I Heart Paris!

First let me say, I love Paris. If there were anywhere in the world I would love to live it would be Paris. I have enjoyed every trip to France I've taken. This trip was a bit a whirlwind and full of surprises. It was only supposed to be a day trip from London. We caught the train in Waterloo Station at 5:00 a.m., we went under the Channel and arrived in Paris at 9:00 am. It was so cold when we got there. I didn't bring a jacket because I thought we were only going to be there a few hours. We hopped on the subway at the train station. Paris probably has the best public transit system in the world. The subway is so easy to take and you can get virtually anywhere.

So we headed down to the banks of the Seine River to St. Chapelle Cathedral. It's smaller and not as well known as Notre Dame but it's beautiful. The stained glass windows are quite impressive. The walls were pretty much made up of windows and they were huge. The rose windows at the either end of the cathedral were beautiful. (My picture isn't so good here, I didn't get the lighting right- see me?)The cathedral was so much smaller than what it appeared to be on the outside. It had two levels to it as well.

We then walked down to Notre Dame Cathedral after that. Notre Dame Cathedral, as always, was beautiful. So many people visit the Cathedral every day. This trip we were fairly lucky since we got there so early. We did not have to wait in a long line to get inside. Here I am with the cathedral in the back ground.


The sun finally came out and started to warm everything up. It was turning out to be a lovely day. It looks like a cold winter day but it was actually a nice spring day. It didn't rain the rest of the day.

This is a picture of an alley of the Left Bank of the Seine. I just like it. We walked down the Left Bank to the Musée d'Orsay.

Here are some of the places we got to visit while we were in Paris:

The Musée d'Orsay. I loved this museum! It houses a vast French impressionist collection (mostly from 1848 to 1914). Some of Monet's and Renior's most famous works are there. The Orsay was originally a train station. This is a must see for anyone going to Paris, but it's closed on Mondays. I only this because on my first trip to Paris it was closed the day I wanted to go. I was very excited to see the Orsay on this trip. I love museums, it must be that history thing.

From the Orsay we took the subway down to the Arc de Triomphe. We got on the SARA train to get to the Arc.
This was so much better than I thought it would be. There is a viewing deck on the top of the Arc. I could see all over Paris from here. Here are a few pictures : The view down Champs-Elysees was amazing.

After we were finished with the Arc, we headed to the Eiffel Tower. I saw it on my first trip to Paris but it is always so exciting to see. I took quite a few pictures of the tower:

















The line for elevators to the top was about three hours. We still wanted to see the Louvre Museum so we decided to forgo the trip to the top.

The Louvre is amazing. I could spend a month there and still not see everything. I really enjoy the Louvre and it is a must see in Paris too, but I like the art in the Orsay a little bit more.
By the time we saw the Mona Lisa and checked out some of the other art it was time for us to leave Paris. We got on the subway and headed back to the train station when we arrived we saw this:There were no trains going to London from anywhere in Europe. A fire broke out near the Waterloo Station in London and all rail traffic was shut down. We were stranded in Paris with no clothes, no hotel, and no idea of how we were going to get back to London! Luckily, after searching the nearby hotels, which we learned were all booked, we decided to try the hotel we stayed in on our previous trip. We were so happy to be back at our cute little Parisian hotel, Hotel Astor Saint Honore. We were very tired by the time we arrived though. We weren't quite sure what we were going to do the next day.