"Alright men, to action!" "WE SURRENDER!": A Weekend in Paris

Wow, hard to believe that it's already the third week of the quarter... only seven more to go! We were just reminded in class yesterday that midterms are already in a couple of weeks, and that after next week, we have our spring break, during which I will be headed to Barcelona with some classmates!  Super excited to get some hot weather and head to the beach!

But let's not get ahead of ourselves...

What I've been up to lately... more of class and such.  On Wednesday, we were supposed to take a field trip to Hampton Court for my Art, Architecture, and Society class (for which, tomorrow, we are headed to Stonehenge! Cool!), but a series of unfortunate events cancelled that plan.  We all met up at Waterloo Station Wednesday morning to hop the train to Hampton Court, but about a third of the way there, we were informed that the train would have to be rerouted, due to someone being hit by another train at a station down the line.  We all waited on the platform at the Wimbledon train station for a while, while Peter (the teacher for that class), tried to figure out a plan of action.  After about 45 minutes, it was decided that we head back to London, where he took us for a walk around Buckingham Palace and St. James Park instead.  The walk ended in Regents Park where, taking advantage of the gorgeous weather we've been having, most of us stayed to hang out and sit in the grass.

Lake in St. James Park

The next day, Thursday, was a crazy, busy, exciting day.  Andreina and I moved from Tricia's house to our new homestay with the Oliver family.  As I probably mentioned in an earlier post, this had been pre-arranged by Janet, the homestay coordinator for the program.  The Olivers had some travel conflicts during the first couple weeks of the quarter, so we stayed temporarily with Tricia until they could host us.  So, Thursday afternoon, we packed up all of our things, and Tricia was nice enough to drive us and our luggage up to West Harrow to the Olivers' house.  We were greeted by Jenny, who let us leave our bags in the living room, as there was still another student staying in the room that would be ours once the other girl left on Sunday morning.  She showed us around the house, introduced us to her husband, Steve, and Yoshi, a Japanese boy who is also staying with them.

We took a walk around the neighborhood, scoping out the nearest tube stop (Harrow-on-the-Hill, about a 10-minute walk from the house).  At 5, we gathered up our luggage for Paris and then headed into Central London to meet up with Peter and the rest of the class for an educational pub crawl.  We did that for about an hour and a half, then made our way to the Victoria Coach Station to catch our overnight coach to Paris.

Overnight coach: what an interesting experience.  8 hours on a coach (British word for "greyhound bus") is not pleasant.  All of us only got about 3-4 hours of sleep, and Amanda had to sit next to some creeper the whole time.  We weren't even able to stay on the bus to sleep when the bus got on the ferry, and sleeping on the ferry was out of the question, as there were kids playing in the arcade and grown men drinking and yelling every 30 seconds. Plus the captain decided it was a good plan to blast music over the loudspeakers for the 2-hour crossing.  Awesome.

 We arrived in Paris at about 8:00 AM.  After figuring out the tube map and how to get to our hotel, we found a place near the hotel to rest and have breakfast until we could check in.  We were able to check in at about 1:00 PM, and we all had a chance to freshen up before heading out to see Paris.

Our first stop was the Arc de Triomphe.

Then we headed to....

The Eiffel Tower!

Wanted to go up to the top, but the line was really long.

After a quick late lunch/early dinner, we decided to do something relaxing: a sightseeing cruise along the Seine.  The weather was perfect for it, so sunny and warm!  Exhausted from our coach ride, we all called it an early night after that.

The next day, we all split up to do our own things, as some of us wanted to see different sites.  Andreina and I headed to the Louvre, where we got to see awesome artifacts and artwork.  My favorite exhibit was definitely the Egyptian artifacts exhibit.  We also got to see some really famous works, like the Winged Victory and, of course, the Mona Lisa!

Egyptian artifacts

Musee du Louvre

After the Louvre, we had a quick lunch and then headed to Notre Dame.  To just go inside the cathedral is free of charge, but we also waited in line and paid 8 Euros to climb nearly 400 steps up to the bell towers.  For anyone planning to go to Paris, the wait and the cost is well worth it, especially when the weather is clear and beautiful like it was for us!  The views are amazing, and it's really cool to see all of the different gargoyles; no two are the same.  You also get to go into one of the bell towers to see one of the bells (I don't think the bell is actually in use anymore, but still very awesome to see).

Gargoyles at Notre Dame

View from the VERY top of Notre Dame, looking down on the Seine.

After Notre Dame, we headed to see Sacre Coeur, a basillica on a hill overlooking Paris.  The exterior and intereior were gorgeous, but we weren't allowed to take pictures inside because there was a church service going on when we went to visit.  A little weird that they still allow visitors inside while there's actual church going on.  I know I wouldn't want random people wandering through my church in the middle of the service, just to have a look.

Headed back to the hotel after that, to meet up with the other girls to get ready for dinner.  We headed to a restaurant near our hotel; we wanted to go somewhere less "touristy", and the guys at the hotel had recommended this one, and I'm sure glad they did!  We all thought our food was absolutely delicious, and had fun trying each other's.  I had a plate of gnocci baked in a cheese sauce, and then a creme brulee for dessert.  I want more!

We spent our last night in Paris the only way one can: to go see the Eiffel Tower in all its glory, lit up against the night sky.  I'll be honest: up close, during the day, I think the Eiffel Tower is actually kinda ugly, but lit up at night, it's almost a completely different structure!  The best part, though, is that, once every hour, blue lights on the tower start to sparkle for about five minutes at a time, and the effect is absolutely stunning!

Eiffel Tower, all lit up

Next morning, we had to catch our coach back to London.  What a difference a ride during the day makes!  Despite the fact that the A/C on the bus was broken, we had a fun time!  Met lots of really friendly people on the bus, including another American student who is also studying in London.  We got her number and might meet up with her sometime soon.  We didn't take a ferry this time, either; we took a train tunnel underneath the English Channel.  The best way I can describe this is that this train looked like a giant horse trailer, but for cars and busses instead of for horses.  As we had been expecting a ferry ride, we were all rather confused as to what was going on, but this train thing took half an hour to cross the Channel as opposed to 2 hours, so we didn't complain.

Pulled into London around 6:30 PM.  Hungry, Andreina and I ate at a sushi place in the rail station nearby.  It was only the second time I've ever had sushi, but I'm officially hooked!

We arrived back at the Olivers' at about 10:00 PM (taking the tube from Central London to their house takes about 45 minutes).  With our room vacant, we were able to move our stuff upstairs and get settled.  We talked with Jenny for a little bit... she is such a sweet woman.  Tricia was awesome, too, but they are both very different.  Tricia, for the most part, let us keep to ourselves, whereas Jenny is defintely more "motherly", and seems like she'll try to include us in things more (this could be due to the simple fact that Tricia lived by herself, whereas Jenny lives with her husband and also has raised 3 kids, owing to the more "family" feel here).  Either way, I can tell that this homestay will be a great one, and that the next few weeks will be just as amazing as the first few have been.

That's all for now, folks.  I'll try to get around to updating this a little more regularly.  Lots of love to all back home!