Paris!!

This was a long and very exciting weekend so make sure you have some time.  This will be a long one. To start Jared worked in Paris for the whole week on a workshop. I came in on the train on Thursday. On my way in it was beautiful. The sun was shining and during the train change, I had an hour to wait and I decided to go outside and lay in the grass. With the sun shining it was amazing. Once I got into Paris I took the metro into the business district where Jared was staying and found the hotel. Jared had a few hours left of work so I decided to go out and look around. There was a large arch called the "Grand Arch" at the end of the road. So I walked down to see it. On my way there I ran into a man trying to talk to me. At first he spoke in French and I said I didn't understand and kept walking but he then spoke in English and began telling me this story about how he needed a picture for an application that he needed to turn in that day. He offered to pay me and I could email it to him. I told him I didn't have time and then he practically begged. So I finally agreed and took his picture and then as soon as I got back I deleted them. Who knows what people are capable of on the computer these days.

Anyways, when I got back to the hotel I waited for Jared. He said he would be back at 6:30 and didn't end up coming back until almost 8:00. Lets just say I was a little bit worried. Anyways he busted in the room like a bat outta hell and wanted to head right back down for dinner. We met up with a few people he was working with at the workshop.  We headed off to an Irish restaurant. We were an odd bunch. One guy, Pradep, is from Singapore, Dhafer is from KSA, Simon is from the UK and Nancy is from Pittsfield. And then Jared and I, kinda from the Netherlands. We were a funny group. We tried to get into the Irish pub but there were no seats so after a beer we tried a different place. We ended up eating at a place called the Red Hippo. The waitresses didn't speak English very well so it was pretty interesting but Simon was very helpful since he speaks a little French. He helped me read the whole menu which was awesome. I got a steak that was pretty good and Jared had a burger. It was a good night.

The next day was Friday and Jared had to work all day so being in Paris, I decided to go out and explore on my own. I planned my trip in the hotel and headed out for the metro. I stopped at a bakery in the station and got a warm croissant that was amazing. I got on the metro and I knew I was in Paris when I smelled the sweet aroma of BO all around. Awesome. My first destination was the Arc De Triomphe. It is huge! I took tons of pictures. The streets that circled around it were filled with cars and many horns blaring with some angry drivers. It was like a 4 lane rotary. Insane. There are no crosswalks to get to the center so you have to go underneath the circle to get right under the arch.  So I walked around until I found the stairs and when I got underneath I thought you had to pay to go back up the stairs in the center. Come to find out you only have to pay to go up in the arch. Whatever. So I just looked at it from afar the first day.

Then I walked down the most famous shopping street in Paris, the Champs de Élysées. There were a million shops and restaurants and tons of people. I stopped at a few souvenir shops just poking around and a few of the stores on the way by. I found a McDonald's with a McCafe and I was so excited because there aren't any McCafes in Maastricht.  I bought a frappe but it was different then the ones at home. It was more like a thin frosty from Wendy with whipped cream mixed in. It was good but different.

I have found that with quite a few things. Like m&ms in Europe are different than the US. I don't know how but they aren't the same. Next person who comes to visit me please bring me some US m&ms. PLEASE!

I walked all the way to the Louvre and passed this Egyptian statue that looks like a mini Washington monument with hieroglyphics on the side and a few fountains. It was such a beautiful day, sunny and 70*, that people were laying out in the grass and in chairs around the fountains. It was a gorgeous day.

I got to the Louvre and it really is a neat building. There were tons of people taking pictures. It was pretty neat.

