Met liefde van Parijs deel een

Its another Monday, Im so tired I could fall asleep on my keyboard and Ive had another incredible weekend! Paris was AMAZING! Even the cold, grey, rainy weather didnt dampen the trip. Amelia walked all over the city and probably up 1000 stairs, no exaggeration (my legs are a sore today). I have a ton of pictures and it was so hard to pick just a few to share. Enjoy!! With love from Paris: Part 1!!

With us both having been to Paris before, we decided to check out some of the other things that we had not seen before and some of each of our favorites. The Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame were of course on my must see list :) We did go by the Louve but didnt seen Mona this time, although I hear she is still there. We packed up Opel Friday and we were off!

I thought it was awesome to see PARIS on a road sign! This is about one of 10 attempts it finally took me to get a useable picture! The trip was supposed to take us about 5 hours but then we hit this....

Traffic! Not exciting. It delayed us about an hour but luckily we had the iPod to keep us entertained, that and the Europeans that simply put their car in park, get out and start arranging stuff in their trunk. That would never fly in Houston!

Beautiful French sunset! I loved being able to drive through Holland, Belgium and France during the daylight hours. The countryside with rolling hills had beautiful green pastures and everyone once and a while, you would see the steeple of a church surrounded by a quaint French town. That was definitely the highlight of the drive.

Other then that, I would not recommend driving to Paris...not when the train is fast and great. Having been there before, I knew that the drivers were crazy and they ARE! Driving down the road, motorcycles would just ride the stripes in the middle of the lane and zoom between two cars. Opel avoided a near collision with 3 bikers that werent paying attention. Unlike America where gas stations are all over, here you can drive for an hour before seeing anything. Makes you keep a close eye on the gas gauge!

*Sidestory: Stop at the gas station: (I had to include this because every time I even think about it, I laugh until I cry). We were running pretty low on gas and finally made it to a gas station in Paris. Amelia pulls up to the pump, I hop out and we cannot get the gas to pump or credit card machine to work. Giving up, Amelia leaves me with the car (and all of our valuables) while she goes inside. I watch her hysterically laughing as she cannot get INTO the gas station door, for what seems like 10 minutes, while the store owner just looks on. Since it was FREEZING, I decide to wait in the car. Out of no where, I see this French biker banging on my window telling me something in French. At first, I ignore him but as he becomes more persistent. I convince myself (and Ill blame the international saftey training/kidnapping newsetter that I attended for work just days prior to this) that, well, I am getting carjacked/kidnapped! Its over for me in Paris... Once we got past the communication barrier, I realized he was trying to tell me the gas cap was open. Ah, thanks French man! After driving the wrong way through the gas station and the car almost getting sandwiched by this huge gas truck, we finally had our gas and were on the way. I cant even begin to think what all the French at the gas station thought as they watched this comedy of two American girls in Paris unfold.

Then, there was the parking. Once we found the parking garage, Amelia commented that it looked very much like the entrance to an elevator. Although I agreed I was insistent that we were at the right place so I got out of the car, pushed the button and low and behold, it was an elevator, for our car! Im not kidding, it looked like an American size hospital elevator! Opel barley fit and we all went for a ride. HILARIOUS! We were in Paris with our car riding an elevator! Both Amelia and I were laughing uncontrollably. Very unexpected. (I know what you are thinking, how can all these things happen to them....I think the same thing everyday!)

This picture was taken was Amelia was accidentally trying to kill us by leaving the car running in the enclosed elevator, while I was screaming at her to cut it off. haha! Thankfully it was a very short ride!

For dinner, we ventured across the street to a Cafe, where the waiter suggested that we try the hamburger, since the menu was in French and we were once again at a loss as to what it said. So our plates arrive, and we were served a hamburger patty with a fried egg on top, with I bet you can guess, fries. Very unexpected. With a few exceptions, Ive never been much of a fan of French food, bland without alot of taste, and this was no expectation. And FRENCH fries in France, all very bad. You would think they would have a corner on the market but no.

After dinner, we hopped on the metro (which is awesome in Paris by the way, the only way to get around) headed here..

EIFFEL TOWER!! I LOVE it at night!! And it is HUGE!

On the half hour, the tower sparkles. I included a video below. Its beautiful to see! Last time I was in Paris, the tower was colored blue in honor of the European Union.

Since Amelia had never been to the top, we took the elevator ride all the way up!


A view of the city! It was hard to get a good picture with all of the lights but you can see here the Arc de Triomphe in the center. You could see millions of lights for endless miles. Amazing view at night! And we really lucked out that it was a clear night. LOVED IT!

View from the top. The very top level was closed for renovation. This was taken from the 2nd level, which is still very high!

We finished the night with, what else, a crepe! And the French do know how to make those tasty treats! DELICIOUS! You can get them filled with anything from jam to chocolate to ham and cheese. Here I opted for the tradition tasty sugar....never lets you down.

We sat and watched the tower and enjoyed our crepe until midnight before heading back to the hotel. A perfect way to start the weekend!! Day one in Paris was a huge success and defiantly kept us laughing! Thanks for reading. I hope you all had a wonderful weekend! Check back tomorrow for Paris part 2! :)

al mijn liefde

Eiffel Tower Sparkle!