Paris Day 3-5 (Mom is helping play catch up because we have two exhausted children)

Angela--On our third day, we woke up late and headed out for a quick bite to eat at a nearby Patisserie. We then took the metro to a charming neighborhood call Montemarte where we took a tiny train up to the top of the "mountain" where we saw the famous church Sacre Couer and walked around to local shops and street artists. Audra had her portrait done while Attie and I walked around a little. When we had had a snack of gelato and crepes, we walked back down to head to The Arc de Triomphe. We had to climb lots of stairs for our view of the Champs Elysee but it was worth it. We also saw the Eiffel tower up close, and while we were having a drink near the Eiffel Tower we noticed smoke in the horizon and lots of fire trucks.




We later found out that Notre Dame was on fire:( Luckily we had visited the night before because our hotel is actually less than a mile from there.

At night, we decided to get dressed up and go out for nice dinner in our neighborhood. Both girls had a pesto ravioli, and Scott had duck. I ordered a salad that had foie gras, smoked duck, and duck livers on it. One of my goals is to order the strangest thing I can that I still think I will eat. It was actually delicious.


Dinner finished around 10:30 (they eat late here) which is why Audra was rushed last night to write her blog:)

Paris Day 4

We started the day a little earlier, so we were able to check out a local breakfast shop. The girls had waffles and a mocha. They are learning that Europeans eat much less sugar:). We then took the metro to a chocolate museum where we got to learn about the history of chocolate and sample of course. There was an Eiffel Tower and Arc de Triomphe made out of chocolate. Then we went to the Rex theater which is a famous movie theater where lots of famous movies have premiered. We did a behind-the-scenes tour and got to record a scene.




After a snack and a metro ride, we ended up on a river cruise down the Seine. We got to see Notre Dame after the fire despite the fact that they aren't allowing any metro trains in the area. It still looks structurally pretty good. After that we got a crepe and made our way towards Montparnesse (a skyscraper with great views of the Eiffel Tower). We rode an elevator up to the top and had a drink while we watched it get dark. Unfortunately Attie realized she lost her phone (probably on the boat tour) but we were determined not to let that ruin our trip.


We were tired after Montparnesse, so we took the metro back to our hotel and got take out sushi from next door  and were in bed by 11. We had tried to check out the D'Orsay museum and the line was hours long, so we decided we would get up early to beat the rush to the Louvre on Wednesday.

Paris Day 5

The 6:30 A.M. alarm came too quickly, but we struggled through and were able to get a pastry before heading to The Louvre by 8:00 am. The line was long, but it moved quickly. We saw The Mona Lisa and the Egyptian exhibit but learned quickly that museums might not be the girls' favorite activity.  We then took the Hop on Hop Off bus around the city which was a nice (although not efficient) way to see some of the major sights. We got off near the Eiffel Tower, had lunch and got in the massively long line to climb to the top.


Ultimately, we decided that we'd rather spend our day seeing some other things and decided not to travel to the top of the Eiffel tower. Instead, we caught the metro and went to the catacombs....which was dark, but actually really cool. We hit happy hour after and had a view of a pet shop with a window full of puppies, so we were all happy.

Photos- Day 2

 

London to Paris- Day 2

Audra:

We woke up in London and headed downstairs for breakfast. The room was small, but the food was pretty good. Mom says it was a traditional English breakfast. After eating, we decided to walk around a little bit more and see what we could see. A cute coffee shop caught our eye and we made the decision to stop for a treat. 

Attie

After the coffee shop we walked around our cute little neighborhood and park before heading to the metro, around the park, there were multiple artists with all of there art work all lined up along the fence, many of the artists were very talented, I thought at least, and all of the art work was very interesting. Once we were done looking at all the artwork and seeing what else we could see in the neighborhood, we headed back to the hotel to grab our suitcases and head to the metro. When we got the metro we had to go through security and stuff because the metro was going to take us to Paris, in a different country obviously. When we got on the train we put our suitcases above us on the rack and got situated in our surprisingly comfy seats. After about an hour and a half of the two hour train ride I started to get antsy and bored with my book. I was also getting a little bit hungry so me and Scott got up and headed to the car where all the food was, when we got there, there were a lot of options for food, between sandwiches, to Pringles, to coffee! The Pringles did appeal to me but Scott insisted I wait until we found a cute cafe in Paris, so I agreed and we headed back to our seats.

Audra:

We got to Paris and started the walk to our hotel, after about 2 miles of walking we finally arrived. The hotel itself was very small, but the elevator stood out in particular it was about 2 feet by 2 feet. Only one of us could fit in at a time. After the 10 min. it took us to get all four of us up the elevator we got into our hotel room. It was pretty spacious compared to the standards that were set by the elevator.

(I have to go quickly because it is really late so here is a speed list of the things we did for the rest of the day)

1. after we unpacked we headed out to explore

2. we ate at a place called La Compass

3. Mom ordered snails 

4.We went home 

Love you all,

Audra and Attie

P.S. sorry for the shortened post we are really tired and have a long day ahead of us.

London- Day 1

Our First Plane Ride: 

Audra

Scott says that it was the best airport security experience of his life, there was no lines and everyone was extremely friendly. We were prepared for long lines and an unpleasant experience, but afterword we didn't see what the big deal was.

Attie: 

When we boarded the plane, we took our seats and got situated, at first me and Audra were a bit nervous for take off, but we were both surprisingly satisfied with how smooth the ride was. I thought it was actually fun, and that the turbulence wasn't even close to as bad as I imagined. 

Officially In London

Audra:

We arrived in London around 1:30 in the afternoon, this was different for us because of the time zone change. We were all pretty tired and just wanted to go to sleep, but we made the decision to try and explore the new surrounding.  We saw Hyde Park, Buckingham Palace, the Marble Arch, and lots of cool architecture. 

Marble Arch, London UK

Attie:

For dinner that night we went to a pub called, "3 Tuns" I had tried their fish and chips, I didn't really like at very much but then I kept trying to try little bits of it until I felt full enough. Audra had the same, we also tried a juice that was flavored, apple and raspberry flavored drink, it was a little to sweet for my liking but I still drank most of it.

Audra:

After dinner we decided to walk around some more and ended up farther away than we had thought. We were exhausted from the flight earlier that day and just wanted to get some sleep, so you can understand why the 9 mile walk made us cranky. Overall I think that the day went pretty well, and to say the least, I am in awe of the amazing things we've seen so far. 

Love You All,

Attie and Audra