We decided on the bus from Amsterdam to Paris because of the
price and after a small altercation with a truck resulting in a smashed
windscreen of the bus, we arrived in Paris at rush hour. Paris is a massive city so we decided to grab a
cab to take us to our hostel.
Unfortunately because of the traffic and an accident (on the other side
of the road...) it took nearly 40 minutes and 30euros to travel 6km. When we finally arrived at our destination,
we weren’t as impressed as we hoped to be with our hostel...it was rated as the
“best” in Paris which only makes me wonder how bad the other ones are. At least we had good roommates in our
room.
The first full day we did everything that people do in Paris
starting with the Louvre. We tolerated
the crowds for a couple of hours and appreciated some of the amazing and
well-known art in the museum. There is so much to see that we decided to see
the sculptures, from the likes of Michelangelo etc...amazing what people can do
with marble. Next we wandered down les
Champs Elysees and checked out the view from the Arc de Triomphe. Then we headed in the direction of the Eiffel
Tower. Although it wasn’t a spectacular
day in terms of the weather we decided to head up the tower anyway, by way of
the stairs. 650 stairs later, we made it
to the second viewing platform, which is the highest you can climb to without
taking the lift. We took our photos and continued on our way. We chose to walk back to our hostel in Montmartre
and despite how cold it was and how busy and confusing the streets are, we found
our way.
The next day we were mellower, checking out the church of
Sacred Heart and the nearby vicinity. We
managed to avoid getting taken advantage of by the street vendors who are
rather aggressive at times finding any and every way to take your money. We headed out to the Eiffel Tower again in
the evening to check out the light show that goes on there every night...it did
look pretty impressive and despite our want to check out the view at night,
there was no way we were going to wait in a massive line up to take the
elevator. The experience that night
returning to the hostel was unique...I thought the tube in London was
busy...well, it’s nothing compared to the Metro in Paris at peak times. Not only were people pushing their way into
the trains at each station but it was virtually impossible to get out at your
stop without having to tackle those in your way. I can’t imagine doing that with a backpack
strapped on...talk about a nightmare.
Luckily we made it back safely.
On our last day in Paris we made our way to the Chateau of
Versailles. Wow! Talk about
elaborate...it looked like everything had been made of gold.The French sure
do luxury well. No wonder the French
people were pissed off and cut off Marie Antoinette’s head! We learned some history, took some photos and
returned to our hostel to collect our gear.
We were now on our way to Spain!
