing! \u00a0I had the duck risotto, Matt got a steak and we ordered a bottle of wine! \u00a0Matt was interrupted while we were at dinner with work stuff so we went back to the room after dinner for an early night.<\/p>\n

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Duck risotto<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Matt’s steak frites<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Wednesday June 29 – We started the day with yummy pain au chocolat as we headed over to the Eiffel Tower. \u00a0The front desk told us there was a bus that stopped in front of the hotel that would take us over there but we decided to walk. \u00a0I mean it was only like 3 miles so NBD right? \ud83d\ude09 We strolled along and finally made our way to the Eiffel Tower. \u00a0Unfortunately, with the Euro 2016 taking place in Paris, the entire park in front of the Eiffel Tower was blocked off! \u00a0This meant, no picnic in the park. \ud83d\ude41 \u00a0 I have to say, I did love the Eiffel Tower, though I expected it to look more worn. \u00a0There was a ton of security to go through to go under the tower so we just walked around and across the Seine to have a snack break.<\/p>\n

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From there, we walked over to the Arc de Triopmphe and down the Champs – Elysees. \u00a0A quick trip to McDonald’s to the bathroom (because the bathroom situation in Paris is odd and not free) and then we stopped for ice cream at Jeff de Bruges<\/a>. \u00a0It was delicious and just what we needed! \u00a0We then walked down to what we think will be the finish line for the Tour de France! \u00a0We hopped on the Metro back to the hotel so we could take a quick nap before meeting my cousin for dinner.<\/p>\n

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This is where we figured the Tour de France would end.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We met her over in front of the Moulin Rouge and as we were walking there from the metro stop, I noticed the street was lined with sex shops! \u00a0hehe! \u00a0As I was pointing this out to Matt he’s like “you do know what the Moulin Rouge is right?” \u00a0Duh! \u00a0I guess I just wasn’t prepared for the fact that there was a still a “redlight district” in Paris. \u00a0haha! \u00a0The 3 of us found a small cafe around the corner and stopped for dinner. \u00a0I think Matt’s dish was the only good one, so clearly choosing based on having a table was a bad idea. \u00a0We had a really fun night as we started chatting with some Canadians sitting beside us. \u00a0My cousin finally had to leave and Matt and I stayed at the table talking to our new friends. \u00a0A bottle of wine, and a whiskey later, we realized the metro was now closed and set off to find a cab! \u00a0That was a fun ride and we got to see the Eiffel Tower lit up! \u00a0It was also 1am.<\/p>\n

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Thursday June 30 – We woke up with no real plans for the day and set off towards Norte Dame again. \u00a0In the process of wandering around, we ran across a bakery that had HUGE meringues in the window! \u00a0Of course we stopped and grabbed a chocolate one along with a pain au chocolat and a croissant.<\/p>\n

As we were eating our ginormous meringue, we noticed the line to go inside Norte Dame wasn’t too long and was moving so we decided to go in. \u00a0Luckily you could take pics, but without flash! \u00a0We were also lucky that we were able to catch the end of Mass. \u00a0It was very, very cool!<\/p>\n

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There was no flash photography inside, so I was scrambling with my camera trying to get the settings right to get anything at all. Even though this one is dark, I think it turned out well.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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This is definitely one of my favorite pics from the whole trip.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We left Norte Dame, we started wandering again and decided to head over to the Marais. \u00a0This was a quaint little section of town. \u00a0We walked around pretty aimlessly for a while and finally decided to stop for a drink. \u00a0Lucky for us we stopped because as we were finishing our drinks it started to rain. \u00a0We stayed where we were until the rain was done and decided to head back to the hotel. \u00a0Originally we thought we might head over to the Sacre Coeur but I was getting tired and we figured we could take a nap and go there later in the night.<\/p>\n

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Fying buttresses – Notre Dame<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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After a nap, we headed out to find food and decided to stop at an outdoor cafe not far from the hotel. \u00a0I told Matt I didn’t want pizza and then I saw the four cheese pizza on the menu so….yeah! \u00a0That happened! \u00a0And it was delicious! \u00a0Once we were through with dinner we decided just to head back to the hotel and call it a night.<\/p>\n

Friday July 1 – We woke up to cloudy skies and our last day in Paris! \u00a0I asked Matt what he wanted to do and he said “I thought you wanted to go to the catacombs?” \u00a0We’d heard the lines were long, like 2+ hours, but there wasn’t really anything left that we felt we needed to do while in Paris. \u00a0The catacombs were about a mile from the hotel so we decided to check out the line and go from there.<\/p>\n

