Where we have adventures and fun in Disneyland Paris and Paris! - Completed

We had macrons, that's it. I'm not a foodie at all and we didn't want to waste time eating dinner at somewhere that would take forever. Neither of us drink much either. The food in the parks wasn't good and I don't eat McD's at home, but food is fuel to me so it did its job. Not to say I don't enjoy food but there are plenty of days where there's nothing I want to eat and would rather not eat than figure out what to eat. I also have the same thing for breakfast almost everyday which would drive most people nuts.

ETA - The food at DLP is well known for not being good and being expensive both qs and ts. We weren't about to pay over 60 euro for a buffet without characters with questionable food. Most qs places have for different entree options and then sides.

You sound like me! I can eat the same thing (and often do) day after day. Hello Oikos yogurt cup every morning :) I know others would just be appalled by that but I'm not a foodie, and fairly easy to please. I don't love McD's but on vacation, like you, yeah, it would be fine. We rarely do TS on our Disney trips cause my family is not willing to sacrifice park time for having a meal. The quicker the better for us!
 
I'm really enjoying your report, afan! I particularly appreciate that you are well-versed in the US parks and can compare the experience. For example, it's interesting that few rides end in a gift shop. I wonder if I've just becomed accustomed to that over the years?

I'm not sure if it's just that we're used to being dumped into a gift shop after a ride or it's just a US thing. I haven't been to/read anything about them at the Asia parks to know how they do it other than it's hard to find Hong Kong Disney stuff like it is Paris. We did find it odd to just be done and not have a shop. There also seems to just be less shops overall. I've read several times that people in Paris don't wear ears and Disney clothes like they do in the US, so that could be part of it, but it didn't seem like we saw any less than at WDW when compared in percentage. There were plenty of ears and Disney clothes or disbounding throughout our trip.

You sound like me! I can eat the same thing (and often do) day after day. Hello Oikos yogurt cup every morning :) I know others would just be appalled by that but I'm not a foodie, and fairly easy to please. I don't love McD's but on vacation, like you, yeah, it would be fine. We rarely do TS on our Disney trips cause my family is not willing to sacrifice park time for having a meal. The quicker the better for us!

Cheerios for breakfast and PB&J for lunch with chips unless I have leftovers. It's easier and it's what I like. I don't need that much variety and if I do I get it at dinner. I'll scramble the eggs instead of frying :rotfl: I'll do ts at WDW but if there for a week it's not taking away and is a good way to get breakfast and meet characters. And always Via Napoli for pizza.
 
I'm working on Day 5 and will have it up today. It's got a lot of pictures since it's the last morning in DLP and our first day in Paris. Lots of fun and funny stuff going on.
 
Day 5: Where we say goodbye to Disney and hello to Paris (Thursday, May 24)

We got up a bit earlier this morning since we needed to take our luggage to bag check at the front of the hotel before our last breakfast in the lounge. After breakfast we checked out at the Golden Forest desk and had our cards charged.

Our last morning would be spent at Disneyland Park and our first stop was Peter Pan after taking a few more castle pics. Thankfully this morning it had opened on time and there wasn’t really a line. We wanted one last trip to Neverland so we can compare it in November to WDW.

We noticed along main street that they’d refreshed the flowers overnight and they were looking much better.

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Next we headed to Discoveryland so my friend could ride Hyperspace Mountain again. I didn’t want to ride it again so I sat and people watched.

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We headed back through the castle and I rode the carousel while we waiting for 10am. It’s always fun to be a kid again and ride the merry go round.

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My horse –

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Day 5 continued - https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...-paris-and-paris.3686192/page-3#post-59341201
 
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Day 5 Part 2 -

We took a few more photo op photos while waiting for the rest of the park to open. We started a trend for at least a minute as people used the Dumbo one after us and a parent tried to get the kids to stand by the Small World one.

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Ok so this one is really a construction wall :rotfl2:

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At 10am we could finally do Le Curuious Labryth which is an Alice in Wonderland themed maze that leads to the Queen of Hearts castle. You can climb to the top of the castle which has some nice views of Fantasyland.

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You can see the Character In Flight balloon at Disney Village in the background. It's at the far part of the village closest to Hotel New York.

