The boat ride over from Dover was sweet as. Found me some Ben & Jerrys ice cream on the boat which I got super excited about. Om nom.
Bit of a long drive from Calais to Paris got stuck in some pretty intense Paris traffic and saw some funny things from others stuck in traffic especially the truck drivers. Random fact for the day: France has a few female truck drivers. Not sure why but kinda found this odd.

Had dinner at l'orange bleue ate snails which was actually really yum. Not as bad as I thought. Way better than mussels. Garlic flavouring helped a treat. We're in France so obviously lots of bread was served with it.
Had the cutest waiter who Emily got a photo with. He managed to spill my wine into Emily's cup. I think I probably should clarify that the cute man was about 70 odd and had the coolest black rimmed glasses and outfit. He looked a treat.
Next course was French onion soup which has heaps of cheese and some bread in it haha. For dinner was some beef on pasta. Had food envy of the vegetarians giant plate of veges though.
After dinner we went on a city lights tour of Paris which was beautiful to see. Drove past le moulin rouge, tour d'effeil, notre dame, military place, French school etc etc can't actually remember all the names but ticked all the main sites in our Paris map.
Got back to our hostel at about midnight and pretty much went straight to sleep cos we had to be at breakfast at 8am to leave for our Paris day at 9.
Had a kiwi girl bex and English girl Kirsty in our room and they were both really lovely.
Petit dejeuner was yum, choice of 4 different breads including croissants, some kind of scrambled eggs, bacon, cereals, yogurts coffee etc which was nice.
Then cranked it for our day in Paris.
Emily and I walked the city with a guy from Dunedin Callum who was a cool relaxed guy keen planning on seeing what we were.
Got dropped off outside le louvre, walked through the grounds along the seine past some cute stalls to the island in the seine where the notre dame is. Figured out what queue to jump in and went through the church which was mind blowing and sent shivers down my spine. It helped that there was a choir singing beautifully whilst we were walking though and everyone was obeying the silence rule fairly well for the number of people in there.
Decided it must be time to experience French culture and have a coffee /chocolat at the cafe notre dame. Sat outside and had a delicious chocolat and un pain au chocolat. Om nom.

Next stop was le louvre, lined up, went through security tried to go through to the exhibitions without a ticket (thought it was worth a try) but didn't get the final step.
Bought a ticket and went and saw the mona Lisa, Venus de milo, Michelangelo statue thing, cherub statue thing and some awesome other things on the way to see the main attractions. Was very cool. Even managed a jump photo in the middle of one of the galleries and got a bit of an amused/telling off look from the lady.

Next stop was the statue of Joan of arc before making our long walk down le champs d'lysee. Paid .50€ for a lovely loo stop and some water. walked outside and down came the rain. it bucketed down. We donned the rain coats hiked the tights and soldiered on, making lovely mud marks up our legs from the jandal flicks.
Made it to the shopping area of champs d'lysee when the rain decided to stop, followed the lead from some kids and tried to dry out from the warm air vents up from the metro. Worked pretty well too. Still looked like 3 drowned rats walking into banana republic even though Emily and I wiped our muddied legs with a tissue before going in. We tried.
Had a quick look, set eyes on some lovely clothes we couldn't afford then carried on. Took a look in Zara where Emily found a dress bag and top.
Attempted to find a cheese cutter hat for Callum and some shoes for me but no such luck.

Found a lunch stop, brioche doree which was delicious. Sat upstairs with a view over champs d'lysee and people watched whilst eating out French decadent sandwiches in...surprise surprise... French bread. Watched some people set up a show on the footpath which sadly got shut down by the party pooping police just as they were about to whip out the goodness of it.

Carried on up to the arc de triomphe and saw the eternal flame. Took a few photos.
Walked down le rue diane to the effiel tower. And joined the giant queue at 5.45 to get up to the top. By 6.20 we were only almost half way down the line and were running out of time ( needed to be at our picnic dinner at the bottom of the effiel tower at 7). So we made the decision to go up the stairs to the first level at least. We ran. After being on our feet all day our legs were already aching but we ran. was definitely worth it. Took a few snaps then ran back down and got to dinner right on time.
Had all sorts of food selection, chicken, quiche, couscous, potato salad, lettuce salad, prawns, salmon, fresh fruit and some dessert that I couldn't fit in.
Finished up with dinner, got change on the coach for our cabaret show.
Had a drink before hand at some pub around the corner which was full of drunken polish people who were hitting on our group of 18 girls. Left there and went to the show.
It. Was. Amazing.
There was a lot of toplessness dancing and singing including amazing ballet stuff. At one point they had motorbikes on the stage. Potential highlight was the amazingly skilled and very smiley uni cyclist who could throw things from his foot onto his head whilst on a giant unicycle. We just sat there with our mouth agape.
There was also a trapeze artist, and hilariously awesome waiters who looked after us. Extremely gay French waiters with over the top makeup on. Love it.
There was plenty of wine and an Aweome table group of 6 girls, 4 Aussies and 2 kiwis. We were by far the loudest (and second smallest) tables. Some enjoyed our antics, some not so much, but all in all we had an amazing time. Walked back onto the bus which was slightly more subdued to our giggling and joking group.

Danced and sung our way back to the hostel with the southafrican Zimbabwean Kenyan group at the back of the bus. Then home to sleep for 5 hours before our early start at 6.45 bags on bus 7 breakfast and 7.30 left.

Drive through France beautiful and green with the lovely orange brick houses everywhere.

Arrived on the 7th and left of the 9th.