Paris Day 2

Z’Seconde Daye En France

We woke up on our second day in France still absolutely zonked with fatigue. We had clothes hanging everywhere because of the various loads of laundry that had to be hand washed and hung to dry. I was taking full advantage of the lovely weather and our mini balcony. The weather was really gorgeous and once we got the blackout blinds up, it was much easier to get out of bed. (We made sure to leave them semi-open every day thereafter. Not seeing a hint of daylight can really kill your bed exiting morale!)

The Hotel Comete was conveniently located next to the Metro, so we hopped on and headed to the Champs-Elysees. It’s a huge street lined with a bunch of nice/cool/”hip shops and eateries and located close to a bunch of Paris landmarks. We walked down the Champs-Elysees in search of food; it was like hunting for elk in a jewelry store, people. Everything was super marked-up, far too expensive for an easy breezy lunch meal on our first day in Paris.

Just as we had given up all hope for food and were about to hold out for a less touristy (therefore less expensive) area in which to dine, we found this dine-and-go sort of minimart that was really cute and seemed to be ‘in’ with the late-twenties white collar lunchers. We each grabbed a sandwich and a drink, and I got a yogurt and a dessert. The guy at the counter was oober nice and we exited the miniestablishment having spent less than fifteen euro. Now that’s what I call “Yum!” We found an adorable park where I was able to watch the people and their dogs (missing Dewey and Kramer the whole time, of course).

We walked back up the Champs-Elysees toward the Sine. We passed by the Grand Palais and the Petit Palais which had gorgeous statue ornamentation, and gold embellishments, and were just really cool. Jen retied her shoes while I took a few snapshots. Then we headed toward the Pont du Alexandre III (a really sweet bridge) that had a stretches of grass on the other side of the Sine.

Some cheerleaders were practicing a routine on the grass, so we sat down and rested. Jen laid down to nap for a little while and I took out my various books (but ended up mostly watching the cheerleaders…who were HORRIBLE, btw. I don’t even know if they were serious.) One of the girls fell on her head during a throw at one point during the practice, but she was fine. From where we were sitting we had a view of the top of the Place de les Inhabitantes, the Eiffel Tower, the Pont Alexander III, and both the Grand and Petite Palais.

We walked down the Seine to the Musee d’Orsay, and then crossed the river again toward the Louvre. We walked through a portion of the gardens in front of the Louvre, called the Tuleries, and then made our way up toward the grand structure of the great museum. We sat around the big glass pyramid and its fountains and looked around a bit. The line to buy tickets was super long and we were still thinking about buying the Paris Museum Pass (to get into over 50 different museums and sites around Paris), so we weren’t going to commit to the time investment of the line and it was too late in the day to go into the Louvre anyway. The sun was setting and it was too pretty to go inside.

We were pretty beat by this time, so we headed back to the area around our hotel for dinner. We bought a loaf of bread, Nutella, cheese, and strawberry jam along with a container of crepes from a local market. We had a lovely picnic in our room and watched a show with Christian Slater solving mysteries. And there were French subtitles so we learned a lot (about the human condition, solving a murder, acting philosophy, and the French language. It was a very fulfilling evening.) We called Lisa on Skype and had a very nice conversation letting her know how our day had gone. My mouth was full so she couldn’t understand me, but it was okay because I think she understood that it was DELICIOUS.

Then we went to sleep.

From, Mallory