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Day 5 continued - https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...-paris-and-paris.3686192/page-3#post-59341217
 
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Day 5 Part 3 - This part is text heavy because it includes our travel from DLP to Paris.

We then walked through Adventureland to Frontierland for one last ride on Big Thunder Mountain of course. We used our last club fp though even the standby line was short this early, and got the first row. It was fun but the middle is better.

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We went into one last gift shop to get the last item I wanted to pick up and then headed back to Sequoia to get our bags and take the bus back to the parks/village/train station. We had asked which stop on the RER A we needed to go to when we were checking out and she gave us a map and said to take the train to the Auber station.

Inside the train station at Disney Village there are two different train sections, there’s the RER that goes into Paris and other areas then there’s another section that goes to places further out like Nice. We didn’t realize this at first. You want the section that’s closet to the Village not the resort bus stop. Once we had this part sorted out we got in line to get our tickets and bought them from the machine. We didn't have a problem using a US chip card rather than a true chip and pin card in the machine or anywhere.

We put our tickets in the turnstile, it spit it out and we each went through. Our bags fit well through these turnstiles but they won’t fit this well later. We got on the train and little did we know the person helping us was a well dressed homeless man who wanted money for the help. He handed out cards in English explaining it and then came back through collecting the cards and money. We didn’t give him money, I told him I didn’t have cash. I got told off in French but I’ve no idea what he said. It’s quite the scam and it seemed everyone else in our car gave him cash. It’s a good thing to be aware but we hadn’t read about anything like this so while we knew to be care of pick pockets and scammers trying to hand you stuff you “dropped” this was a new one.

There were a couple of buskers that came on at one station and played and then walked through asking for cash and then got off a stop or two later. Overall this was the most active, for lack of a better word, train we were on for the rest of our trip.

The ride into the city was about 45 minutes maybe an hour, I didn’t really look at my watch since I was looking at things outside the windows. We got off at the Auber station and looked at the sorte (exit) signs. We knew we needed to be close to the opera house so we followed the signs to there. Little did we know, until we got above ground, that the Auber RER station is connected to the Opera metro station. So while above ground the Auber station is a 10-15 minute walk from our hotel, underground it was a short walk to the Opera station.

This is where things got funny, at least after it was done we got a good laugh about it. We ran our tickets through the turnstile again and I went through turning my suitcase sideways so it would fit through because these turnstiles were more narrow than the one’s at DLP. I have 4 wheels so it was easy to do. My friend has 2 wheels and kept it the normal way which made it get stuck. She got through the turnstile but there was also this little door thing after the turnstile that you have to go through. Little did we know that if you don’t exit fast enough or hold it open that it will lock and trap you between the turnstile and the door. She tried to squeeze through but couldn’t fit. Thankfully a nice lady that spoke English came up behind her and realized what was going on and used her pass to get the whole thing to unlock and she was able to get past the door and they got her suitcase shoved through. It definitely set us in a panic because there were no workers around and no one seemed to care and we weren’t sure what to do. Looking back on it it’s absolutely hilarious because she got stuck in the turnstile. We learned to hold the door open and go through them quickly after that even without our suitcases.

Then there were the stairs. I’m sure there was an elevator somewhere but we never saw one. Luckily this was a station that didn’t have a ton of stairs but we still had to drag the suitcases up the stairs. When we got up to the top we saw the opera house and after looking at google realized that our hotel was a 3 minute walk down the street. The intersection, like many in Paris, had several streets connecting through it, so once we weaved around to the correct street we made the short walk down the Rue de la Paix to the Park Hyatt Vendome to check in.

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Day 5 continued - https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...-paris-and-paris.3686192/page-3#post-59341217
 
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Day 5 Part 4 -

The bellmen took our bags when we walked in and we went to check in. Our room wasn’t ready but they would email when it was, since we didn’t have access to text/calls. This was one of the things that the pocket wifi really helped with. It was great having access to the internet to look things up, find directions or just post a photo to facebook. I also used it to keep up a little bit with the Disboards. One of the main reasons we got it was because DLP doesn’t have wifi throughout the parks yet and we wanted to be able to look up wait times in the app and other things without having to find wifi. Some of the museums and places we ate had wifi so you could get by without it.

