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We had ticked off much of our 'to see' list on day one so our last day we only had a few places left that we wanted to check out. Our first stop was supposed to be the moulin rouge, we didn't fancy paying over a 100 euros for dinner and show there but did want to visit it and see the legendary windmill. We got the train further into paris this time and when we got to the right station I saw a sign saying something about pompidou and said lets go that way! I'd read that pompidou was a really modern and funky art place but clearly there are a few things called pompidou coz the way we went out wasn't the right place. Then because we'd come out the wrong way we got pretty confused about where we were on our map and had to walk around for ages to find ourselves on the map so we could make our way to the moulin rouge because the road names and stuff didn't seem to be right either. It was ok that we got a bit lost though because we got to see some more pretty architecture as we walked around trying to get our bearings. Eventually we got there and took a few photos - there wasn't much else to do so we made our way to the sacre coeur passing a couple of little windmills on the way.
When we got to the top of a pretty steep hill we walked from these serene little streets to a bustling market street full of souvenier shops and tourists so knew we were in the right place. As we turned a corner near the top of the hill which I now know is called monmartre, there was a pretty awesome view of paris below, then as we turned to look around we saw this huge white church at the top of it. I had again only heard of the name and hadn't seen any pictures of it so it was an awesome suprise when we saw what it was. It is beautiful, probably the most magnifcent and grand building i've ever seen! It looked aisin in style unlike any of the french architecture i'd seen. We took loads of photos and chilled out on the steps for a while in the sun. The further you get down monmartre the more amazing the sacre coeur looks, layers are added from the scenery around it and from the bottom it looks even more distinct and grand than ever. I had decided to wear shoes that day seeing as everyone in paris seemed to be dressed pretty smartly most of the time and I was feeling a bit out of place wearing scruffy trainers everyday, but what a silly decision! They were flat, sensible shoes but they didn't fit properly so I got really nasty blisters on the sides of my toes and every step became torture! Not long after then I took them off and walked around most of the rest of the day with my shoes off - its lucky I have pretty tough feet from years of bare feet in martial arts, the pain of standing on a stone would have been much better than walking in those shoes!
Partly because of my feet (well probably mostly) we decided to give the metro system a try, it was as easy as the london underground really and we went further down into the centre of the city to try and find the french Statue of Liberty. We strolled along the river to the bridge next to the little island where she stood and went down to see her. We then took another stroll back along the river to the eiffel tower to chill out on the lawns and mess around with photos. We had ice cream and relaxed on the grass for a while before deciding to try and find a building that we'd passed a few times over the past few days and with a gold dome that looked pretty majestic from a distance. We made our way towards it and we found the back of it first which was pretty cool too! It was like a fortress - cannons lined up all around the edge and trenches around the grounds. Turned out that it was a war museum but it was closed at the time we got there. The grounds and building itself was fascinating enough to look at though. We walked around the edge of it to see what the other side with the golden domed roof was like. It was very beautiful and looked like a kind of palace.
By then it was starting to get darker and my feet were in pain so we went to find the hard rock cafe which we'd seen earlier in the day to have some dinner. It wasn't as cool as one we'd been in before in barcelona - which had had a car coming out of a wall and lots of guitars and rock icons on the walls, this one was a bit less ineteresting and mostly was just a few guitars on the wall and tvs showing rock videos but steve got to collect a 'hard rock cafe paris' shot glass (he has one from each of the ones he's been to) and the food was nice so can't really complain.
Our last planned stop was to the Arche de la Defense which we'd seen at a distance from the Arc de Triomphe on our first day. It was night when we got there and the area around it was all lit up and looked pretty funky even from the bottom of the arc so was looking forward to seeing the view from the top. It was really impressive in its modern setting although it didn't quite fit in with the fancy and mostly traditional scenes across most of the rest of Paris. I walked up quite a few steps in my horrible shoes only to read that it was closed and we'd missed closing time by like half an hour. I was a bit gutted but I was tired and really wanted to chuck my shoes away so we headed back to the hotel - promptly threw my shoes in the bin and went down to the hotel bar to chill out.
I had a lovely time in Paris and would recommend all the places I saw to anyone visiting! The french people that we encountered were very friendly and speak much better english than I do french - thank goodness!!
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