We were staying right in Saint-Michel so there were lots of places really close by. Not too long after going out to look for somwhere to eat we came across this really cool street pictured above that had lots of small restaurants along it. We found a really good italian place, with an even better prix fix menu to eat at and we both really enjoyed our meals. Later on we also got a very good crepe breakfast in another little restaurant on this street. Sadly, I don't remember the name of the street.
Friday morning we woke up and the weather wasn't great, it actually misted pretty much all day, but we were determined not to let that stop us. We set off walking around to see some of the most famous things that Paris had to offer. Our first stops, both of which were right down the street from our hotel, were Notre Dame and Sainte-Chapelle. Notre Dame is an enormous gothic cathedral right in the heart of Paris and it actually sits on a sort of island along with Sainte Chapelle right in the middle of the Seine River.
Pictured here on the left is the front of Notre Dame and on the right is a portion of Saint-Chapelle. Both of these were incredible buildings and the inside of Notre Dame was enormous, it reminded me just a little bit of Saint Patrick's Cathedral in New York City.
After we saw these we continued to walk, crossing to the other side of the Seine and following the water until we made it to the Louvre. We thought that we wouldn't really have time to walk through the Louvre because its so big but we went to see the famous glass pyramid anyway. I know we will be back to Paris, perhaps even before I come home from study abroad, so on my next trip one of my goals will be to actually walk through the Louvre and see the incredibly underwhelming Mona Lisa.
Here is a picture of me looking awkward in front of the glass Pyramids of the Louvre. The pyramids were extremely controversial when they were designed by I.M Pei and placed here at the front of the Louvre. The larger pyramid is actually the entrance and you walk into the pyramid before descending down into the first part of the museum. Continuing on our way after this, we walked through the Tuileries Garden, which I imagine is much more beautiful in the spring and summer. It's probably also a lot more crowded though so it was a nice walk. It led us right to the Champ de Elysee which we followed all the way up to the Arc de Triomphe.
After all that walking we were getting hungry so we hopped on the metro right here and took it down to the Bastille stop. We got off the stop right at the traffic cirlce where the Bastille once stood. There wasn't anything there now but I guess we can say we stood where the Bastille once did. At this point we found a cafe, Cafe Bastille, and went inside for a late lunch. This busy day had made us pretty tired so we went back over to the hotel for a quick nap before dinner. Dinner friday night was my main birthday present from Maude. It was an unbelievable dinner cruise down the Seine river that started and finished right by the Eiffel Tower. The dinner cruise was one of the highlights of the trip I'd have to say, it was a really nice time and we had a great waiter who spoke perfect enlish and got really excited about how much he loved the US when we told him we lived near Washington, DC. Not really what you would expect from a french waiter.
Here is a photo of me and Maude on top of the boat while we were passing the Eiffel Tower. This photo was taken by another friendly French man, we didn't really run into an American hating French people like sterotyped, in fact French people were a lot nicer to foreigners than Czech people generally are. After finished up this great dinner we headed back over toward our hotel and found a street that my roommate Brandon had told me about, he was abroad in Paris all last semester. We went to a really cool bar with lots of French people where all of the bartenders and waitresses were wearing masquerade masks and almost every shot you could order was a flaming shot. The drinks however were insanely expensive, about 11euros for a mix drink and 6 euros for a shot. But the place was really cool and I was about to turn 21 so we stayed for awhile and had a few drinks. This was the bar that I turned 21 in, and not too long after midnight Maude got me some sort of flaming shot that tasted a lot like liqurice. Finally, we went back to the hotel and went to bed after a long, but really great day.
Saturday was birthday and Valentines Day and we didn't really plan or want to do anything special but go up on the Eiffel Tower at night. We spent most of the day just wandering around the city and actually came across some famous places accidentally. But really the best part of Saturday was after dinner, which was at a slow but very tasty fondue restaurant, when we went to the Eiffel Tower and went up to look out at Paris.
This is a picture of Maude and I up on the Eiffel Tower, you can't really see much of the city in the picture but really we had a great view and it was really great despite the fact that it got pretty windy and cold up there. The video is also of the view from the Eiffel Tower. I don't have a video of it unfortunately, but we were also fortunate enough to see the lights on the Eiffel Tower go off and flash, I think this happens every hour or so until a certain time at night.
Sunday morning we woke up after a great weekend and went to have our last brunch in Paris, we wandered around and bought some postcards that I will eventually be sending home. Finally, we got a ride back to Orly, hopped on the plane, and it was a short flight before we were back in Prauge. All in all it was an incredible weekend and a story I will be able to tell about my 21st birthday forever.
This weekend Maude, Melinda, Saadia and I will be travelling to Budapest in Hungary, a city that people who have gone say is amazing so keep posted and I will try to get a post up about that a little faster than I did about Paris...
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