Contiki Tour - Part 1.1 France
FRANCE | Sunday, 22 January 2006 | Views [744] | Comments [5]
Hi everyone!
OK, so after 2 failed attempts and roughly 1 1/2 hours wasted typing on this blog... I'm having another go now that we are back in London. Bacially seeing as it's all past tense, I'll just review most things we did so you know what we've been up to for the past 22 days!!!!
So first stop on the contiki tour was France!! And first city of all:
Paris:We started off the contiki tour heading accross the channel on the ferry, and drove through all the WWII grounds, particularly where the battle of the somme took place. Was hard to imagine how it was as it was all over grown, and back to being farmland basically, but was interesting hearing all the stories about the battles. We got into Paris pretty late in the afternoon, and after a quick stop off at the hotel, we headed straight to the Louvre to get that done. It was a real rush through, and didn't really get to see much, however we did get to see the Mona Lisa and the Venus De Milo, which was definately something we wanted to make sure we saw. After the louvre we went on a driving tour of Paris, which was spectacular. 'The City of Lights' was actually EXTRA lit up still from christmas, so it really was a great sight, particularly driving down the Champs Elysee with all the car lights and fairty lights. We topped off the first night by climbing the eiffel tower, which gave us amazing views of the city, and our first experience of european gypsies!!!! :)
The next day we spent walking around Paris. We saw Notradame Cathedral, then jumped on the Metro to go to Hotel des Invalides. Basically, this is a war hospital from Napoleans days, still used today. It also has a war memorial attached to it documenting French Military history. In the building next to it, is a huge cathedral style building, which was originally Loui the something's personal chapel, but was converted to hold Napolean's tomb, and the tombs of some of his more succesful Generals. Napolean being the egomaniac he was, he had his tomb set up so that to see it you either have to bend over (bowing to Napolean) or it's above you (look up to Napolean). Afterwards we headed to the Arc de Triumph and actually climbed to the top of it. Again, great views of Paris, and in particular their crazy drivers. The 12 lane round about surrounding the Arc has an average of 1 accident per 7 minutes. 12 lanes, but no lane lines!!!
After that we walked down the Champs Elysee and looked at all the shops. That night we headed to the Moulin Rouge, which was a really great show. Expensive, but worth it. Great entertainment and great food. (Pam - Coles actually ate a steak... and liked it!!). Afterwards went to the pub next door and got to know the people on our tour! Great first two days on tour!
Lyon:The next day was mostly a travel day. We headed to Lyon from Paris, doing a quick stop through a town called Foutainleur. The towns claim of fame being a really elaborate chatteau who's previous owners include one of the Loui's, and Napolean. Lyon was only a quick stop over for the night, but we had a good time and ate French Cuisine : snails!! That was interesting. We'd been given a fairly apt description. They taste like Basil or Garlic chewing gum. Interesting, but glad we tried it!
Nice:The next day we drove onto Nice, however the first night we spent in Monaco! That was a great night. You could smell the money on those people! Apparently you have to pay a non-refundable £2,000,000 to apply for a citizenship in Monaco! And you can still get knocked back! Went to the monte carlo casino, which is one of the most prestigeous casino's in the world. (Gamblers: Minimum blackjack bet was 25 euros per hand ($40 AU) and everyone else was betting thousand's of euros at a time!). The next day we just explored Nice on a free day, which was a lovely town. Sitting on the Mediteranean Sea, it was really picturesqe with aqua water, and cliff side houses. Got some great views from ontop of one of the cliffs all along the main beach. Just bummed around for most of the day. At night we had a great night at Wayne's Bar which was a really great place.
The day after Nice we headed onto Italy, but I'll leave that for the next installation on the journal. FOr now, enjoy what we've done in France (that was about 3 weeks ago) and we'll try and update as soon as possible. Hopefully on a computer where we don't have to pay for internet!
Apologies to all who've been watching the site, but the past three weeks has been non-stop.
Love to all back home!
From Snape & Coles xoxo
Tags: Contiki
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