We got directions to Hotel Invalides/the army museum and walked their through Place de Concorde. It was about a 20 minute walk but it would have been easy to take the metro.

Superman says ‘Don’t Walk’

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Our first sighting!

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French bunnies!

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I liked that throughout the city they used scrims like Disney so you know what you should be seeing.

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We had lunch in the museum café which was pretty good. They had sandwiches, salad and pasta, more traditional French lunch offerings. I got a ham and cheese sandwich that was heated in a press.

Day 5 continued - https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...-paris-and-paris.3686192/page-3#post-59341220
 
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Day 5 Part 5 -

Our first stop after lunch was to see Napoleon’s tomb. We found out later from our tour guide at the Eiffel Tower that there are 7 caskets that make up the tomb, like Russian nesting dolls, and they don’t even know if he’s actually in the tomb or if anyone is. It was a simple tomb in an ornate location.

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We also toured through the WWI and WWII section which was interesting to see how they display the wars. There were a lot of uniforms from various countries that we hadn’t seen anywhere here, like from Russia and Algeria. There was also a section about the marching band and having played clarinet for several years in school it was interesting to see an old version without as many keys.

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We also looked at a bunch of old swords and riffles but they started to look the same. There were also some ornate saddles and other horse dressings that were impressive. Not all of the descriptions throughout the parts of the museum we saw were in English, but there was a fair amount that we could read about if we wanted to.

When we had seen all that we wanted to and were deciding what to do next I saw I had an email that I room was ready so we headed back to the hotel. We decided to take the metro back to the Opera station and bought our 3 day pass from a ticket window. I felt we got a good value from the ticket though I didn’t add things up but we used the metro a lot to get around because it was easy, clean but not always fresh smelling and we didn’t have any problems over the 3 days.

Day 5 continued - https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...-paris-and-paris.3686192/page-3#post-59341226
 
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Day 5 Part 6 -

Back at the hotel we went to the reception desk and Louis got us checked in and escorted us up to the room. When we got to the room I saw that it was a double and said we’d booked a twin room. He left us in the room to go check on it. Our luggage came up a couple minutes later and Louis was back a couple minutes later. I don’t think we waited more than 10 minutes. Louis explained that when they had upgraded our room that morning they didn’t see that we had booked a twin room. He was able to move us to a twin room that was still an upgrade and had been recently renovated. Best I can tell from the room is the upgrade may have given us a larger space and a courtyard view. The street view wouldn’t have been that interesting in their location. (Side note, I have a Hyatt card that gives me low level status but that’s where the upgrade came from. We also stayed using free nights and points). Louis took us to our new room which was made up as a king but they would separate it at turndown. It was nice getting to see it as a king bed though.

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The room was nice with a large bedroom and closet area. I especially liked the closet because it kept stuff from exploding all over the room. The craziest thing to me was the sink in the shower but I did like the mirror that was above it. The middle part of the mirror stays visible while the rest of it would steam up during a shower.

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The view was also nice and we enjoyed being able to open the windows, especially at night before bed. The windows had black out shades as well.

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The only downside to our room was despite having the a/c or fan, I’m still not convinced it was anything more than a fan, at 61 degrees, the room never got that cool and it was warm sleeping. This hotel, like the Sequoia Lodge, have changed to the duvet over the comforter and no sheet which makes it hard to toss blankets if you are hot. I ended up using just my fleece blanket I use on the plane to sleep a couple of nights. Totally the opposite of Sequoia where the a/c worked so well I had my fleece on top of the comforter.

After we’d unpacked and relaxed a bit we went down to the concierge to figure out dinner. We found out we wanted to eat too early for Paris, it was a bit before 6, but we had tickets for the Eiffel Tower at 8 and were hungry then. Arthur was great in calling a couple of pizza places, which was what we wanted to eat, to see if they were open before sending us to the one that was. We ate at Pizza Pino, which is a chain, we saw a couple others throughout the city, but it was good. I had a good cheese pizza and my friend had one with ground beef and a fried egg on top that she enjoyed. We had to use google translate again because I couldn’t remember how to ask for the check and our waiter didn’t speak English. I knew from my research that we had to ask for it though or we might be there forever :hyper:

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We noticed that there was a cute 50’s diner next door and decided we’d have dinner there the next night if we hadn’t found somewhere else to eat. We also noticed the Hippopotamus restaurant which we’d seen at Val d’ Europe and that people were eating already so we had that as an option as well. While my friend is a way more adventurous eater that I am, we’re not foodies and I’m about as far from one as you can get. I enjoy food but it’s just fuel to keep me going so while I want it to taste good I don’t need it to be fancy and complicated.

