Now that my mother is on her way back to the United States after a lovely five day visit here, I have some time to write about what we've been doing! It's been a very busy and fun-filled week between sight-seeing, finding new restaurants, and of course my twenty-first birthday! Paris was a bit of a zoo this week since so many people are on vacation, but we fought the crowds when necessary and did a lot of nice sight-seeing. I even went to a few places that I hadn't visited before, like an ancient Roman amphitheater in the heart of the Latin Quarter and the Basilica of Sacré Coeur. We also did a lot of sightseeing on foot, at least on Monday and Thursday, by far the nicest days of the week in terms of weather. I didn't take as many photos as usual, because these were mostly places I've been to (many times) before, and also because Mom had her camera with her, which is much nicer than mine!
On Monday we saw a bit of the Marais, Paris's old Jewish quarter, before heading past the Louvre, via Les Halles, and then through le Jardin des Tuileries to Place de la Concorde, up Les Champs Élysées to L'Arc de Triomphe. (It sounds like a lot more walking than it was--I'm still surprised at how walkable of a city Paris is!)
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| Église Ste Eustache, near les Halles |
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| Mom with the big head in front of Ste Eustache |
On Thursday, the other sunny day of the week, we spent the morning wandering around Montmartre and the afternoon visiting Sainte Chapelle and the marché aux oiseaux, or bird market, which actually sells flowers and gardening goods, as well as little gifty things like Christmas ornaments and is always a pretty place to wander through.
Of course, the gray and drizzly weather during the rest of the week didn't keep us from being out and about! On Tuesday, despite the drizzly weather, we headed to the Latin Quarter, visiting Notre-Dame, Ile de St-Louis, Les Arènes de Lutèce (the ancient Roman amphitheater I mentioned earlier), and of course le Jardin du Luxembourg.
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| Les Arènes de Lutèce |
On Wednesday, we didn't have great weather for my birthday, either, but we headed over to the Rodin museum to visit its sculpture garden, walking past les Invalides on the way, before going to la Tour Eiffel, which was pretty crowded despite the crummy weather (its top was obscured by passing clouds). I'd bought the tickets ahead of time, so we didn't have to wait in line to get in, although it was pretty crowded inside, especially to get to the very top level. But we persevered and made it all the way to the top, despite my dislike of elevators and Mom's dislike of looking over the edge of tall buildings, and it was a lot of fun anyway! And in the evening, after a lot of hassle and a change of plans when the restaurant where I'd been planning to eat ended up being closed for construction this week, we finally met up with a bunch of my friends here at a very interesting restaurant in the Marais, not too far from here... We'd thought it was called le Curieux Spaghetti Bar, but when we arrived at the address, the name had been changed to Who's. It was a very interesting restaurant, and the food was quite good, and the company was excellent, so it ended up being the best birthday dinner I've had in a while! And certainly the most interesting...
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| Le Penseur--The Thinker |
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| view from the top... |
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| most of the birthday diners outside the restaruant |
After the day of good weather on Thursday, we spent Friday morning at le musée d'Orsay, and the afternoon at Les Galeries Lafayette for some window shopping! Of course it's way too expensive to shop there--it's like Nordstrom's on steroids--but it's always fun to look at what they have, and the building itself is pretty impressive, too. However, you can't take photos inside the Orsay, and I didn't bother while we were shopping, so the details of the day will be left a bit to the imagination, but suffice it to say that it was a lovely day and the end to a lovely week!
