Jess 3-9-08

Hello everyone!

Well, I've realized that it is pretty much impossible to write down everything we did in Paris in one day, since there is so much to talk about, so over the next few days we'll have to describe it all the best we can in increments. It'll save your eyes from so much reading at once too, I'm sure.

What I can say is that it was a really wonderful trip, and definitely one of the highlights of our stay here in Europe. I'm glad that we took so much time just to spend in one city, otherwise I think we would have missed out on some pretty awesome experiences. It was more relaxing than I might imagine it would have been, as well.

So, let's get started!

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Phewwwwwwwww!

Well, we just swept in from the skies over Switzerland and are finally back in Florence, totally exhausted, but also excited. Paris was really a blast, and I hope I remember to put in everything we do. Unfortunately since this internet is the flimsy "borrowed" internet in Bill's apartment, we won't really be able to put up any photos until tomorrow when we're at school, but we can certainly tell you all about our trip!

Well, to those of you who don't know, we ended up getting to Pisa Aeroporto around maybe 10:30PM, dreading a horrible night's sleep in the chairs of the waiting areas. The whole airport was dead, except for the information desk and a small crowd of people, who were maybe awaiting the arrival of a flight. After an unsuccessful attempt to get comfortable in the cheap chairs and a cup of equally unsuccessful coffee to wake us up, we decided to go to a hotel for at least a few hours of sleep. We finally arrived at a decent hotel (hey, we're college kids... we don't know the difference between decent and abysmal yet) at around 12:30 and 4 1/2 hours later were walking our way back to the airport for 7:00AM boarding.

Though the start of our trip was rough, the rest went relatively smoothly, we took off and arrived on time in a comfortable enough jet and stole a few more minutes of sleep between the plane and bus rides to Paris. Although I have to say that the turbulence of the flight was a nasty and frequent reminder of being hurled through space in a large metal tube. Nonetheless, we arrived safely and made our way to the North of the city via Metro. Our friends who had previously visited Paris were quite right -- the metro system is incredibly easy to follow and takes you almost anywhere you want to go within a half hour, even in a huge city like Paris. We wound our way underground in another metal tube (I was starting to feel like a canned vegetable at this point) and finally surfaced directly in front of the amazing church of Sacre Coeur. It's a truly stunning sight -- grandly perched atop a high grassy hill, with it's exotic (almost Moorish, Bill says) domes.

As excited as we were to finally see one of the most famous sites in Paris, we were much more excited to take a nap, and climbed the upwards-curving streets to our apartment. It was nestled in a quiet neighborhood at the bottom of some steps leading up to Sacre Coeur, and we found it pretty easily. Our greeter was a bit late (and called 20 minutes late to tell us he was going to be 20 minutes late...?) so we wandered around a bit to explore the neighborhood with all our belongings on our backs, like nylon hump-backed camels. Eventually we made it into the apartment, paid our dues, learned that the toilet was electric and the shower was only hot for 20 minutes, and struggled with Herculean might to get the darn futon to open up. But finally we flopped down for a well-deserved sleep. We'd finally made it to Paris!

Although the first day and a half was a little rough around the edges at some points, the rest of the trip went rather smoothly. After a well-deserved nap, we went to a nearby fancy restaurant to treat ourselves to a well-deserved meal. The menu was all French, and although I spoke some French it was all Greek to me. So we went with what we could read, and it was delicious! I had Pot-au-Feu (beef, carrots, potatoes, leeks in a pot) and Bill had a really great beef pie with tomato sauce. After some traditional after-dinner coffee, we went back to prepare for our next day in Paris.

The next day we allowed ourselves a little time to sleep in and bought some 6-day Paris Museum Passes, which allow privileged access to dozens of museums. These came in really handy, especially when it came to getting in the over-stuffed Louvre. Monday afternoon we decided to visit the Louvre for at least a few hours. Unbeknownst to us, it was much too far to walk to the Louvre from Montemartre, where we were staying. We are so used to our small, walkable city of Florence that we assumed to walk wouldn't be too far. And of course, we were sorely mistaken. Really sorely. In our feet. We walked for over an hour just to make it to the River, but we saw a lot of the city that way. Blessings in disguise, right?

I have a secret to share with you. The Louvre is really an airport. No, really. It's huge! We walked from one end to the other on it and I swear it has got to be at least a half mile long on each side, it took ten minutes just to walk around from the back to the front! We walked through the massive courtyard to the intriguing glass pyramid squatting in the middle of this grand palace. We saw a mother and son trying to take a picture of themselves in front of the Pyramid and I offered in French to take a photo for them. Although that turned out to be an unnecessary attempt, since they were from the U.S. Oh well. I should have known by the fact that the son was wearing a "NorthFace" jacket, very in vogue for Americans (and from the looks of it over here, pretty much only Americans) this year. Nonetheless they returned the favor so Bill and I could get a picture together without craning our necks in an attempt at a self-portrait.