Day 5 continued - https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...-paris-and-paris.3686192/page-3#post-59341235
 
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Day 5 Part 7 - I apologize in advance for what may be too many pictures of and from the Eiffel Tower (but I don't think it is).

After dinner we walked back to the Opera metro stop and took it to the Eiffel Tower. There aren’t any stops super close so we went to the closest that we didn’t have to change trains. It was a 10-15 minute walk I think. There was so much to look at it’s hard to judge. They were also doing renovations at the base of the tower so it wasn’t as easy or well lit getting in and out as it normally would be. It would have been nice if their site had included this information when I purchased our tickets but there wasn’t any.

I had bought our tickets online as soon as I saw them available. Like we are often used to doing for WDW things, I started stalking the site when I thought it was about time for them to be released and got the tickets for 8pm. Sunset wasn’t until after 10 and we had wanted to see that and the tower lit up and this gave us enough time to do it.

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I thought the birds were funny, it looked like they were getting ready for their nightly meeting J

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We were able to bypass the line of people buying tickets, and by this point you could no longer buy tickets to the top. I definitely recommend buying your tickets directly from them when they become available or booking a tour that includes it because it will save you a lot of time. Our only wait was for the next elevator. We discovered when waiting for the elevator that there was a tour guide that was part of our ticket which was a nice surprise. Dreis was very informative explaining about the elevator and the tower both on the way up and once we got to the top. He pointed out landmarks and gave some of their history.

There used to be a person where the statue is, working the elevator.

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Though there is still an inside operator.

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Day 5 continued - https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...-paris-and-paris.3686192/page-3#post-59341252
 
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Day 5 Part 8 -

Once he was done we walked up to the 2nd floor a the top to check out the view from a bit higher up. We gook a lot of pictures and then sat and relaxed for a bit to wait for the first light show that happened at 10. It was twilight so it wasn’t totally dark but it was neat getting to see the show from the tower. Once it was done we knew we had an hour so we went to the gift shop and made some purchases and then waited for the elevator so we could go down to the 100 level. There’s a glass floor here along with the restaurant. It was neat being able to look up into the tower but the glass floor wasn’t that exciting. It’s not as high off the ground as the one in the CN Tower in Toronto,, but I also don’t see the fascination or terror that some people do with them. But I wouldn’t do the one at the Grand Canyon, it just doesn’t seem as safe.

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We didn’t stay on this level long since there was a line for the elevator back down and we were on a mission to be down before 11pm. Waiting for the elevator here is where I got annoyed because while there was a line people also felt like they were more important and would push or sneak through to get to the front so it took a little longer to get down than it should have. However we did make it to the bottom in time for the light show. It’s really cool to see but once you’ve seen the first few seconds it seems like you’ve seen the entire 5 minutes.

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We made our way back to the metro, a longer walk than getting there because of the construction. We couldn’t figure out how to get to the road we wanted to be on and ended up going a different way. I never felt unsafe walking or taking the metro this late though.

Day 6 - https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...-paris-and-paris.3686192/page-3#post-59364319
 
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Day 4 Part 3 -

After lunch we caught a showing of the 25th Anniversary show. There’s only two per day now since the anniversary is over a year old. It was cute...

That's an eclectic mix of characters they have there in the show. I wonder how they decided who's in it? From Winnie the Pooh to Stich and Chip n Dale with Toy story. I might have to look up what the 'theme' was they were going for there.

