It was early July when I realized that I had off of work for another Spanish holiday on July 25th. Hillary and I had already been looking at travelling to France over the weekend in order to see some of the Tour de France, and seeing that the final stage in Paris took place on July 24th, we seized our opportunity.
Getting to Paris was probably the worst obstacle I have had in Europe. With no Ryanair and Easyjet not flying to Paris, we were left with the expensive train or the less expensive (but still relatively expensive) bus. Being only two hours from the Spanish/France boarder, I thought Paris couldn’t be too much farther. Wrong. The bus ended up being twelve hours each way. So Hill and I bought our bus tickets to Paris, leaving Friday right after work (and travelling overnight) and arriving back in Bilbao in Tuesday morning, right before work. Perfect! The things I do for travelling. And to see Molly I guess. That’s right! Molly met me in Paris.
Hill and I arrived in Paris bright and early. We headed to our apartment to drop off our stuff as we couldn’t check in until the afternoon. The receptionist told us our room wasn’t ready yet, as we expected, so he upgraded us to a bigger room which was ready, contrary to what we expected.
Let me just explain all of the room stuff now, so I don’t have to revisit it later. First I had problems flushing the toilet. After about fifteen minutes of struggling with the lever, I pushed it down as hard as possible (actually I am pretty sure Hillary did this), it flushed successfully. Molly checked in later in the day as she arrived from Spain after us, and she also had flushing problems. Great. When we got back to the room we tried to figure this out. Eventually giving up, we asked the receptionist to help us with this literally shitty problem. He asked if I pushed really hard. I assured him I did but to no avail. He told me the plumber doesn’t work Sundays so he would put us in another room. This ended up being another upgrade. To recap, we booked the smallest apartment and were going to have to rent an extra pull out bed. We eventually were in the biggest apartment, never needing to rent the extra bed. And most importantly, the toilet flushed, free of problems.
Okay, so that was a pleasant and fascinating story I am sure. Anyways, Hill and I made our way into the city center. We started off our weekend in Paris at Sant Chappelle. This is on the same island as Notre Dame, but is arguably less known. I am not sure why though, because this place is gorgeous. It has stained glass windows at least 20 feet high, filling the lengths of the walls. I have pictures, but they do no justice to the intricacies of the windows and the detailed paid to the rest of the church.
If my memory serves me correctly, we then walked towards the Arc de Triomphe. We walked along Champs d’Elysees to scope out the Tour route, but were somewhat disheartened to find that the boulevard was lined with stands that seemed like exclusive access. I guess we would have to find another place to watch from.
We made it to the Arc and decided to go up. I was told it was free for European students (as I am) and I love free things. We stood in line as Mother Nature, again, thought it was the perfect time to screw with my plans. It got cold quickly. The storm clouds rolled in and the wind picked up. She then let us have it, throwing rain at us horizontally, rendering my feeble umbrella useless. We stuck out the line, found out that the ascent was indeed not free, and then made an awkward run for it. By which I mean, we ran out of line away from the ticket booths, not up into the Arc.
The weather made us think that a museum was the perfect idea. It just so happens it gave everyone in Paris that idea. When we arrived at the Musee d’Orsay, the line was worse than New Year’s weekend. We decided to eat instead, hoping the line would shrink in time. Well, the line was still quite long, but the sun came out and we ended up just wandering the area.
We walked up to Pere Lachaise, the famous cemetery in Paris, and wandered about, trying to find the graves of some select famous people. After seeing Chopin’s, we were on our way to see Jim Morrison’s when we were abruptly cut off by a security guard saying the cemetery was closing. No! We were so close! Hill and I then tried going up a different way, with the idea of saying we were lost if we were caught by the same guard. Well, it wasn’t the same guy, but we were stopped again. Drats! Then a couple asked us if we were looking for Morrison and pointed the way. We made a quick dash for it. Admittedly, the grave wasn’t astounding, but there was a beer bottle on it which made me kind of happy.
