La granadina It's the spring semester of my junior year, so I am celebrating with un gran viaje filled with classes (unfortunately) and crazy foreign fun.

Paris in three days is intense! I slept so much the week we got back, you would not even believe. But now I am awake, so I will share my stories! The start was not such fun. 3:30 alarm clock, me coughing up a lung: we really could have done without. Then we almost died I don’t even know how many times in the taxi (Spaniards are ridiculously bad drivers), and Queen was singing “The Show Must Go On.” So it did. We got to Paris and walked for so long it’s not funny, got to our hostel to hear the room still wasn’t ready, and decided to quest for food, since it was past noon and we hadn’t eaten since the night before. The first test of my mad French skills! All I can say is thank God the hostel guys spoke English. I know the polite words (excuse me, please, thank you, etc), the greeting words (hello, goodbye, good morning/evening/night), the tourist words (I don’t speak French, I am Canadian, do you speak Spanish/English, where is…), and the number words (from 1-69). Go me. Why do I not know more French? Je ne sais pas. Because I rock at life. Anna is worse, though: she only says “voulez vous coucher avec moi c’est soir?” Awesome. Showers and snoozes were actually first on the agenda once we got into the hostel. We were so tired, it was ridiculous. Being winter, it was dark when we resurfaced, but that just meant Paris was gorgeous in a nighttime way. The City of Lights, you know what I mean. Since we obviously hadn’t walked enough in the past week, Anna and I just wandered for a few hours. Taking pictures, seeing sights, etc, etc. So cool. We had some dinner, then turned in. We didn’t want to go out at all, considering our screaming feet, aching legs, lack of French, and Granada budget. Oh, and severe exhaustion. The next morning was another early start cuz the first Sunday of the month is free museum day. That means art (and walking). The Louvre was insane. Every single bit of wall had some sort of painting; you didn’t even know where to look. I think next time I would much rather have an audio tour or someone who knows the place, at least. I must admit, it was a bit overwhelming on its own. After the hours we wandered, it’s weird to think how little we saw: Mona Lisa (a little anti-climatic, hard to get a good look), the Venus de Milo, a huge room just of Rubens, and so much more. You could spend a day just looking at medieval Italian stuff. It’s really that crazy. Before our next museum we ate delicious crepes (good one, France) in the Tuileries and then moved on. The Musee d’Orsay was amazing. In 2 ½ hours we saw it all, but I easily could have spent more time looking at all the famousness. It was newer stuff, art nouveau, impressionism, etc, and all very exciting. We walked to Notre Dame, which was not a bad walk at all, until we realized it took an hour. Our legs were officially in denial! Notre Dame was cool, though I have to admit, after a week of churches, we were a little jaded at that point. We chilled in the park there, eating hot dog sandwiches and listening to accordion Beatles covers til the sun went down. We dined picnic-style on our king-sized bed, watching Bridget Jones en français. Day three was a bummer, weather-wise: clouds, haze, some rain, and clouds. Frustrating when it was so sunny before, but oh well. We walk on! The Eiffel Tower was about 330 steps, and I honestly don’t why we walked it. Because we’re locas. The view was exciting, but also disappointing, since we could barely see anything the signs pointed out. Sacre Cour was a medium gray spot on the light gray horizon. Tres belle. We metroed up to see it still, though, and the church was pretty, though the view was not. Getting there also was not. The metro, first of all, should have had a giant sign directing Anna and me to the elevator. Silly Americans, we didn’t think the stairs would be any worse than any other Metro station, but we were so wrong! It turned into a spiral, with every turn bringing more steps, and oh, it was a bad dream. My thighs hurt just thinking about it. Then the train up to the church was broken down, so we walked some 250 more steps up to the church. I hate that I’m not kidding. We didn’t even go up the tower, since we were barely standing at that point, and view was (sadly) grey. So we hiked back down, ate crepes sandwiches, and wandered through the classy part of town. The Moulin Rouge and Le Chat Noir were something to photograph, and then we went back to the hostel. Our last night was another bedtime picnic, watching France’s Wheel of Fortune. Sorry, but their Vanna White is kinda slutty. Every now and then she just struts across the stage, or shakes around a bit for entertainment. Huh. But I won one of the puzzles! I can’t even get them in English, but “horoscope du jour” was all me. Oui. Tuesday morning was not quite as fun, with a 4am wakeup and brief taxi crisis, but we got back to Madrid sans problem. We got home to Granada around 8pm, and that was our Paris adventure!