Wow. It's been nearly a month since I've last updated this blog. It feels like a near eternity. I've decided that I'm going to update the next few blogs of each city I visited with the pictures included so this blog isn't long!
My first week of my vacation was Paris, Versailles, Normandy and its beaches. We arrived to Paris by bus on Saturday afternoon. We were extremely lucky to have our own hotel rooms, it made everyone more sane and a hot shower to yourself was the best treat. Saturday basically consisted of checking in, un-packing sort of thing. After that, we went on a couple hour walk around the Latin Quarter, which was the neighborhood we were staying in. We grabbed some dinner and had to hurry home because we were seeing a Oriental Cabaret. The cabaret was DREADFUL. Very very high school production, but we all had a good laugh about it afterwards. Bedtime was early because we had a long day Sunday.
Sunday: Hopped on the RER (a metro line) and toured Versailles. It was beautiful!! The lines were long and it was SO crowded, but we had a GREAT time. We had lunch in Versailles and rode the train back to the city. My friends and I took a long, needed nap afterwards. After that, we had a quick pizza in the Latin Quarter and went to a little market to get some soap and shampoo sort of thing.
Monday: Day 1 of our 3 walking tours. I was with Dr. Mackaman, who is the director of the Abbey Program and he's a genius of French History. He has a PhD and all that good stuff, so I knew this French Revolution walk I was going on would be amazing. We walked EVERYWHERE!!!! The Panthenon, Notre Dame, lots of churches, some park that I don't remember the name of and the area around the Louvre. It was a great walk!! We walked from 10 am to about 5 am. Needless to say, my friends and I took it easy that night. We ate McDonalds, which was a huge treat and hung out at the hotel with our friends and some of our professors.
Tuesday: Another walk with Dr. Mackaman. The walk was about modern France and post-revolution. We went to a museum and saw the infamous "thinker" statute. We also saw the Eiffel Tower!! It was my first time to see it, and it was AMAZING. The weather was a perfect 74 degrees and Alexis and I ate lunch underneath it. The walk ended early for us, so we had a great afternoon to wander around the city. We went back to the Notre Dame and did a little shopping and had a cup of coffee. I loved the Notre Dame so much! Alexis treated me to a pedicure for my birthday and we had a lame pedicure a block down from our hotel, so we had to walk back with those little flip flops because we had boots on. It was so funny! After a shower, we all headed out to see the Eiffel Tower "sparkle" and to get some dinner. Long story, a taxi cab ride back 2 hours later, we ate dinner close to our hotel. Saw the tower sparkle 3 miles from it. LOL.
Wednesday: Our free day!! Slept in a little, and had a picnic in the Luxembourg Gardens. We read and had a great sunny afternoon. Katie and I then went to H&M, which is one of my favorite stores! That night, a bunch of girls and I went to a bar in the Latin Quarter by the river called the "Le Who" Bar. It still to this day is my favorite place in Paris. It was a live-music bar sort type of thing. The duo that played that night sang all of our american favorites from U2 to Oasis. Needless to say, after a few glasses of wine, we were all singing along with the band and had the best time.
Thursday: I went on a walk with my French professor. The walk was through the immigrant part of Paris. It was SO cool. We went through the Chinese, Muslim, Indian, Spanish and Korean neighborhoods in Paris. The weather was very rainy and we went to this cool discount department store and I got some cheap beauty products that I needed badly! That night, almost everyone from the Abbey came back to Le Who Bar. The wine was flowing and the music was loud and it was a GREAT night again.
Friday: Louvre day. Went in for a while, but didn't stay too long because it was SO crowded, and for those of you who know me know that I HATE crowds! LOL. We had a lunch and I went with Alexis to get her tattoo and then we took a metro up to see the Moulin Rouge. We didn't realize that the Moulin Rouge was in a bad part of town, so we took a taxi home. It was so fun, that taxi ride!! That night, we ate gyros in front of the Notre Dame for dinner and spent another night at Le Who. We arrived back to the hotel pretty late at night since it was our last night in Paris. :(
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