Paris, France

The Last of the Love Locks
 

Maurice, aka our hotel manager
Image Source

Our room had this great big window that Sarah enjoyed playing with--pay no mind to the large bottle of Sprite.  Does anyone else ever crave citrus?

Our first city in Europe on our honeymoon was the City of Love (Paris, France).  After spending a night in Keflavik, Iceland, we flew from Iceland to Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport.  John reserved a hotel that was on the opposite side of France, meaning we had to get onto three different metro lines to get to the closest metro station.  After departing our last metro station (finally!), we walked quite a few blocks to get to the hotel.  The Hôtel des Amis (re named Hôtel le Petit Château) was snuggled beside other apartments and houses in the quiet and cute town of Malakoff.  We were exhausted from all of the flights, trains, subways, and walking, but were greeted with a friendly hotel owner who reminded us of Maurice from Beauty and the Beast.  We realized quite quickly that he didn't speak any English and we didn't speak very much French (aka: none).  We eventually gestured via charades that we wanted the internet information, then Sarah used Google Translate to talk to the owner.  The hotel owner had trouble using our credit card because in the Stone Age of 2013, many American credit cards didn't have the chip that Europeans have.  After using Booking.com (thanks!) as a translator, he then showed us our room which had a double bed and our own bathroom.  It was so nice to drop our bags off and rest for a little bit.  Nothing compares to being able to set your bags down after a day of walking!  Especially if you have had to carry your wife's one ton bag... We headed out to explore Malakoff which involved typical Parisian scenes:  lovers sitting on benches near Mairie, and people munching on baguettes and quiche (including us).

The next day John immediately took Sarah to the Eiffel Tower.  We grabbed our first crepe of the trip right next to the Eiffel Tower.  Something you should probably write down:  John's crepe order: Nutella and bananas; Sarah's crepe order: Nutella.  The line to get up into the tower moved quickly for us.  Some days we heard it can be huge, but don't worry there's lots of pigeons and people watching to occupy your time.  Once on top we had to buy some champagne to toast our marriage.  We grabbed a quick lunch and then headed back to the hotel to get ready for John's first surprise of the honeymoon. 

We're so ashamed.  Please ignore our very American Starbucks cups.

We dressed up fancy and went to Bastille.  We were early and feeling a bit tired, so we went to grab some coffee.  We were trying hard to avoid places we had in America (like Starbucks) so we chose a small coffee shop.  We ordered the mocha from the menu.  To our uncultured surprise, it was a shot of espresso with a chocolate bar. So we did what any ignorant American does:  laugh and cheers, then drank the whole thing like a shot.  After getting some other coffee (from Starbucks, shhhh.  Also, see the end of the page for some Starbucks advice) John then surprised Sarah by walking over to the The Opéra Bastille - Opéra national de Paris and picked up the tickets to Lucia di Lammermoor.  Sarah was thrilled to find that we even had good seats in the second balcony--well done John!.  It was a blessing to have French and English subtitles to the opera or else John would have been lost to what was happening.  The sets, singing, and acting were incredible and we highly recommend seeing an opera while in Paris.

The second day in Paris we went to Notre Dame and toured both inside the church and outside in the gardens.  We found the October temperature PERFECT for travel.  There was so much to see:  the details on the outside of the church, the artifacts present inside, and the great views you can get when going up into the bell towers are priceless.  After Notre Dame, we then went to the Arc de Triomphe to get a good evening view of the lit-up Eiffel Tower.  Bonus:  seeing the biggest roundabout that we've ever experienced.  John knows he would get stuck in the middle of this roundabout if he had a vehicle, and Sarah knows she would just stop. After the views of the Eiffel tower, we had dinner in the Bastille area--complete with a mojito (first one of the trip, which made it officially vacation in Sarah's book!).  The Bastille area was our favorite place to find places to eat and drink because of the amount of shops and restaurants in this area.  There's a great little Chinese place that we also enjoyed on the steps of the Opera.  No one makes Chinese like...Paris?

The next day was full of museums and wonderful art.  John and Sarah took the metro to the Louvre Museum.  The entrance is fun to go through because you take the escalator down underneath a glass pyramid--flashback "The Da Vinci Code."  Once underground, you get your tickets and a map of the museum.  There is so much to see so it can feel overwhelming.  John took Sarah to go see the Mona Lisa and teased her by asking her try to imagine how big the Mona Lisa is.  She imagined it would be huge, but then as we walked into this room, we spotted a ton of people crowded around something.  It was so small, Sarah didn't know what it was until we reached the edges of the crowd.  Spoiler alert:  The Mona Lisa is not that huge.  Some other major things that we saw were the Venus de Milo and the Hammurabi code (an eye for an eye law).  Sarah really enjoyed the men made of veggies and fruits--she got that piece.  Imagine a huge maze with beautiful works of art hanging around:  that's kind of like the Louvre.  Except, you don't necessarily want to get out of the maze (museum), because you just know that you're missing something.  Just go!

