Paris

Although Paris deserves a really long post, I really only have time for a short one relative to how much we did.  

When classes and finals ended on February 21, I was done with the first half of my semester abroad.  Although I was not actually half way through the time that I have over here, the part of the semester where I have class every day was over and the part where I will be working at my internship was going to begin, but first, Paris with Alison.   

Alison arrived Tuesday night and then Wednesday morning we went to the train station to catch the Eurostar to Paris.  We got in during the early afternoon, and started right off with the Louvre.  We saw the Mona Lisa, as one does, as well as Napoleons Coronation, which I always thought was called Napoleon Crowning Josephine.  Either way, for some reason, that is one of my favourite paintings.  But as cool as it was to see priceless, beautiful works of art, the highlight of our Louvre visit might have been the window washing robot that cleans the iconic Louvre glass pyramid.   The next day we took a walking tour down the Seine which started at Notre Dame and went all around ending about a fifteen minute walk away from the Arc De Triomphe.  I know it was a fifteen minute walk, because we walked it.  It did take us a little longer than 15 minutes but that is only because we stopped at a famous Macarons shop, and it was a good stop.  I only had a small bit of one, but they were a good choice.  After we made it to the Arc, looked around and took some pictures, we ventured on to the Eiffel Tower.  We had planned to go up since we figured that if we went up, we could catch the view in the daylight and then wait a little and see the lit up Paris.  However, due to the winds, the summit was not open so we decided to wait for a different day.  But I got a crepe, we saw tourists being scammed (using some hidden ball game), and we got a beautiful up close view of the Eiffel tower lit up at night.  That night we went to our second bistro of the trip and I got my second steak frites.   

Friday was Versailles day.  The weather was a bit temperamental, but once we got inside the sky cleared up.  The palace was beautiful.  I did not remember much of it at all from when I was five, but you could sense the history and see the beautiful artefacts.  The best part about Versailles, I thought, wasn’t even in the Palace, it was way out deep in the property where Mary Antoinette built a little village.  There was a beautiful old hamlet, huge fields, and even live animals.  I had no clue that was there and I am glad we stumbled upon it.   

NEXT: On Saturday we toured through a few museums and saw some beautiful and widely famous pieces of art from Monet, Van Gough, and Picasso, to name a few.  We also found our way into Notre Dame and ended the evening at the Sacré-Cœur where we got a beautiful view of the Paris skyline at night.   

Our last day in Paris we went up to the top of the Eiffel Tower, I got escargot, and we made our way back to London on the train.   

Food: Crepes–A lot; Steak Frites—Twice; Salmon tartar—Surprisingly good; A really great veal dish—Maybe my favourite; Lamb—A tad small, but really good as well; Roasted Chicken—Not my favourite but we were also rushing to the train station; Escargot—Great as usual; Lots of baguette bread and Pain au raisin and Pain au chocolate

-Drew

LINK TO PHOTOS (https://goo.gl/photos/3HrzxsXyvdZDwbLbA)