So by the time we walked all the way down to the 1st Arrondissement in Paris, we had only a few hours left, but luckily we had our pre-paid passes so we just went inside anyway. We saw the underground remnants of the original "medieval Louvre", a comparably small fortress with a classic moat and everything. We wandered around in the Egyptian and some of the Greek and Roman collections (which were quite extensive), but when we realized that there wasn't too much time left in the Museum we ran upstairs to at least see "Mona Lisa" once. And wow, even the Hallway in front of her was amazing (and huge). So many artists and paintings we'd seen so many times! Gentileschi, Leonardo, Raffaelo, Michelangelo, Del Sarte, Fra Angelico, Bartolomeo, Botticelli, Caravaggio, mutiple Caravaggists -- it was really awe inspiring. We had no idea how many famous works were in the Louvre! It was sort of a nice surprise to not know exactly what we were going to see. And then of course we saw her famous smile, Ms. Mona Lisa.

The Mona Lisa was fantastic, she was quite beautiful and because we were there at the very end of the day, there was no swarm of people pushing in to get a look. We just walked right up. Most other students we know here thought she was small, but she seemed a decent size to me. I guess because we are so used to seeing Italian portraiture in Florence that she seemed like a pretty standard size, even a little bit big. Anyway, she was really great. The sfumato for which Leonardo is so famous makes itself particularly apparent in her portrait. And the smile does make you wonder who she is. Or was, rather.

So after that the museum closed and we wound our way out of the museum and into the clear setting skies above the central court of the Louvre. It was a lovely blue and pink mix. In the distance we could see the massive Arc du Triomphe down Avenue Champ-Elysees, so we decided to walk to it, since it was open later and we might be able to see the sunset from the top (apparently you can climb it! I did not know that at all).

Again we obliviously strolled off down the beautiful Tuileries in front of the Louvre towards the Arc. I say obliviously because it was much longer, yet again, than we had thought. It took us the good part of an hour to reach the arc, but on the way we saw all sorts of interesting parts of Paris. First of all the Tuileries were beautiful, although only just starting to come into bloom. Some crocuses were popping up and blooming (Mom I thought of you), and the grass was green, but the trees were still bare. Around the large fountains, where children were racing boats, there were replicas of the statues found inside the Louvre, which makes me think that the originals once stood outside in their place. At the end of the Tuilieries, there was a large roundabout with a huge and very real (and very stolen) Egyptian obelisk surrounded by two massive mythological fountains. Bill stood for a photo shoot in front of the Obelisk, at least 30 feet away from it, and was still positively dwarfed by it's size.

We walked down Champs-Elysees, and saw all sorts of chic-chic stores we'll never afford; although I wasn't so disappointed since most of the expensive stores had ridiculous, shapeless styles that made no aesthetic sense. The walk was beautiful, and the Boulevard was huge, at least 6 car lanes wide. You have to cross it in two stages.

Finally we made it all the way up to the Arc de Triomphe, which is plopped on somewhat of a hill. The rotary of Champs-Elysees seems like a traffic nightmare. No lanes, but probably wide enough for 8-10 lanes, with maybe 12 major roads all leading up to this giant whorl. It's so big that pedestrians (to avoid certain death) have to go underground to get to the other side, or into the center, where the arc itself is.

We reached the Arc and paid homage to the tomb of the unknown soldier that sits underneath the main arch facing the Louvre, and proceeded to climb another monument practically made of stairs. Except this time it was almost entirely a tightly wound spring of a spiral staircase, and you had to pace yourself just to keep from getting dizzy. On the inside there was a small museum about the Arc itself and other arches of the world, as well as an original plaster mold of one of the stone decorations on the outside of the Arc. We climbed more stairs and finally made it to the top.

The view was really beautiful. We made it to the top just after the sun had sunk beneath the city, and the sky was still pink and orange where it had disappeared. It was a wonderful view of the whole city, which stretched out in a pinwheel from the center of the Arc. The Eiffel Tower, which was still quite distant but nonetheless monumental, had just lit up in a brilliant orange glow to match the sky. We enjoyed the view for a while before meeting a musical couple from San Francisco, who shared our need for a photo together with the cityscape backdrop. So we got a photo together on the top of the Arc de Triomphe.

After that, we went home (by metro this time), and ate some dinner, totally exhausted. The next day (Day 3), we had tired ourselves out so much from all that walking that we slept in until 3, making any museum excursion pretty much useless. So we went to the grocery store and proceeded to completely ignore all our cooking class knowledge, opting instead for frozen french fries and ketchup. And let me tell you, it was delicious.
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Well there you have it, the first three days of our adventures in Paris! More updates to follow soon!

Good to be back, hope all's well where you are.
Ciao!