Today was our first day in Paris. We woke up in Amsterdam and checked out of the apartment by 7:30. We called a taxi from the phone our apartment provided and a Mercedes SUV showed up, so fancy! Taking a few last pictures of the city before departing, we said goodbye to this city we fell in love with and all the bikes that came with it. We stopped in the train station for a quick breakfast - a couple diet cokes and a coffee paired with a breakfast sandwich for mom. (I was finishing off the delicious bread and cookie butter from the day before.) the train departed at 8:17 to head to Paris. We were in the back of the cart across the aisle from each other. I tried to get some blogging done, but no such luck when my iPad ran out about an hour into the ride. Instead, I ate my breakfast and quizzed Mom on her French speaking straight out of the tourist book.
We arrived in the Paris train station around 11:30 and had to take some pictures, this train station was way more impressive than the others we had been to. We got in line for the taxi, only having to wait about 10 minutes. The First glimpse of Paris was wonderful, the architecture is so different than any other city I have been in. We took the taxi to the apartment in Montmartre, knowing we had an hour until scheduled check in, but wanted to get there and make sure we knew where it was and then find lunch nearby. With only 20 minutes to check in, we didn't think we had time to find a place to eat, so just waited out front for the owner to come check us in. With check in scheduled at 12:30, when it hit 12:45 and no one had shown up, Mom called. The lady said she would leave then lol, guess she was waiting on the "you're late" call. We got checked in around 1, and explored the apartment a little. Mom wasn't too impressed with the place, but with Paris being such an expensive city, we had to deal with the fact we couldn't get the nicest place in town, and I was fine with it. I'm not looking to spend much time in this apartment anyways :). It just had some slanted floors (think I have a video of rolling a ball across the living room with no push). Too bad, it didn't matter, we just wanted to explore Paris.
Time to hit the streets! This afternoon, Mom had planned for us just to walk around and explore Montmartre and not go into the main part of Paris. We walked past a few restaurants, checking out other peoples dishes and quickly decided on lunch at a cute little restaurant that had outdoor seating of course overlooking the main shopping street. The waiter was great, very friendly and even helped my Mom out with her French a little bit. And all of our meals with amazingly delicious! Mom had a pork casserole dish, Aunt Lanie had the beef and veggie special plate, and I had a salmon avocado salad that was out of this world.
We then walked the main shopping street and side streets, getting lost and finding our way back multiple times. We came across a couple of real estate places that had listings in the Montmartre area posted in the windows. That's when we realized that this "affordable" section of Paris was still extremely expensive and we couldn't believe we were staying in the apartment we were in for only when we were paying. We grabbed some amazing gelato right next to the restaurant we had lunch in - I had stracciatto (mint chocolate chip) layered with chocolate in a petit cone, so good!
We had heard from many people that Parisians do not appreciate it when you immediately speak English to them and expect them to know your language instead of at least attempting to speak French, and this is so true. We went into one store to look at a hat that I liked. I made the mistake of immediately asking if the woman spoke English and she would not speak to me. She let me try on the hat but was very rude while we were in there. But, we heard her speaking English to other customers. After shopping for a bit, we went to the square in the area of town near the Abesseeses metro stop. There was a merry go round that wasn't running and then also a separate little garden area that was fenced in. Inside the garden area was the love wall, which was very cool. It is a large blue wall with I love you written in over 270 different languages. We found the languages we recognized - French, English, Spanish, and sign language. We walked around the gardens for a bit, noticing there was a school overlooking the garden and taking in the architecture of the buildings surrounding us. There was also a group of young boys in the square having a flour and water fight. Even though we got a little wet from some water guns, it was fun to watch then having so much fun like that. There was also a group of boys playing soccer in the square. One thing we have already realized about Paris is that there isn't a lot of greenery, so I guess in the square is one of the best places for them to play sports like that. Another thing that will be tough to get used to is the dog situation. Because of the lack of greenery, dogs just go to the bathroom in the streets and on the sidewalk and no one picks it up. There is water running down the sides of streets in random spots because it's just a known fact that you will step in the poo at some point and will need to get it off your shoe. I made it out with no stinky step ins today, but who knows if I will be that lucky for the whole trip!
After hanging out in the square for a bit, we walked back up to the apartment and hung out there for a couple of hours. We looked at all the pictures from our day in Amsterdam and found some funny videos on my GoPro - especially of Aunt Lanie! We decided to have dinner on the hill of the Bascilica, right by our apartment. We walked back down to the Main Street in Montmartre to a sandwich spot we had spotted earlier, grabbed a couple things to share and headed back up the hill. We also had taken the wine opener and some glasses from our place to enjoy a bottle up there as well! Across the street from our apartment is a cute little conscience store type place with a fruit and veggie stand out front. We followed the other tourists to lead us up the hill, which was quite the hike. We came around one corner to our first view of the Eiffel Tower - so cool! From there, we continued the hike around the corner to the hill. It was a breathtaking view of the city of Paris. We walked up to top of the hill, attempting to get view of the Eiffel Tower but it was blocked by the trees, oh well! We walked around the hill and surrounding area a couple times to find a spot, finally settling on an empty grass patch over to the side of the hill. We started eating and attempting to open the bottle of wine. Ten minutes after the attempting started, and hearing a guy behind us laugh most of the time, he offered to help. None of us had realized that the wine opener was missing a part, but he was strong enough to open it without the part, thank goodness! We took in the view and did quite a bit of people watching. There were a couple girls in front of us drinking wine from the bottle and eating pasta and a group of young Parisians next to us all sharing a meal. At one point, Aunt Lanie almost got hit by a pigeon, wish I had that on video! We finished our meal and wine and went in to see the inside of the church. There was a cute couple taking wedding pictures up near the church, so beautiful! Inside, it was a gorgeous church, and mass was going on. Mom and Aunt Lanie lit candles inside the church. We had one more look of view, taking it in as much as we could and then walked back to the apartment. We have stayed up for an hour planning tomorrow in Paris, and I'm so excited! Sleep tight. See you tomorrow Pari
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