Saturday: Full Day in Paris

And here's what I would have written on Saturday night:

I couldn't fall asleep Friday night, I think partly because of the time zone difference and partly because I was so excited to be in Paris. I had arranged to have a wake-up call at 7:30, but it never rang. I happened to look at my watch at that time anyway since I was just lying there awake, but had I tried to judge from the sunlight I would never have gotten up. It was perpetual twilight because of the alley outside!

The hotel had a breakfast buffet for us downstairs, so I had a bowl of cereal and two croissants with strawberry jelly--yummmm. There was some juice too, so overall my breakfast was so worth the lack of sleep! I could see out the windows to the street while I was eating, so I saw the souvenir shops start to open. Since our tour didn't start until 10, Alice, Courtney, and I bought some souvenirs after eating. I have certain things that I collect everywhere I go, so I looked for them. In case you're wondering, I like to collect:

• Pencils
• Flag patch from country (took me three days to find a French one!)
• Pin from city
• T-shirt if possible

Our Galway group climbed onto the tour bus with the Limerick and Cork groups, and our French tour guide gave us a 3-hour tour of the city. I took almost 400 pictures that day, mostly of random monuments and buildings that I don't even remember the names of now. I have a bunch of those at the bottom of the post, but I'll try to do my best to remember what they are!

Our tour guide's voice was very sleep-inducing, so by the end of the bus tour I looked back and saw lots of kids nodding off. We stopped for lunch in the Louvre dining center, then our tour guide and another one split us up to give us a 1.5 hour tour of three of the main attractions of the Louvre: Venus of Milo, Winged Victory, and the Mona Lisa. We also learned about the history of the building (it began as a medieval fortress and you can still explore the original foundations in the basement of the building) and information about lots of other artifacts and pieces that we passed on our way to those three famous women.

I packed my own lunch to eat Saturday, so I saved a table for the group I ate with while everyone else bought ice cream and McDonald's for lunch. The restrooms cost 1 euro to use after lunch, which was ridiculous--but really, they had you stuck...there was no other place to go.

During most of my time in the Louvre, I kept thinking about The Da Vinci Code...our tour guide looked and sounded like Sophie, the floors in the Mona Lisa room were the "unmistakable parquet" that Robert Langdon commented on, Madonna on the rocks was hanging in the neighboring gallery...I felt so horrible that that's all I could think about when visiting such a famous place!

After we saw the Mona Lisa and the 5 other Da Vinci pieces, our tour ended and we split up to explore the city at our own pace. Kevin, the assistant director, took a big group to the Eiffel Tower, but Alice and I split off to go see more of the museum. We wandered around for a while until we finally found our way to the Egypt collection (and Etruscan stuff on the way), then browsed through Africa/Americas/Asia. I was really glad that there were no mummies. The tour guide, Aude, who was in the video I put up a couple of days ago, said that officially the countries whose artifacts are in the Louvre allow it since they have some French pieces in exchange...but really, in wartime, France likes to steal good pieces from other countries. Apparently they had so many Egyptian artifacts at one point that they had to send the whole collection back. Oops.

After seeing everything we wanted in the Louvre, Alice and I walked back to our hotel. It took us about 50 minutes, mainly because we had to stop almost every street and check the map. We took a couple of long detours but eventually got back to our street. After that we learned to take the metro, but it was nice to see the city like that--especially in the daytime (we would definitely not have walked around lost at night).

The reason we went back to the hotel after the Louvre instead of saying the city center to see more monuments was so we could buy some boots. I've been eyeing some for weeks now, but told myself not to buy any in Ireland since they're cheaper in France...plus then I can say I got them in Paris. I found a pair for 10 euros, and Alice got two pairs for 15 euros total. They're not the style that I really wanted, but they're growing on me. I got a big blister on the bottom of my heel from wearing them all weekend, so I haven't worn them in a couple days, but they should be nice during the rainy season here.

The shops there were kind of crazy. There were a bunch of thrift-type stores that just had cheap clothes piled in bins; since the early morning, dozens of people were poring through them. The worst part of shopping was the million baby carriages that women had with them. The shops are tiny and there's no room for a carriage, but they drag them in anyway. I knocked over so many things trying to get by!