Day 5 Part 3 -
This is where things got funny, at least after it was done we got a good laugh about it. We ran our tickets through the turnstile again and I went through turning my suitcase sideways so it would fit through because these turnstiles were more narrow than the one’s at DLP. I have 4 wheels so it was easy to do. My friend has 2 wheels and kept it the normal way which made it get stuck. She got through the turnstile but there was also this little door thing after the turnstile that you have to go through. Little did we know that if you don’t exit fast enough or hold it open that it will lock and trap you between the turnstile and the door. She tried to squeeze through but couldn’t fit. Thankfully a nice lady that spoke English came up behind her and realized what was going on and used her pass to get the whole thing to unlock and she was able to get past the door and they got her suitcase shoved through. It definitely set us in a panic because there were no workers around and no one seemed to care and we weren’t sure what to do. Looking back on it it’s absolutely hilarious because she got stuck in the turnstile. We learned to hold the door open and go through them quickly after that even without our suitcases.

Oh my gosh that is something that would totally happen to us! We've had a number of train issues like this, so much so I get the side eye if I mention public transit + suitcases! You giggle later, but so not funny at the time. Glad that worked out quickly :)

Day 5 Part 4 -
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Superman says ‘Don’t Walk’

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Oh, we totally need Superman in the states. I'd listen to him. Maybe I wouldn't have so many folks jumping out at my car if it was Superman telling us to not walk :)

Day 5 Part 6 -

The room was nice with a large bedroom and closet area. I especially liked the closet because it kept stuff from exploding all over the room. The craziest thing to me was the sink in the shower but I did like the mirror that was above it. The middle part of the mirror stays visible while the rest of it would steam up during a shower.
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So that's just interesting. At first when I read it I thought it was like the old ships where the bathroom in the cabin was just one big wet area and the sink was in the shower to make the plumbing easy. Then I see that you have two sinks in the room? The normal one and one in the shower? I guess for men shaving? I would never think of that. Beautiful room still, with a bathtub and that big closet and everything.

Day 5 Part 7 - ….

I had bought our tickets online as soon as I saw them available. Like we are often used to doing for WDW things, I started stalking the site when I thought it was about time for them to be released and got the tickets for 8pm. Sunset wasn’t until after 10 and we had wanted to see that and the tower lit up and this gave us enough time to do it.



We were able to bypass the line of people buying tickets, and by this point you could no longer buy tickets to the top. I definitely recommend buying your tickets directly from them when they become available or booking a tour that includes it because it will save you a lot of time. Our only wait was for the next elevator. We discovered when waiting for the elevator that there was a tour guide that was part of our ticket which was a nice surprise. Dreis was very informative explaining about the elevator and the tower both on the way up and once we got to the top. He pointed out landmarks and gave some of their history.

And I'm storing these tidbits for later. Very helpful. Your pics were great pre, during and post sunset so we need to see that for ourselves. :)
 
That's an eclectic mix of characters they have there in the show. I wonder how they decided who's in it? From Winnie the Pooh to Stich and Chip n Dale with Toy story. I might have to look up what the 'theme' was they were going for there.

It was themed to the lands in the park. So Woody, Jessie and the Jungle Book guys were Frontierland. Peter Pan etc was Adventureland. Buzz and Stitch were Discoveryland but really I think it was just to include Stitch and so Buzz wasn't by himself since the only other option would have been Star Wars. Alice etc with Pooh were Fantasyland. A lot of the characters are only in those lands for meet & greets not for a ride and Stitch doesn't have anything in Disneyland just the Studios and no meet which was surprising.

So that's just interesting. At first when I read it I thought it was like the old ships where the bathroom in the cabin was just one big wet area and the sink was in the shower to make the plumbing easy. Then I see that you have two sinks in the room? The normal one and one in the shower? I guess for men shaving? I would never think of that. Beautiful room still, with a bathtub and that big closet and everything.

:rotfl2:I hadn't thought about it that way when I posted about the sink. I imagine it's for guys shaving. The mirror was helpful to have though.

And I'm storing these tidbits for later. Very helpful. Your pics were great pre, during and post sunset so we need to see that for ourselves. :)

It's a fun trip to do and we lucked out with great weather. I'll get some more posted this weekend. It's all written but figuring out which pictures and how many is the tricky part.
 
Day 6: Where we take a shower outside :rotfl2: (Friday, May 25)

No longer at Disney and not having a breakfast to get to we finally got to sleep in a bit which was nice after the late night. Our first stop of the day was Notre Dame which had a short line to get in. We stayed on the bottom though I’m pretty sure we could have climbed to the top if we’d wanted. It was a beautiful cathedral with a lot of different areas you could pray in with some nice art and stained glass.

