Paris le Deuxième!

 

Paris Part II

Our day began with a sense of foreboding.  I was very nervous about navigating the Paris public transit system.  Helsinki and Tampere make it very easy.  But everything I’d read about Paris felt different.  We couldn’t have all of our tickets on one phone like we usually did.  We’d have to go separately through turnstiles which our kids aren’t used to.  And I’d read too many horror stories of turnstiles not validating tickets, and overly aggressive transit controllers issuing hundreds of euros in fines.  So we were a little rattled.  There’s also a system of overlapping subways and busses and trains.  They all need different tickets.  So we ended up buying the wrong tickets and spending about 30 euros that we didn’t have to, which got our day off to a bad start.

Then we left our room to go down to breakfast, only to realize we had left our room key inside.  (In most of Europe you have to plug your room key into a socket to activate the lights in the room, so it’s pretty easy to forget to grab it before you leave).  And our kids also forgot to put their shoes on.  The first one was our fault.  You’d like to think the second one was a freak accident, but with our kids it’s pretty standard.  So we went downstairs with half of our crew in their socks, and no way to get back into our room.  Luckily they gave us another key.  But we were a bit rattled.

Breakfast was delicious and huge.  We had our fill of coffee and pastries and sausage, a mound of Nutella and fantastic cappuccinos – so fantastic that we each had several .  

Then we took a shuttle to the train stop, bought the tickets we actually needed, and headed towards Paris.  Almost immediately someone hopped on the train at the last moment, handed us a card, and successfully begged a Euro off of us.  It wasn’t a huge deal, but it felt like perhaps a grim omen of more to come.

After an hour train ride, we got off at our stop.  It was at one of those underground intersections where you can exit to the street at almost a dozen different locations.  We weren’t sure which would be most efficient, but I recognized Champ Elysses, and so we headed for that one.  It was about a fifteen minute walk through tunnels.  (Oscar at one point asked if Paris was all one big tunnel).  And I was preparing myself emotionally for more obstacles and frustration.  We climbed the steps to the Champs Elysses.

And emerged in a beautiful Paris morning with the Arc de Triomphe immediately in the background.

We heard cheering nearby and went to investigate.  The street was all blocked off.  Because the Paralympic marathon was taking place.  We stood for a half hour and cheered some of the world’s best athletes as they raced around one of the most impressive monuments I’ve ever seen.  

We then walked the Champ Elysses, which was an interesting blend of old Parisian skyline and new garish luxury stores, and headed towards the Eiffel Tower. 

I’d been a bit negative about the Eiffel Tower to be honest.  I didn’t tell anyone that, because my family was excited which is enough for me.  But I sort of thought we would all be underwhelmed.  Monuments and buildings have never been my thing.  And I don’t find the architectural structure of the tower especially beautiful.  I thought we would go, eat the croissant, and be ready to see something else. 

I was wrong on all counts.  The tower is breathtaking.  

I couldn’t stop looking at it.  And it was decorated with the Olympic rings.  Which ironically is the second different place we’ve seen the Olympic rings this summer (after a fantastic visit to Whistler with friends).  

We had some pastries and coffees right underneath the tower.  I asked Milo if he was excited to eat his croissant and have his picture taken with the Eiffel tower in the background.  He announced that he didn’t really care about that anymore.  Which was an expensive way to learn that.

We wandered around Paris some, and all the while the Eiffel Tower would loom in the background.  You’d catch a glimpse of it here, or see it peeking over the rooftops there.  I once had a student who was from Seattle describe Mt. Rainier as a friend who comes out to see you on sunny days, and no matter how many times you’ve seen her in the past she always surprises you with how beautiful she actually is.”  I never felt that way about Rainier (which should be renamed Tahoma).  But I did feel that way about the Eiffel Tower. 

One of the coolest things we did was to take a boat ride on the Seine.  It was expensive.  80 Euros for the four of us.  But that included champagne for us and snacks and juice for the kids.  And it was well worth it.  

The weather was fantastic.  And the boat took us by many sights that we had decided were not worth it for us to see:  Notre Dame, the Louvre, a glimpse of the Luxor Obelisk, St. Chapelle, etc.  We also got to go underneath several of Paris’ famous and beautiful bridges, and learn about each one.  I’d highly recommend it.

Afterwards we walked around the city a bit in search of lunch and marveling at the sights.  

We even saw the little sister to the statue of liberty!  She was quite a bit smaller, and we only saw her from the back.  Still a heckuva a view.  Aww yeah!

We had a wonderful lunch at a charming bistro. 

After lunch the kids found a beautiful park to work off the energy from the free ice cream they had just gotten.  

Then we made our way back to the train station, stopping at a grocery store for snacks for the evening – the best pretzels, and grapes that unfortunately had seeds.  And wine, for about four Euros a bottle.  Then we walked back towards the train stop.  

As we walked along the Champ Elysees Olympians were alongside us with their gold medals draped around their necks!  It was one the few times in my life that I was so star struck that I forgot to take a picture.  But I mean c’mon!  We walked down the Champ Elysees with Olympic gold medalists!  How many other people in the world can say that!?!  I mean, I guess the other thousands of people who were on the street with us.  And thousands more who were there for the Olympics in 1900 and 1924.  But other than those tens of thousands of other people, how many people beside us have walked the Champ Elysees with gold medalists?

I’m sure there are better ways to do Paris.  I’m sure that we didn’t find the perfect baguette, or ride on the secret Seine boat, or find all the spots the locals love.  I’m okay with that.  We’ve spent so much of our life trying to find all of the ways to maximize our trips, it was refreshing to just be okay being tourists.  It’s such a uniformly beautiful city; what’s the value of trying to find the very most beautiful part of it when in exchange you have to miss all of the rest of its beauty? 

Then back to the hotel to wind down before bed.  The train ride went equally well.  In the morning we had left a tag on our door saying we didn’t need our sheets to be changed.  It was part of a sustainability initiative to save energy.  It promised the kids a prize if they left the tag out.  So we did.  When we returned to the room we found our prize – a single coupon for half off at a restaurant that was already closed.  Yay.  So we ordered room service, which felt like a luxury, and made the kids feel very fancy.  Maybe too fancy – Oscar now asks for room service nightly regardless of location or circumstance.  And it made us grown ups feel pretty fancy too. 

Au Revoir!