There is a really beautiful garden that is close to the Louvre museum called Jardin des Tuileries.  We enjoyed relaxing and exploring this area.  Of course we also grabbed another crepe as a snack.  (Pop quiz:  What's our crepe order?!) We took tons of pictures and got many different angles of the Eiffel Tower.  John was able to orient himself to where he was in the big city, and Sarah was able to take pictures.  After a break with a crepe in the gardens we went to La Basilique du Sacre Coeur de Montmartre which is known as the Basilica of the Sacred Heart.  One of our favorite things about traveling occurred--random festival!  We stumbled upon a wine festival at the Basilica.  There were lots of vendors selling wine, bread, and food.  It was such a fun surprise because we were able to have some fresh wine and dinner there.  After touring the festival we then began our trek back to our hotel.  It was then that Sarah wanted (um, maybe "needed" is a better word) to try a free public restroom.  It took her awhile to figure out how to get out because the restroom kept speaking to her in French.  It was tougher than it looked.

The next day we went back to the Notre Dame to go up in the bell towers (and wound up passing a commercial or film--how Hollywood!).  Unfortunately, the actual bell tower was under construction so we couldn't see the bell that inspired the Hunchback of Notre Dame.  The view from on top of the Notre Dame is one of the best: you get to see the Eiffel tower, the Arc de Triomphe, and the Sacre Coeur.  From on top of the tower, you become one of the gargoyles and share the same vantage point.  Side note: when we got back to the US we re-watched this movie.  

We decided to cut our trip in Paris a couple days short to get more time to see more cities in Italy, so the next day we took an overnight train to Nice.  After traveling to Nice, Italy, and Brussels we came back to Paris a day early so that we could both get more time in Paris and ensure we would make our flight to Iceland.  This last day in the mainland of Europe we went back to the Eiffel Tower to get some more photos.  While we were taking a break on a bench in front of the Eiffel Tower, a lady came up to us speaking in English.  John advised Sarah to ignore this as she clearly was trying to get money.  She explained that she wanted us to donate money to help deaf children.  Since we were ignoring her, she got frustrated and asked us, quite rudely, if we were deaf or mentally handicapped.  Finally, she stormed away.  We laughed so hard at the irony of this.  However, we're quick learners and devised a plan for future peddlers:  we are going to just start making out.  

The last thing we wanted to do in the city of love was to buy a love lock and lock our love on a bridge.  We went to the Notre Dame area where we bought a lock and inscribed our names and our wedding date.  We then found a place to lock our love lock onto the bridge and threw the key into the river so that we could lock our unbreakable love forever.  We also kept a key that we turned into a Christmas ornament.  Unfortunately (for us), Paris decided to cut all of these locks tp prevent further people from doing the same thing.  We know, we know, there's a legitimate reason:  the weight of the locks were damaging the bridge.  Looking  back, we are proud to be one of the last couples to lock our love onto a Parisian bridge (complete with video footage to find it again).

What are the things you like to do in Paris? Do you think Parisians should let people put love locks onto bridges or do you have a more "structure friendly" alternative?  What are your favorite toppings on a crepe?

John's love of Chipotle is even international.  He just happened to "stumble" upon one in Paris..

Even gelato in Paris is romantic/a work of art!

Chasing Time Zones,

John and Sarah

Promised Starbucks Advice:

If you are lactose intolerant, or particular about what your Starbucks order is, make sure you know that order in the language of the country you are visiting.  Lactose intolerant Sarah read the menu as we waited in line and assumed that the word that looked like "skim" would mean skim milk.  She checked with the Frenchman in front of her, and he happily nodded.  She ordered her moka blanc chocoloate with "la skimma."  As she sipped it, she noticed that it tasted like cream cheese, but thought it might be the way Parisians liked their coffee.  No.  It's not.  Her stomach can attest to that.  The next day she asked another, more helpful Frenchman who explained that she ordered "heavy cream."  FYI, skim milk in a French Starbucks:  écrémé (totally counter intuitive, right?!).  You're welcome.