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We also used our museum pass to go to the archaeological crypt that had remnants of old buildings they’d found while renovating the cathedral I think. They went back several hundred years.

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We walked along the Seine to get to the metro stop which was a great way to see things. You can walk from Notre Dame to the Louvre but with all the walking we’d been doing and would be doing we wanted to save our feet.

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Day 6 Continued - https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...-paris-and-paris.3686192/page-3#post-59364322
 
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Day 6 Part 2 -

The line to get into the Louvre was short, even the one to buy tickets, though we used our museum pass again. With the short lines I was surprised at how crowded the museum was inside and can only imagine what it’s like if you’re there when it’s a busier time. We went this week because I knew it was just prior to school breaks for the UK and France, it turned out to be a great week to go and gave us Memorial Day as a recovery day. The Louvre seems to go on for days.

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I still don’t understand why they put the glass pyramid in front since the building is already impressive looking, but it does seem to be one of the first things people ask if you saw so I guess it’s doing its job.

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Day 6 Continued - https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...-paris-and-paris.3686192/page-3#post-59364328
 
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Day 6 Part 3 -

We saw the French crown jewels which were gorgeous and some other important French artwork like a portrait of Louis XIV. We of course saw the Mona Lisa, which is the main reason we are there. This one museum of artwork will satisfy me for the next 2-3 years. It’s pretty but it all starts to look the same and just isn’t my thing. Though I did like the statues because they differ more than the paintings and it always amazes me how they get the draping on the clothes to look so good.

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So many people…

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After a stop at the gift shop to get the one souvenir my mom asked for, a magnet with the Mona Lisa, we looked for the exit. Don’t worry I got her more than just the magnet ;)

We found the exit took us into a mall which seemed really weird for an art museum of that type to exit you into a mall. However it came in handy since we found the food court. Again with the choices what they were and not wanting Chinese, Japanese or a sandwich we ended up at McD’s again. These two meals is probably how many times I’ve eaten there at home in the past 2 years. I had a chicken sandwich this time which was pretty good, they’ve upped their game and made the breading more flavorful.

Day 6 Continued - https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...-paris-and-paris.3686192/page-3#post-59364334
 
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Day 6 Part 4 -

There weren’t any shops we wanted to stop in so we found our way outside to a pedestrian bridge that goes across the Seine. Our destination was a statue on the other side. What we realized upon getting to the bridge was that it’s the one that has all the locks on it. It was neat to see since it hadn’t been on our radar of things to see. The bridge also had great views.

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The statue we were looking for was right at the end of the bridge. It’s of Thomas Jefferson for the time he spent there as ambassador and his work with democracy. There’s also a park somewhere that has something to do with him and if I remember correctly has a statue of Washington, but the park wasn’t anywhere near the places we were going. TJ will pop up again later in the day.

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Back across the bridge we walked through the Tuilerie Gardens that is a large park with a fountain the people were sitting around enjoying the weather to the Place de Concorde that is a large plaza that separates the gardens from the Champs Elysees. The large plaza used to have a guillotine and is where King Louis XVI, Marie Antionette amongst others were beheaded.

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The obelisk in the center of the plaza is over 3,500 years old and came from Egypt.

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Day 6 Continued - https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...-paris-and-paris.3686192/page-3#post-59364349
 
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Day 6 Part 5 -

From there we walked up the Champs Elysees

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and went in a few shops along the way including the Disney store. We didn’t buy anything though.

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The other Jefferson thing I wanted to see was along this street. Where the Zara is now was where his residence was when he lived as an ambassador in Paris. It’s interesting how things have changed since it used to be residences on the same street in the middle of the city. Also, if you haven’t read America’s First Daughter about Patsy Jefferson I highly recommend it along with their second book My Dear Hamilton. I’ve also read their book about Eliza Schuyler Hamilton and it’s as good as their first book. They are both history novelizations.

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We reached our destination at the end of the street, the Arc de Triomphe. The line wasn’t too long and we again used our museum pass. A warning that I’d wished we’d had, as soon as you have your ticket scanned you start up the stairs to the top so be prepared. We weren’t expecting the stairs to start to quickly. It’s also spiral staircases up and down which while it didn’t cause me to get dizzy going up it did mess with my mind a bit. On the way down I put my hand up to my left eye so I couldn’t see the spiral going down which helped.