After finishing shopping, we walked around for a while before finding an Italian restaurant, where we each ordered an individual pizza. We were definitely the first customers of the night, so I felt really bad that he wasn't making any money. Then I remembered that people don't eat until late in Paris, so we were probably the early supper crowd. The owner made two pizzas from scratch right in front of us and then cooked them in the brick oven that was in the main dining room. Ten minutes later, we had a delicious supper. I wish I could go back and have more!

For dessert, we went back to the 24 hour shop from Friday night and each got two desserts. We went back to the hotel to eat them and ran into Courtney, who had hung out with Miriam and Jackie during the day. They were eating take-out and getting ready to take the metro to the Eiffel Tower, so Alice and I decided to tag along for the transportation and then go on a boat tour (with Courtney too).

The trip on the metro was really painless, but I'm glad that we went with a big group since some of the guys had already used it and told us what to ask for and what the stations we needed were called. Sunday morning we figured it out for ourselves, but especially at night it was nice to have some guidance. The actual metro trip took not even ten minutes, and then we just had to find the boat tour station.

We walked around the river for a while before finding the first one, but it closed half an hour before we got there...so we ran down the street to the other one, which we managed to catch in time to book seats on the last tour of the night (10 p.m.). It was quite chilly, but I had bundled up in lots of sweaters and my warm new boots, so the tour was a wonderful hour of seeing the city all lit up from the water. We didn't get to go up the Eiffel Tower like most everyone else, but we did get to see it all lit up from the boat.

After the tour finished, we were so tired from walking all day that we decided to just go straight home. I remember thinking that I would definitely sleep great that night since I had walked in the fresh air for so long. We ended up half-running back to the metro station because we were nervous about walking around in the dark and because we all had to pee, but it did help keep us warm!

We meant to find a cafe, since that's one of the things that I really wanted to visit while we were there, but ended up going back to Alice and Courtney's room and having tea and watching the Olympics (in German) instead. I wrote down a bunch of things to remember (which I am looking at as I write this) and then was too tired to stay up late. I went back to my room, set the alarm on my watch, and crashed into bed. My log says "soo tired...maybe sleep tonight!" That's basically all that was running through my head; also, I was sad that we had visited so little of the city and only had a few hours left Sunday morning to explore.

And that was the short story of Saturday! The pictures are in backwards order and kind of all over the place as usual, so bear with me here.

The Eiffel Tower at night from the boat.