I headed to the metro and got off at the Eiffel Tower. I still had a good amount of time until Jared would be getting out of work so I took my time walking around. I walked to the Eiffel Tower and it was huge. It was hard to get a picture of the whole thing (don't worry, I did get some).  I had so much time and it was such a nice day that I decided to walk up the stairs of the tower. It was not as bad as I was expecting for how big it was. Unless you have young children or are incapable of going up the stairs, it really isn't worth waiting in the incredibly long line to take the lift. You get to take as many breaks as you want and you get to stop and each level for as long as you want. Plus you really can only walk up to the second level and have to take a lift the rest of the way anyway.  So I walked to the first and second levels.  On the second level you can buy a ticket for the lift all the way to the top so I did. I could see so far away.  It was pretty amazing.  On my way down I checked my phone and I still had about an hour before I should head back to the hotel.  So I went out and grabbed a DELICIOUS chocolate strawberry crepe.  It was sooooo good!! Then I walked out so I could get a few more pictures of the Eiffel tower.  I was taking my time and slowly strolling around finally looked at my phone thinking it was about time to head back and turns out I was already supposed to be at the hotel 30 minutes earlier!!!  So I basically ran back to the metro, got on as fast as I could and rushed back to the room.  I was supposed to be back for a certain time so that we could meet up with some of Jared's coworkers to grab something for dinner before our bike tour that night.  So I got back to the room and Jared wasn't even there.  So I waited another hour and he finally showed up busting in the room again rushing around to leave.


 On the way to the meeting place for the bike tour we stopped at this little food stand to get these weird upside down grilled cheeses with ham in them.  I didn't really like this.  We met for the bike tour under the Eiffel tower.  Once we were off we saw tons of different things.  We saw the Cathedral of Notre Dame, the Conciergerie where Marie Antoinette was held, this huge building that was built just to house a piece of the cross that Jesus was crucified on and the crown of thorns.  We saw the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, and lots of bridges.  There is one really cool bridge that people call "Love Lock Bridge".  Couples go to this bridge to "lock up their love".  It is a bridge covered in locks with names on them and ribbons.  The couples lock their locks onto the bridge and throw away the key so its forever.  It is supposed to symbolized eternal love. 

The next day Jared and I decided we wanted to get our own lock for the bridge so searched all day in tons of different stores while we visited the Arc de Triomphe, and the Louvre.  In the Louvre we saw the Mona Lisa, the Venus de Milo Statue, an Egyptian Pharaoh statue to name a few.  It was pretty neat.  The Mona Lisa is a lot smaller than I thought. Jared and I also saw the Eiffel Tower and the Cathedral of Notre Dame. Inside the Cathedral there was a mass going on. That was neat too.

Well after a long  search we finally found a lock.  It was very small but that's okay.  We needed to write on our lock to make it personalized but by the time we realized this all the stores were closed.  We had stopped for dinner at a place near the Cathedral and then headed over to the bridge.   We ended up writing our names in pencil but to make it extra unique we got a key chain to attach of a heart with two little people on it holding hands.  Then we went to the bridge and locked up our lock and key chain onto the bridge with the Cathedral of Notre Dame right behind us.  We took turns throwing our keys into the river below so it was locked forever.  After that I said I wanted to go take some pictures of the other locks on the bridge because there were thousands of locks but Jared stopped me... He told me that he's known for a long time that he wanted to be with me for the rest of his life and that I make him so happy... He said a bunch more that I can't remember because I was so excited and he got down on one knee and asked me to marry him.  I did shed a tear and with no surprise I said YES!  It was a perfect moment and I couldn't be more excited.

To end the night we went back to the Eiffel Tower to see it all lit up at night and to get another crepe.  We sat and watched as right at 9:00 the Eiffel Tower sparkled.  It was really neat. It was a perfect end to a perfect night.

I looked at the train ticket the next morning and saw our train left at 12:10. So we gathered up all our things at the hotel and headed off to the metro.  We took the metro to the train station and looked up for our train but there was no train leaving at 12:10.  Jared took out our tickets and realized that our train didn't leave 12:10 it was leaving at 12:01... We had 2 minutes to get on the train.  Jared found the track and we started to sprint.  We ran as fast as we could.  We jumped on the train right as the bell was ringing to show the doors were closing. One more wrong turn and we would have missed it.  Then when we got to the other station where we needed to change trains we ran to go buy tickets to try to catch the first train instead of having to wait an extra hour.  We also just barely made that one.  So it definitely was an eventful ride home but we made it.  It was a great weekend.  I hope that Jared and I will be able to go back to Paris to that bridge and find our love lock sometime soon.