PARIS

Ah, Paris, Paris, Paris, the city of loooove. Don't know where to begin!

We arrived in Paris looking like crap. The train from Barcelona was FREEZING, I really don't know why they chose to freeze us before dropping us off at our destination. We were all wearing the warmest clothes we had: me in my white capris and white Nike pullover (aka marshmellow suit), Hanna in her sundress and scarf (aka unprepared dark-side suit), Sarah in her black workout pants and black Northface fleece (aka the yin to my yang), and Saaya in jeans and a black hoodie (aka the real dark-side). So it was 9:00 AM in Paris, and we looked h.a.g.g.a.r.d. We were looking forward to getting off our eskimo train, but when we stepped off it was--surprise surprise--cold as hell.

Feeling extremely stupid and ill-prepared, we hailed a cab and headed to Le Meridien Montparnasse, the most beautiful and luxurious hotel we will be staying at on our trip (thank you Saaya's parents!!). After trying to pull ourselves together in the hotel bathroom (and getting strange looks from women as I brushed my teeth... and Hanna brushed her teeth with her finger), we headed to the cafe next door for omelettes and crossaints for breakfast, which marked the beginning of our 5-day cheese tour of Paris. Then we went to the Arc de Triomphe and went to the top for a beautiful view of the city! We walked down the Champs Elysees and we foolishly went into the Louis Vuitton "for fun." After that we went to the Orsay museum, which is definitely my favorite museum so far: it had a great Impressionist collection, with Cezanne, Renoir, Monet, Manet, Van Gogh, and Degas. Ah, so beautiful! Then Hanna and I fought exhaustion and walked to the Notre Dame, for a free entry and free tour! We snapped some great shots of the stained glass and learned some religious history before heading home for going to the best restaurant in Paris: Au Chien Qui Fume, The Smoking Dog. The french onion soup was to die for! So much cheeseeeeee :) I had canteloupe melon with parma ham, which was soooo yummy and then duck with rasberry sauce and peaches. So bomb. Oh, and great wine! Then we got a scenic tour of Paris at night by cab (Sarah found her own little "arc de triomphe" at the Louvre: "Hey you guys, there's the Arc de Triomphe!!!" Fail.) before stumbling into bed.

Our second day, we went to Mont St. Michel! We woke up SO early to catch our 8:00 AM train to Rennes, before getting on a bus to Mont St. Michel itself. By the time we finally got there it was about 12:30! But so worth it! Mont St. Michel is like a little town in itself on a tiny island in the middle of marshland/quicksand on the Northwest coast of France, it also has an abbey situated at the top of the mountain which is dated back to the 8th century! We walked up the little cobblestone streets to the abbey itself and got an audioguide to help us through. It was beautiful and the views were great, though there were some rooms that were very ark and ominous, perhaps due to the fact that the abbey was used as a prison during the Medieval times when religion took a downturn in France... After the abbey we went shopping in the little shops along the way down and ate lunch in a cafe with mean worker ladies who hated us. Then we walked outside and sat in the sun to enjoy the views while we waited for our bus to take us back to Rennes, and the train back to Paris. We got home and went to the local grocery store to get some goodies for an in-room picnic: camembert cheese, crackers, apricot jam, and salad, and WINE! It was delicious :) then, sleep!

No trip to Paris would be complete without a visit to Versailles, even if it was incredibly expensive!! We headed out on a 12-minute train ride (the only time we remembered our iPods) to Versailles and were amazed by the amount of people there! After waiting in line for what seemed like ages, we finally got our tickets and our free audioguides and headed inside for a tour of the palace. The rooms were of course decorated beautifully, and the Hall of Mirrors was breathtaking, literally one of the most beautiful rooms I've ever seen, not to mention the Treaty of Versailles was signed in it!! Afterwards we got sandwiches for lunch and ate them in the gardens of Versailles, I've never seen anything like it! We were craving Au Chien Qui Fume again, and we found one nearby so Saaya called, being the only French speaker in our group, but got laughed at and hung up on... then Sarah tried:
"Hello? Yes, hi. Do you have ze Parma haaam wis melon? Oui oui? And ze foie gras? Oui? Ok, gracias!" Turns out it wasnt the right one, but oh well.

After our lunch in the gardens we went to Marie Antoinette's Petit Trianon, her little home away from home on the grounds of Versailles, far away from her asexual husband. It was much more quaint and cute and homey than Versailles, with pale green painted walls and basically shabby chic all over the place. We walked around her garden for a little, into the Temple of Love :) but after that we were too tired to go see her other little farmhouse, which was even more casual than the Petit Trianon. Bums.

After Versailles we were exhausted and headed back to Le Meridien for a little rest before going back to Au Chien Qui Fume (the real one). Hanna & Sarah got foie gras (basically REALLY fatty duck liver, which was sooooo yummy!! My first time trying it! It tasted like reallllllly flavorful and rich duck meat except it melted in your mouth, so delicious!) We got parma ham & melon again, and french onion soup, I got chicken and potatoes in tarragon sauce, and Saaya got a creamy salmon pasta. For dessert Sarah got profiteroles ("Cant wait for my proliferats y'alls") with vanilla ice cream in the middle and dark chocolate sauce drizzled on top. Saaya and I split the WORST CREME BRULEE IVE EVER HAD (any of us has ever had). I dont even want to talk about it.

On our last day in Paris, we started out at the Louvre. Much to our surprise, the line wasnt bad at all (maybe because we "accidentally" cut the whole line, whoops!) and we got our tickets in about 15 minutes! We went straight to the Mona Lisa... really cool but totally overrated (sorry, guys). It was like this tiny painting on a HUGE blank wooden wall and it was covered in glass. Then we headed for Miro's Venus, where we met the MOST annoying Chinese girls ever. They insisted on taking pictures in front of every famous work of art, holding up the crowd of people and blocking everyone's view of the art itself. Needless to say, Hanna and I fought for justice and got in every picture. The girls totally talked crap about us in Chinese so I knew we had succeeded. After this we kind of lost interest in everything else... the Louvre has such a big collection and we were museum'd out after all the ones we've seen already so far. So then we walked around the area around the Louvre and got lunch at a small streetside cafe, where we got the smallest and lamest Caesar salads ever (for 14 Euro!!!) and red wine. In the square across the street, there was a small orchestra playing classical music! It was so lovely :) After paying for our meal we watched them play for a little (and Hanna cried during Canon in D) before going souvenir shopping... at which time I got a crepe with nutella & bananas, yum. But not the best choice for a shopping snack, as it got all over my hands and face.

Then Hanna and I went to Sacre Cour in Montmarte. Montmarte was so freaking sketchy-the second we got off the Metro it was like WHOA: weave hair salons everywhere, hair on the streets from the salons, smelly, ew. Sacre Cour was the most crowded thing weve seen in all of Europe so far, and even now we dont know why. Probably everyone was just standing around, catching their breath from the millions and zillions of stairs to get there. So we walked around Montmarte, which was actually really cute, with painters in the streets and cute little shops along cobblestone streets. But again, crowded! It would have been so much better with like 1/4 of the people there. So we left.

That night we had our final Parisian meal: another picnic on the floor. This time, with an Asian twist (of curry flavored ramen noodles) in addition to the camembert cheese and apricot jam on crackers. Even though we were all suffering from a food coma, Hanna and I went to the Eiffel tower! No trip to Paris would be complete without one. The view of the tower itself was beautiful, as the sun had just set when we got there. We took our touristy pictures and went to stand in line, when we realized that by the time we waited in line, got up there, took pictures, waited in line to come down, and got home, it would be past 2 AM. Not cool. So we left.

Ja'dour Paris!!!