The Notre Dame at night from the water. Seeing this basically decided our trip to visit it on Sunday.
Waiting for the boat tour to start. We have a system of taking group pictures like this...whoever is taking the picture rotates to stand on the left.
New boots! The outside has a big button and some straps. They're aight.
The tour boat. We sat on the opposite side in the seats facing the water. Actually, we stood the whole time, but still.
More Eiffel Tower.
Some tour boats floating by on the Seine as we walked to find boat tour companies.
The metro station by our hotel.
The Moulin Rouge at night. It's very bright.
The pizza oven where the owner cooked our food. Yummm.
My delicious pizza!
One of the wonderful shops on our street; this one's called the Sexodrome. This one has dancing mannequins that show you what they're selling...
An artifact at the Louvre.
I thought Dad might enjoy this one...
Bet you immediately thought of Night at the Museum. Yeah, me too. Go Easter Island!
One of the walls in the room with the Mona Lisa. This is what most of the paintings looked like there.
Took me five minutes of standing in the crowd to get close enough to take this fuzzy picture.
Da Vinci's five other paintings at the Louvre. This one plus two others (and possibly also the Mona Lisa) are probably all modeled off one man's face and body...Leonardo really liked that lover, according to Aude.
See? Same face.
Madonna on the Rocks doesn't have any crazy blood on her like in the book...guess that's a good thing.
And same model again.
The museum can't really stop Da Vinci's pictures from getting darker because he constantly experimented with the chemicals in his paints. They don't how the pictures will react to the chemicals, so meanwhile the pictures just get darker and darker.
Doesn't really look like he's in pain...Aude here is suggesting that the artist just wanted to try painting the human body, but had to make it religious somehow so the church would pay for it. Hence the arrows that some saint died by.
The Great Hall.
One of the random statues found in the Great Hall.
In the early works hall, some famous French painter of this century put in this picture. He considers himself a pioneer, just as the artists of the other paintings in the room were, so there you are.
One of the numerous religious paintings.
Those famous parquet floors!
Winged Victory.
A snapshot of one of the ceilings. I can't imagine being rich enough to build places like this without feeling guilty. Or doing it at all.
More ceiling.
Venus of Milo.
Another Greek statue at the other end of the hall from Venus of Milo. This one got lucky and kept her arms.
The Sphinx welcomes you to the Greek and Roman section...seems like it should guard Egypt instead, but whatever. The face doesn't match the name of the king inscribed on it apparently...although how they knew what he looked like is beyond me...
In today's basement of the Louvre. These are the supports for the original east gate that helped the Louvre guard the town.
What the Louvre's plan looks like today. The white bit is what's left from the very original fort.
What the area would have looked like around the original Louvre.
You can see up and out of the glass pyramid from the inside.
The glass is crisscrossed with metal support pieces. I'm surprised no one has driven into the pyramid up top!
The inverted pyramid...just imagine a rose floors below...oh Da Vinci Code...
The pyramid from outside.
All right: now this is the section with a bunch of random buildings. This is a hotel. It's old. And doesn't the bus driver have nice decorations?
There are numerous used bookcases along the riverside, which the owners open during the weekend to sell to walkers.
Like this.
Some fancy building is back there. I think it's a palace of some sort.
Another pretty building.
The Notre Dame. It's actually on one of the two islands in the River Seine.
One of the bridges across the Seine, along with a fancy building to the left.
A tower that flew by my window on the bus.
What typical cafes looked like. Bet the outside seats would be more fun in the summer.
A really ornate building. I'm really sorry and sad that I can't remember what they all are!
A twin-tower gatehouse. My Castles class is really paying off.
A street with a market going on.
Once again...it was pretty and sounded important when the tour guide mentioned it, so I took a picture.
The Sun King, Louis IV, had his initials put on this building.
A view of the Louvre from across the river.
One of the two clocktowers from what used to be the great railway station here. Now it's another museum.
More bridges and lots of boats on the river. A bunch of them looked like houseboats.
The police have very bright uniforms in Paris.
The National Assembly building. Don't you like the statue's wig?
This glass building keeps showing up in all of my pictures. I really should know what it's called...
More cafes, different street.
Another important building.
And another one.
One of the many canons in front of the Invalid's Mansion (which is still used as a hospital today).
The Hospital of the Invalids.
Alexander the III's bridge, the most ornate one on the river.
The intricate metalwork of the Eiffel Tower.
See why I didn't go there? It's so crowded by the Eiffel Tower.
Um...okay American President...way to have your own street...
Courtney, Miriam, Jackie, and Alice in front of the Eiffel Tower.
Take two...after the first picture only got her ear and my cheek because it was zoomed in accidentally.
There were carousels everywhere! I'm sad that I never got to go on one.
One half of the castle that is now a museum in front of the Eiffel Tower.
The Business District in the background.
At the museums, where lots of people stop to take pictures of the Eiffel Tower, vendors tried to sell us these keychains.
Kevin, the assistant director, talks to Courtney.
Forgot to take my sunglasses off...
There's a big fountain thing below.
Lots of vendors at the museum/Eiffel Tower view.
The museum again.
The signs, even though they were in French, were almost easier to follow than the ones in Ireland! There actually were street signs!
If you look on the left of this picture, you can see an entrance to the metro station.
The Business District in the far end of the street.
One of those confusing granola bars!
In front of the Arc d'Triumph. Which isn't spelled like that??
You can go up to the top of the Arch and see the view from there.
The names of all of Napolean's generals are listed inside the arch.
The arch.
Some famous place they told us to take a picture of. You can see an ad for the movie Sherlock Holmes to the side!
We could start to see the arch from way down the street.
A famous tower.
The first glimpses of the Eiffel Tower!
Both of those towers.
That glass building.
A statue of Joan of Arc.
Statues in another building.
Oops...this is actually my supper from Friday night...
A typical street. Napolean had his main architects redesign all of them so they were longer and straight and had matching buildings.
One of the buildings had lots of funny faces like this and suns for the Sun King.
A tower made up of canons from the French Revolution, if I remember correctly.
Suns on the building here.
That canon tower from the distance.
The buildings on the corner each had the number of district and the road name on them.
One of the two main opera houses.
Up closer.
And more closer.
Another pretty building.
What the buildings all look like.
Pretty cathedral or something. It's getting late...my descriptions are getting so bad!
The end! It took so long! Only one more day to describe, but that'll have to wait until tomorrow.

So good night!