I hopped in line while Matt ran across the street to grab some breakfast. \u00a0I figured we’d give it 15 mins or so and see where we were. \u00a0With no other plans, we ended up waiting almost 2.5 hours to get in! \u00a0I think it took the longest the closer we were. \u00a0Finally we were in and headed down to the tunnels!<\/p>\n

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Stairs leading down. (looking back up)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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Tunnel<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Stairs leading up. They were very narrow. There were 87 in all.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We entered with a small group of about 10 people but as Matt and I started walking in the tunnels, I realized there was NO ONE around us. \u00a0It was about this time that I had to start talking myself off the ledge. \u00a0I wouldn’t consider myself claustrophobic but being in the tunnels all alone started to kind of freak me out. \u00a0Finally another couple came up behind us and I started feeling better. \u00a0From there, it didn’t take too long before we entered the actual catacombs. \u00a0It was weird, and creepy, and cool to see all of those bones. \u00a0There must have been millions down there! \u00a0And we only saw a small section. \u00a0The bones were all neatly stacked. \u00a0Some had designs or patterns. \u00a0It was very interesting.<\/p>\n

It’s supposed to take about 45 mins to walk the 5 blocks to the exit but it didn’t feel like it took that long. \u00a0Maybe it did. \u00a0Anyway, in order to exit the catacombs, you have to go up this tiny, spiral, stone staircase. \u00a0It’s only big enough for one person to fit as you go around. \u00a0When we started up, Matt saw a sign saying there were 87 steps. \u00a0We kind of laughed and started up. \u00a0About halfway up, I kind of freaked out again. \u00a0I had to focus on my breathing because you are just in the small tunnel going around and around. \u00a0You can’t see anything above or below you really, other than a few steps either way. \u00a0Finally I saw light and bolted for the top. \u00a0When we got out Matt made a comment that this might not be the best place to go if you were claustrophobic. \u00a0It was then I told him I had a few minor freak outs. \u00a0:O<\/p>\n

While the catacombs were very cool, and I’m glad we ended up going, I’m not sure it was really worth the 2.5 hour wait in line. \u00a0I’m glad we waited till Friday and had seen everything else first.<\/p>\n

After we got above ground, we headed back towards our hotel to the Luxembourg Gardens. \u00a0They were directly across the street from the hotel. \u00a0We stopped to have lunch by a fountain and then walked over to the actual garden. \u00a0It was a lovely park and there were tons of people lounging on the lawn. \u00a0It was still pretty cloudy though so we headed back to the hotel for a nap.<\/p>\n

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Start of the Luxembourg Gardens.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

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When we got up, we walked around to find some souvenirs and grab dinner. \u00a0We still had yet to have crepes so we stopped at\u00a0La Creperie. \u00a0We could see the Pantheon in one direction and the top of the Eiffel Tower in the other. \u00a0The crepes were delicious! \u00a0After dinner we took the long way back to the hotel before turning in early, since we had an early train to catch to London. \u00a0This turned out to be a good thing since it started to rain after we got back to the room.<\/p>\n

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Our view from dinner.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Looking the other way.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Our dinner. Before and after!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It was an early night, which was good considering we had an early morning ahead of us.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tuesday June 28 – From Lucerne, Matt and I caught one of the high-speed trains out of Basel to Paris. \u00a0The train ride was about 3 hours but the scenery was pretty and I read a book. We arrived in Paris a little after 1pm and after sorting out our metro tickets, hopped on a train to the hotel. \u00a0Luckily for us, the hotel was right across the street from the metro stop! \u00a0We checked into the\u00a0H\u00f4tel Observatoire Luxembourg\u00a0and\u00a0\u00a0had a…<\/p>\n

Read More Read More<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[27,28,30,29,26],"class_list":["post-319","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-europe-2016","tag-catacombs","tag-eiffel-tower","tag-moulin-rouge","tag-notre-dame","tag-paris"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/travel.laughinglyeverafter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/travel.laughinglyeverafter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/travel.laughinglyeverafter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/travel.laughinglyeverafter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/travel.laughinglyeverafter.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=319"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/travel.laughinglyeverafter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":674,"href":"https:\/\/travel.laughinglyeverafter.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319\/revisions\/674"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/travel.laughinglyeverafter.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=319"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/travel.laughinglyeverafter.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=319"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/travel.laughinglyeverafter.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=319"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}