Eventually we met up with Molly and saw Harry Potter. After the movie we were hungry but excessively indecisive. That was a terrible combination as we ended up walking for hours without eating anything. We ended up at the Eiffel Tower. Molly’s first words went along the lines of “Wow, that is awful.” I had never heard anybody have that reaction to the Eiffel Tower, but I guess we are all welcome to our own opinion. It turns out she really dislikes when the Tower is lit up at night and the lights are twinkling. A crepe and a metro ride later and we were back at our apartment and crashed for the night.
The next day was the day of the Tour. But first, we were hungry. Jane, a friend who studied abroad in Paris this past spring, recommended the Jewish Quarter, L’As du Falafel specifically, for food. I have to hand it to her, the falafel was delicious, but I cannot say that this is the best falafel I have ever had. This still goes to the Rei de Falafel in Padua. Sorry Paris, you guys were close.
After gorging ourselves on the side of the street we walked up Rivoli to see if we could find some cheap Tour shirts. They were cheaper than the official stores up on Champs, but disappointingly, they were not 8 to 12 euros like I had read. Eventually we found people lining up to see the race, and found our place along the road from which to cheer for. I draped the Spanish flag around me in honor of Contador and Sanchez, and waited for the bikers to arrive.
After what felt like hours with the sun beating down on us and burning my oh so fair skin, Molly met up with us and the bikers came by soon after. This was after a ton of sponsor floats and team caravans paraded by. Well, I have to admit, it was pretty exciting, but also pretty comparable to the Running of the Bulls. After hours of waiting there were only a few seconds of excitement. Luckily they passed by twice and I could actually see the racers. Unluckily, Contador and Sanchez took 5th and 6th. Ah well, I have to hand it to Evans. Congratulations.
After the Tour we tried to make it to Place de Concorde to see any part of the ceremonies, but all the roads were blocked off, thwarting our attempts. We instead went for food near Saint Michels. The biggest event of the night was probably Molly ordering escargot. All the tables around us stared as she wrestled with the snails. Come on! This is France! Haven’t you seen a girl eat a snail before?
After dinner we bought a bottle of wine and kicked back on the banks of the Seine as boats passed by. Eventually it started to mist and the wind picked up so we headed back to the apartment for a good night’s rest.
Our last day in Paris, Hill (wowza, almost Paris Hilton) and I went up to Montmartre area. We walked up to Sacre Coeur and took in the view until our stomachs got the best of us and were urged to eat. We feasted on cheese and baguette in the sex district and a middle aged British lady told us that we looked very romantic. As she walked away, I asked Hill, “Romantic, or poor?” Apparently there is a fine line.
We walked around a bit more, down to the Opera and over to Tulieres Gardens when it was time to catch the metro to the bus station. We were early, but then alerted that we needed to pick up boarding cards or something before we could actually board, despite having tickets for the bus. We hurriedly ran down to the ticket desk and picked up our passes, all the while getting stressed out as our departure time passed. The stress was all for naught, though, as the bus sat at the platform a good ten or so minutes more.
I wish the bus ride was as quiet and uneventful as the ride to Paris was, but it wasn’t. The driver deemed it in good taste to play an awful movie really loudly. The movie was called Hole in One. Look up the synopsis if you have never heard of it. Actually, I am pretty sure you haven’t heard of it, it seems like a straight to video type of movie. Anyways, it was a raunchy teen comedy about a college student who liked to bet during golf. He made a bad bet and lost, ultimately ending up with a pair of fake breasts. The rest of the movie he tries to raise money to remove them and also get with his love interest. Hint, his love interest isn’t a fan of tits on men. Anyways, that ended and I tried to get a little sleep before we pulled into the Bilbao bus station twenty minutes before work started. I rolled off the bus and stumbled sleepily into work for a thrilling day at the office. All in all, I would say it was worth it.
