PARIS!

I just got back last night from the most amazing weekend in my life in Paris, France! It was sooo awesome I can't even describe it, but I'll try! :) This might be a long post...

We left Caceres on Thursday afternoon. It was me, my roommate Steph, and another ISU student, Page. A 4 and 1/2 hour bus ride later we were in Madrid. I wanted to take the metro to the airport, but we were going to be pushing it to be on time for our flight, so we took a very expensive taxi ride to the airport in Madrid, only to find out that our flight was delayed an hour. Apparently, France is having air strikes, so the airports are short on workers and all flights are either delayed or cancelled. So we left Madrid around 10pm.

The flight was good, and it was awesome to fly over Paris at night. It's so huge!! The lights seemed to go on forever. After we landed, we took an even more expensive taxi ride to our hostal.

Ok, our hostal: First of all, it was far from the center of the city with all the attractions and touristy stuff. You could call it suburbs, or slums maybe, of Paris. Second, the name was "Peace and Love Hostal." Third, the website told us that there was a bar in the hostal. What it should have said was there was a hostal in the bar. Seriously. We walked into a cute little bar, checked in with the bartender, and the rooms were upstairs. At first I was a tad bit unsure about the whole situation. But the bar was nice, and the people there all spoke fluent English, and were so friendly. They looked after us and gave us transportation advice and everything. So we ended up loving the place.

When we got our keys, the bartender/hostal manager told us it was "a bit of a hike" to our room. That hike turned out to be a narrow winding staircase 6 floors high. I thought I was going to die walking up there! Our room was... small. Like the inside of a car small. Like the size of a dressing room small. Like having to step on my bed to go into the bathroom small. But it was still nice, and hey, it was cheap.

Friday morning we went to the metro station by our hostal, and after playing sharades with the woman at the ticket office who spoke absolutely nothing but French, we bought a ticket. Next step was to figure out where to go. We stared at a map of Paris for 20 minutes, got on a train, then switched at the next stop because it was going the wrong way, changed lines and got on the wrong train again, then finally ended up at the Lourve.

The Louvre was everything I thought it would be, but bigger. It was huge! We saw Napoleon's apartments, the Mona Lisa, the Venus de Milo statue, The Coronation of Napoleon painting, The Wedding Feast at Cana, among others. It was very cool.

From there we went to Notre Dame. The inside is cool, but dark and not pretty. It was so weird seeing in person what I had only seen in the movie The Hunchback of Notre Dame. We couldn't go to the top though, because the tours had closed for the day. But it was still neat seeing the inside, the altar, and everything. After that, we went to the Luxembourg Park, but it had just closed right before we got there, so we couldn't actually walk through it.

Day 2: We were a lot better with the metro system, and took trains to the Opera first. I was really excited to see the Opera, but when we went inside, they said the auditorium was closed because of some rehersal. I was so disapointed! (See a pattern? We were begining to think we were cursed, everything we went to was closed)

We then walked to the northern part of the city, and got to see the outside of Moulin Rouge. Then we went to one of my favorite places of the trip: the Montmadre. It's a really big hill, with soo many tourists. There are a lot of souvenier shops and cafes, and a "painters' square" which is a park full of artists and easels and their works. There were musicians all around playing the guitar and singing, and tons of people were sitting on the steps where you can see the entire city of Paris.

The best part was the Basilique du Sacre-Ceour (Basilica of the Sacred Heart of Jesus of Paris) at the very top of the hill. It's absolutely beautiful, but what really made it neat was that inside, you have to be completely silent and cell phones and cameras aren't allowed. It was sad that I couldn't take any pictures, but it made the place seem so special because everyone was quiet and respectful.

From there, we went to the Arc de Triomphe (Arch of Triumph). It's in the middle of a "star" of 5 main avenues of Paris that go out from it. We had to enter from one of the avenues and go in an underground tunnel to get to the Arc. Under the Arc is the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, with the eternal flame. Steph and Page paid to go up on top of the Arc, but I didn't.

After that, we made our way to the highlight of the trip: the Eiffel Tower. I was sooo excited! It was a long walk there, and we kept seeing the top of the tower getting closer and closer. When we finally got there and could see it up close, it was breathtaking. We crossed the Seine and walked underneath it, and I was just blown away. I couldn't believe that I was actually there! There were soo many people! Underneath it, and all around the Champ de Mars was just packed with people and music and food. It was incredible.

We waited for it to get dark, then we stood in line for an hour waiting to get tickets to go up. The elevator was really scary, and I'm not even scared of heights. All you can see is the city of Paris getting smaller and smaller, and you look around you and see just skinny iron structures holding you up.

We only went to the 2nd level, but it was amazing. By then it was night, and all of Paris was lit up on all sides. The Seine was gorgeous, and I could see the Arc of Triumph, Champ de Mars, and the Trocadero. Every hour on the hour, the Eiffel Tower lights up in flashing lights, which makes it look like it's sparkling. Soo pretty!

After we went back down, we went accross the river to the Trocadero, which is just a building but has steps in front of it. So after climbing the steps, we could see a perfect view of the Eiffel Tower. It was raining, but we didn't even care. I didn't want to leave! We bought crepes (the most amazing thing I have ever had in my life) and took the metro back to the bar, I mean hostal.

Sunday morning, we left to go back home to Caceres. Ok here's how our traveling went: We had to take the metro from our hostal to the end of the line, which was about 45 minutes. The metro to the airport was shut down for some reason, so we had to take a bus from the last stop to the airport. The bus was packed, and it was a long ride. When we finally got to the airport, we walked inside and saw that the entire place was a disaster! The whole air strike business turned the airport into chaos.

We got in line to check in with only an hour until our flight, thanks to the metro/bus situation. The line was enormous, and we soon realized there was NO way we would make it in time. So I flagged down a woman, and practically begged her to help us. She did, either because we had no luggage to check or because I was so charming. So she took our passports and went off for awhile, then returned with our tickets.

We ran through security, then of course I was singled out and had to have my backpack personally searched. I finally got done and we sprinted to our gate. Once we got there, it was announced that our flight was delayed. Go figure.

Soon they announced that our airplane was ready, and we were just waiting for the bus to come pick us up and take us to the plane. I don't know why, but it took 2 whole hours for them to find a bus for us. I could have walked to the plane and back 17 times in the time it took the bus to arrive at our gate.

So anyway. We FINALLY took off. We arrived in Madrid, and had to take yet another expensive taxi ride because we didn't have time for the metro. We arrived at the bus station with 10 minutes to spare before our bus left for Caceres. I really think I can't just take a normal flight anywhere, it seems like I have bad luck whenever I travel. But oh well, we made it. We got home to Caceres around 10:30pm.

It was an amazing amazing amazing trip, and I'm going to remember it forever. I'll hopefully have pictures up soon!