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So happy, if I only knew what was going to happen…

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Day 6 Continued - https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...-paris-and-paris.3686192/page-3#post-59364361
 
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Day 6 Part 6 -

When you get to the top of these stairs you aren’t really at the top yet but at an indoor level that has a gift shop, a small exhibit and there was something showing on a tv in French. There’s some seating but not a ton. There’s a much shorter and regular stair case you use to get to the top and then you are out in the open. It has great views and was nice to be able to see the Eiffel tower amongst everything.

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When it started to rain we all headed for the stairs to go down a level. Had we only known what would happen next we would have waited here for the next 20 minutes or so but we didn’t so we headed down the stairs.

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When we got to the bottom there was a downpour and everyone was along the wall under the arch. No worries, we can wait out the rain storm here with everyone else. It was raining too hard for the one small umbrella we had to do any good. :umbrella:

Then the wind shifted and we all got drenched. I’ve always joked when it’s pouring outside, especially during thunderstorms when I lived in NC, that you could grab your shampoo and take a shower outside. Well guess what, you can and you only need the wind to help!

It was bad, the water was streaming down my face and I almost started hyperventilating because my brain said ‘oh no water on the face and nose, we’re drowning’ which caused a small panic but once I got the water wiped off my face I was ok. By this point we were all trying to shove our way back inside the tiny room at the bottom of the spiral staircase and up them. Eventually the people coming down stopped trying to come down and we were able to go up a few steps and everyone got inside. I had a lot of water to wring out of my hair and the skirt of my dress. There was a couple that had made their way down the stairs past people and wanted everyone crammed at the bottom to move because they had an umbrella and had to get it. I turned to the guy and said you’re umbrella won’t help, do you see what the wind did?

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Once it had mostly stopped raining we all finally left, with rust on my face and arm, though I wouldn’t know that until later, and my jean jacket. We decided we weren’t going to mess with the metro that we wanted a taxi back to the hotel so we went in search of a taxi stand. It was a quick trip back to the hotel and by then we were laughing about what happened. I’m sure we were a sight to see when we got back to the hotel.

I showered to warm up and clean up and felt much better once I was dry again. No more joking about taking showers outside either :rotfl:

Day 6 Continued - https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...-paris-and-paris.3686192/page-3#post-59364371
 
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Day 6 Part 7 -

We stopped at the concierge desk to find out where to get macrons because we had missed seeing the place Dreis had suggested along the Champs Elysees at the tower the night before. With directions on where to go we headed out to explore more of the neighborhood and find some dinner. We came along this shop that uses doxies like Izod uses alligators which make me excited until I looked at their prices. Over 100 euros for a tshirt is crazy. So I settled for a picture of their sign.

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We found the macron shop, Laduree, and later that night when looking at their other locations realized that was the place Dreis has recommended so we succeeded after all. We each got three macrons to try. I got chocolate, strawberry candy and vanilla. The chocolate was ok but was more dark/bitter than I like. The strawberry candy was heaven and I want one right now. The vanilla was pretty good but not my favorite. They have some locations at both CDG and Orly which we flew out of so I got some to bring home for my mom to try and so I could have more. I also discovered that they have a location in Vancouver, BC so I see a day trip in my future, along with Toronto, NYC and Washington, DC. I’m excited there are places here so I don’t have to go back to Paris just for a really good cookie :love::mickeybar:drinking1

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We hadn’t seen anywhere we wanted to have dinner on our walk so we headed back to the 50’s dinner for burgers and milkshakes. The HD Diner or Happy Days Diner, was super cute and had good food. The beef of the burger was very flavorful and better than what you’d probably get at a diner in the US. The milkshake was also yummy with a flavor more like hot chocolate than the Hershey syrup type shake we’re used to here. We also mostly just heard French being spoken by the other diners so we thought if they come here then it must be good.

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After dinner we stopped at the little market by our hotel to get drinks and then went back and relaxed for the night.

Day 7 up next - https://www.disboards.com/threads/w...-paris-and-paris.3686192/page-4#post-59389615
 
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