Sight-Seeing in Paris

As a native Southern Californian, I can definitely appreciate the wonders of public transportation found throughout most of Europe. Anna and I have become experts at navigating lengthy subway passages, confusing bus schedules, and rows of railway platforms. Although the subway systems in cities like London and Paris do add more time to your travels than you might imagine, overall, they are quite efficient and save you miles of walking. Southern California would benefit greatly by having such a system in place. Tonight, however, we experienced first-hand the not-so-wondrous aspects of mass transit. On our way to a lovely dinner at the apartment of some friends of Anna's, we took a subway line out to an area of Paris we hadn't yet visited. We boarded the subway that would take us to our destination, and when we first got on, it was a little crowded, but we found a place to stand near the front. At the next stop, 10 more people got into our car. Another stop, 10 - 15 more people squeezed in. By now, we were shoved to the back of this little area of our car, and I was convinced (understandably) that no more bodies could possibly be packed into this space. At best, about 20 people can fit rather uncomfortably into the car; presently, there were about 40. The subway train stopped again, and to my horror, 10 more people got on. I have no idea where and how they all fit in; all I know is that my face became very familiar with the feel of the glass window at the back of that car. The best part, of course, was the barrage of smells that accompanied this pleasant experience. I won't go into detail; suffice it to say that if taking regular showers is a sign of the snobbery of the American people, I will gladly remain a snob for the rest of my days. I was never so glad to get out into the fresh, cool air of night as I was this evening (and getting out of that subway car was an experience in itself). It was pointed out to me that the locals do realize there is a limit to just how many bodies can be packed into a single space, evidenced by the fact that no one else attempted to squeeze into our car at subsequent subway stops. But when arms and legs are dangling out of windows and preventing the subway train door from fully closing, I imagine that those things alone would cause anyone to think twice about plunging in . . .

Fortunately, we are not spending all of our time in Paris riding around on the subways; we do occasionally come up for air and culture. Paris has plenty of both, and we've been enjoying ourselves tremendously. For the last few days, however, we've worked hard for our enjoyment. We've been doing some hard-core sightseeing here in Paris; we bought a museum pass for 45 euros that covers the majority of the important museums and sights. It's a good deal, but the catch is that you have only four consecutive days to see them all. So you have to be prepared to really focus for those four days (not much time for lingering in little French cafés. . .). We spent our first day at the Louvre (a must if you're in Paris); day two was spent at Versailles (also a must; the grounds at Versailles are absolutely gorgeous.) Day three, however, was really the killer. We decided to see the major churches and Cathedrals of the old city area; these include Notre Dame and Saint Chappelle. Notre Dame is breathtakingly beautiful; I am a huge fan of the Gothic style of architecture. Saint Chappelle is also lovely - it was built for Saint Louis (King Louis IX - the only king to ever become a saint), and has walls made completely of stained glass. So far, so good. But a little later in the day, we decided to go up to the tower of Notre Dame, seeing as this was covered by our pass. To get there, you walk up an amazing number of stairs (not surprisingly). Fine, there is a great view of the city and you can see the belltower made famous by Victor Hugo, so it's worth the physical exertion, despite already being tired from intense museum-going the previous two days. Afterwards, we headed over to Champs-Elyseés, a rich, ritzy boulevard that ends with the Arc d' Triomphe. We decided to see the Arc first, then stroll leisurely down the boulevard. We walked quickly to the other end of the boulevard to get to the Arc, took several minutes figuring out how exactly to get to it (even though we could see it directly in front of us, things are not clearly marked here, so discovering that we had to go underground to reach the Arc instead of crossing the street in front of us took some real effort), and finally reached the entrance to . . . an amazing number of stairs that would take us to the top! We were completely exhausted at this point, and the sight of a perfectly functional elevator right next to the stairs with only a thin strip of red tape signifying its unavailability was almost more than we could take. But, we were determined to get full use out of our museum pass, so we put our heads down and charged up those stairs. It was a circular staircase that seemed to go on forever - Anna kept looking up and laughing, then kindly telling me not to look up so as not to be discouraged (and of course I wasn't at all discouraged by her disheartened laughter. . .). Somehow, some way, we did make it to the top, with me laughing rather hysterically by then from the lack of oxygen to my brain. There was again another incredible view of the city, and I guess that walking up an inordinate amount of stairs all in one day will actually save us from having to spend money to go to the top of the Eiffel Tower, since we've essentially seen that same view twice now. Afterwards, we found a Haagen Daaz somewhere along the Champs Elyseés, and sat eating the best ice cream I've ever tasted and contentedly watching the world go by. We spent our final museum pass day at a less frenzied pace, visiting the Rodin museum, Napoleon's tomb and Army museum (yes, I took lots of pictures here for all you history buffs, as well as pictures of the World War II exhibit - several floors of this), and the Orsay museum (a little overrated, unless you really love Impressionism and everything that comes after that period in art history). We collapsed in a Starbucks at the end of the day (hard to justify spending at least 4 euros for a thimble-sized cup of coffee in French cafés, so we have to switch it up and get more bang for our euro at Starbucks once in awhile), and vowed not to walk up any more stairs. At least not until we got back to our room at the hostel, located on the (wait for it) fourth floor, which is really the fifth floor. All I can say is we better have really strong legs by the end of this trip. . .