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J'adore Paris!
We had such an amazing time in the romantic city of Paris. We arrived in Paris on our last of forty trains early in the evening on Monday. We walked to our hostel that was in the famous Moulin Rouge, very close to Montmartre. This was such a cool and fun area of Paris, out of the way from all the main attractions. We climbed up the flights of ourdoor stairs to Montmartre and saw the amazing view of Paris on top of the tall tall hill up to the neighborhood.
We ate a lovely French dinner of Croque Madames and continued our exploration of adorable galleries, bakeries, creperies and shops that Paris has to offer before our busy busy Tuesday!
Yesterday, we hit the ground running with all of the sites we wanted to see in Paris after our first real breakfast in twenty-two days of croissants, coffee, baguettes, and OJ. The hostel said only one croissant per person... How do you think we handled that one? Our train snack breakfasts of grabbing a few bananas and a bag of pretzels in a local convenient store was getting old!
We began our romantic journey through Paris at the Louvre, passing the Opera House. We had such a beautiful day, it was in the 70s and nice and sunny! From the Louvre we wandered along the river and Orsay to the Arc de Triomphe, stopping at the famous Lauderée for a mid morning macaroon. We ate our French macaroons under the Arc de Triomphe and ran into Louis Vuttion and Chanel... I can't wait to come back when I am not on a "backpackers budget!"
We continued our five mile self guided tour through Paris to the Eiffel Tower, truly breath taking. Also, my map reading ability is AMAZING! We walked under the Eiffel tower and found a really sweet market where we got churros to hold us over until we found our baguettes and cheese to eat under the Eiffel Tower. We found some nice baguettes and a cheese shop and made our way into a really nice neighborhood's park, right under the Eiffel Tower and that's when our Parisian day went a little crazy!
Poor Han started to feel really faint, disconnected from her limbs and got really nervous. I hailed our first cab EVER on this Euro Trip and we went back to the hostel. She was feeling really awful and of course was scared because we were in a different country. Since she felt really faint we thought the best thing would be to take her to the hospital. Wouldn't you rather faint in a foreign country in the hospital rather than the Woodstock themed hostel that you're staying in that has a cat?
We arrived to the hospital and it was no MGH. It was old and dirty and Han was not happy (especially since she is in Health Science!) While we were waiting for her to be seen we made sure to drown her in water, she drank about four liters while we were waiting. She was very dehydrated. During our two hour wait she ended up making herself feel better and we left. The timing could not have been any more perfect. We were done with all of our Paris sites anyways! AND to make it even better when we got in the cab to the hospital our perfect sunny day got cloudy and rainy and then as we were leaving the hospital the sun came out! If there was a time and a place for this to happen, and yesterday was the day.
We were not even out of the hospital yet and we were laughing about it. The whole time Hannah said for me to not leave her and the nurse took her to take her vitals, me being me (and Lorena's daughter) I wanted to be with her, so I tried to charade to the nurse that I took a few years of high school French, therefore it would be useful for me to be there... It was worth the shot! Holly and I even took turns waiting in the waiting room because there could only be one family member with the person, of course after a few minutes of following the rules we were able to sneak us all in. Did I mention that before we left I grabbed the leftover train snacks for the ER? I think I'm a Simonelli...
Though, being in a French not so great hospital it was definitely a story for the books that I will always find a way to bring up to Han's children someday.
We ended our night on top of Montmartre at a cute French bistro and seeing Paris all lit up on a clear night. We got crepes for our stroll back to the hostel and walked in disbelief that our Euro Trip was over and Han's hospital visit was our only mishap.
Today we took our hostel locker locks to Pont du L'Archeveche (Lock Bridge), the fitting and what seems like the only way to end our 23 day adventure with each other.
Holl and Han are my travel soul mates, I could not imagine doing this trip any other way or with anybody else. It was an amazing experience that won't seem real to me for a few days or weeks. It stilll feels like a dream. Somebody pinch me!
Love,
Al
- comments
www.holidayfans.com Paris is such an adorable city, i love everythig of Paris, its smell,its food, its galleries, streets, romance.. everything.. glad you shared your Paris experience, Alex. thanks for the post :)