Paris: the city of love.

I am currently on the EuroStar while writing this on my way to London so I can get back to manor. Words cannot describe how amazing this trip was. Hands down this is one of the best trips I have been on. So lets start at the beginning....

(Clearly no longer on EuroTtar… kindle died on the way home.)

Tuesday night was America night in the Bistro because of the elections back home. I wasn't planning on going because we were going to leave for Paris Wednesday after class and I still hadn't packed or put away my clean laundry. Well my friend came knocking at my door and I was talked into going down for one drink. After that, I packed and headed to the computer lab to finish some last minute things so I wouldn't have to worry about it on my trip. Instead of going back to EIU in the spring, I'm going to Sonoma State University in California so I had a few more documents to send to them. Before I knew it class was over and I was on my way to Paris.

Getting to Paris involved a lot of on and off traveling. We took a bus from the Manor to Grantham Train Station and then that to London and then we hopped on the EuroStar. After that we had to take the Metro and we finally were a block away from our hotel. YES, I SAID THAT CORRECTLY. WE STAYED AT A HOTEL, NOT A HOSTEL! I was pretty excited.

Wednesday night we decided that we had to go out. Kelsie, Jasmine, Megan, and I walked to the Eiffel Tower. We had no real clue how to get there. It was dark. We spoke English. Problem? Surprisingly no. I ended up asking for directions and everyone was really nice even with the language difference. Also, a lot of people know English.

On our way to the tower we stopped at a great pizza place and it honestly was the best I ever had! We continued on our way to the tower and an hour later we made it there. Because it was late and a Wednesday night we pretty much had it to ourselves. Our first night in Paris may easily be the best day I have had in Europe all together. We attempted to talk to locals and we just sat, talked, and watched the Eiffel tower glitter (it happens every hour). Five hours later we were finally back at our hotel and all ready for bed.

Shoot the rat! Totally forgot about that. Did you know Paris had rats? We didn't! WE SAW TWO RATS OUR FIRST NIGHT HERE!!! The first one was far away so we played it off as a cat but we all knew it wasn't ...the second one ran right past us!! I thought I wad going to die!! 

Thursday and Friday were both mostly spent in museums, which was amazing!! We were able to buy a two day pass that allowed us into a bunch of museums and we got to cut the lines which honestly saved us hours. If you went to four museums you already bought back the pass. By Thursday night we were three euros short of paying for the pass. That was only day one of museums too!!

As we all know I kinda really love art...AHH I THOUGHT I WAS GOING TO EXPLODE!! I was able to see sculptures by Michelangelo and de Vinci's Mona Lisa at the Louvre. We went to the Louvre both days and I'm pretty sure we still missed things there. It is bigger then big. By the end of the first day I thought my feet were going to fall off. The M'O was another amazing place. I saw paintings by Monet and so many more artists that I'm in love with. We also went to the Centre Pompidou. Needles to say, I loved the art. 

Friday night we did a wine tasting. I'm not huge on wine, but since we where in Paris I had too :) It was so much fun! And I learned a lot about wine. Our wine tasting guide was so funny. It was six Harlaxton students and a lot other Americans and an Australian couple. I did find out I like white wine more than red wine. Ugh going back to America and being underage for three months will be annoying. It will be nice to turn 21 in California.... on Easter Sunday. Haha.

After the wine tasting we got dinner and then went to another art museum. After that we went back to the hotel, I took a nice hot bath and called it a night. Paris is amazing but very exhausting!

Saturday was our free day. We had nothing planned but we knew there was a lot of Paris still to see. Saturday of course was a great day. My friends and I were able to sleep in a little, which was amazing! We got our great breakfast from our hotel and were on our way to walking around Paris. Saturday was a lot of walking and sight seeing. We went to the shopping part of Paris…. which none of us could buy anything, but it was great seeing everything! I could of lived off of crepes they are so good!! I wish I go be back at Paris so I could eat all the great food. It did rain on Saturday, but it was our last day so it could have been worse. I had on flats that had lace on the side…. needless to say I could not feel my feet by the end of the day! Jasmine and I had to go to the Eiffel Tower one more time, so we did that on Saturday night after getting great pasta for dinner. The Eiffel Tower is really fun to hang around. We got crepes (again) and just sat and talked, it was a great time. However, we were wet, cold and tired. Oh…and we had an hour and a half walk back to the hotel. We grabbed some hot chocolate and made the walk back. Paris is such an amazing city because even just walking around is so much fun.

It’s now Tuesday and I have three weeks left of school. I can’t believe that my time in the UK is almost up. I really miss home, and my friends. I miss long nights at EIU doing stupid things with my best friends, but this semester at Harlaxton has been life changing. I have so much schoolwork to do this week, and then on top of that I have Sonoma things to do for next semester. It’s pretty stressful, but I wouldn’t trade this for anything. I can’t wait to see everyone over winter break, but I will never be ready to say good-bye to Harlaxton and all the memories that have taken place here.