I jumped on the train about noon, umbrella firmly in hand after my host mom wisely persisted I take one and set off towards Paris. I meant to jump on the Metro that goes to Invalides, but I got on some other one and ended up at the Musee D'Orsay. Having to go to the bathroom, I followed the signs for the "Toilettes" in the train station and upon arrival, I was informed that you have to pay to use the bathrooms. PAY. PAY!?As in give your money just to pee! I was so done. Really, Paris? Public bathrooms do not exist in France. Not even at parks or playgrounds. I was going to flip a lid on that city and I had just started off that day.
After succumbing to the GPS on my phone, I found the Disney store and there I found Emily. We meandered through shops, dodging the rain when we could, and went underground to climb out under the Arc. Thankfully, the rain subsided for a bit. The rest of the day was random showers and mostly just drizzles.
Having done my intense foodie research beforehand, I convinced Emily to go with me as I hunted down some famously delicious french fries (actually, they are really called Belgian fries) south of the Saint-Germain district. I must say, they were some darn good fries! For 4.60 euros, I basically got a shpping bag full of the fried starch, fresh out of the oil. That was my lunch...Good thing we had about 7 more hours of walking to hopefully make a dent in those calories.
We walked, snacked, got kicked off some palace steps, found wifi in a park, and walked some more through Paris. I showed her the Marais district/Jewish District that I love and attempted to show her the Saint-Germain district, although I couldn;t find the exact spot I had been the day before...of course... While walking towards the best falafel place ever, we ran into this long line of people waiting to get in somewhere. After looking around, we discovered it was to the European House of Photography. Umm, hello! Of course we hopped in line and went in through the exhibits. I was kind of dissapointed by the exhibits; one really strange fashion exhibit of poor quality photos, one of depressing (and sometime naked) people, and one of really basic rainforest pics. There was one exhibit that was a cool photojournalistic diplay of portraits from Guatemala. Another was a photographer who lived an awesome life photographing everything from the Bronx, to Mafias, to the Presidents in America 60's, 70's, and 80's.
Now that dinner time was approaching, I was craving some pizza. So began our next adventure: finding a non sitdown pizza place! Whilst searching and walking, we found a Pierre Hermes. This, my friends, is an EXPENSIVE but famous macaron bakery and epicure of fancy schmancy desserts. I walked out with one Creme Brulee macaron and 2.50 euros poorer. Talk about pricey! But talk about goooooood. My first French macaron and it was everything I had hoped for and more. So fat and fluffy but with the right crisp and crunch. And the flavors; they jumped out at you. So bomb.
After that mouth watering find, we found an awesome. awesome. awesome. pizza place that had about 15 different types of pizza to choose from, ready-made, and full on Italian goodness. The workers all spoke Italian to each other which convinced me that it must have been authentic. It was hot and packed full of goodies and delicious!
We finished up our dinner, and wanting to see Paris at night for the first time, we walked over to Pont Neuf and killed some time by chilling on a bench over looking the Seine. Behind us was a brief moment of burning sunset and then a spectacular show of Monet-worthy clouds above us for the next hour. It was a surreal moment in time. So much beauty in one instance, I had to convince myself that I was actually in Paris again. After a great show of God's finest creations, we made our long, very long, over 3 kilometers long, walk back to the Eiffel Tower. Emily's shoe had decided to go catty-whompus and literally fall apart so, being held together by a pony, we slodged our way back west.
My feet and toes were hurting so bad, I was having flashbacks of my marathon days. Wearing combat boots with two pairs of socks made for some cramped living space for my poor little toes, but they hurt like none other. When I got home that night, I stripped off my wet layers of shoes and socks and my toes were so read and swollen and in pain!! Today, walking to church was painful even though I opted for my most comfortable TOMS. Still bruised little toesies and swollen, red :(
But we made it to the Eiffel Tower and we witnessed "the sparkle" for the first time. Every hour on the hour after 9pm I think, the Tower begins to sparkle with beautiful white lights. It is so magical! We stood in the garden beneath it amongst a group of plenty of tourists and basked in the twinkling lights. It was a great end to an exhaustingly fun day. After adding up the hours I spent in Paris that day and the number of hours I walked who-knows how far, it was nearly 13 hours. That's a lot of hours and a lot of walking. So come Sunday in church, every time someone said a prayer, I basically took a 2-minute power nap and tried convincing myself to stay awake.
Now past midnight, I had mapped out a plan of getting back home through the Invalides Metro, but after walking and not finding it, I went to multiple bus stops and realized, after waiting for over 20 minutes, that the buses were not running anymore, I took an unneccesarily long detour to another metro. Oy vey. More walking! I hate getting lost! And yet it happens nearly everyday here.
Well on my way to that last metro, I was walking towards Trocadero, the big building across from the Tower, and I lived my first French Ratatouille moment. There were mice/rat things the size of SQUIRRELS running through the park. Ya, fancy that, Paris! Between paying to use the bathroom and oversized rodents running through the parks, I could not wait to get home in bed!!!!
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