Paris, The City of Lights.

This weekend Diane and I travelled to Paris for the weekend. Everyone told us it takes a least 2 hours to get to the airport so we left really early. However upon arriving at the airport in under 30 minutes we were baffled at all this 2 hour talk. However the airport in Paris was a different story, upon our arrival both our brains started working overdrive. We were reading and hearing things French, thinking in English, but instinctively speaking Spanish. The journey from the airport to the hotel was about 2 hours long and we were helped along the way by a friendly French man. We arrived at 11 PM and went to bed, we need our rest for the big days ahead. Here is the view from our hotel room.


The following day we went to the Louvre art museum. It was awesome rolling up to the museum and seeing so many triangles. I never thought that any part in my life I would be taking so many pictures of Triangles, but they were really cool. Here's a good picture of one of the triangles. That's Diane walking toward you. We had a French lunch at the museum, which consisted of meat and lots of cheese. I had cheese and potatoes and I would say it was about 60% cheese and 40% potatoes. I even managed to sneak a picture of the Mona Lisa in, even though it was prohibited, technically I think it is legal because I took the picture in the camera allowed zone.


After the art museum we walked to the Champs y Elysees toward the Arc de Triumph. It was
a long walk but the arch was awesome. I didn't expect it to be so big. Here is Diane and I in front of the arch.

Mom and Dad, I did go up to the top, it was a great view. That night I bought dinner in a supermarket. A really nice French dude helped find French bread, cheese, wine and other goodies that French people like to have with their dinner.

The following day we went to Notre Dame. Now I don't want to be a Notre Dame hater, but I feel like some of the cathedrals in Spain are a little more impressive. I've been showing a lot of direct pictures of monuments, so here are the infamous Gargoyles on the cathedral.
After Notre Dame we went to the Pantheon. I was under the impression their was only one Pantheon, a.k.a the one in Italy, but I have to say the French Pantheon was pretty legit. It was really cool seeing the tombs of people like Voltaire and Rousseau even if I'm not entirely sure why they were so important in my history classes (hey I'm being honest). I also saw the largest Pendulum in the world there as well. Here is a picture I took of Diane at the Pantheon, it's one of my favorites of the trip.

That night we went to the Eiffel tower. I had heard the tower sparkled on the hour every night, so when the metro came out of the tunnel and the tower was right there flashing like the sparklers we used to have at New Years, it was quite a site. Diane and I went to the very top. It was wicked high, and I've been to the top of a lot of tall buildings (Empire State, Sears Tower, Prudential) but something about the Eiffel Tower just made it seem really tall. I have since looked at this picture and learned that it really wasn't that tall.
I think one of the reasons it seemed so tall was because you could feel it shaking in the wind. It was pretty freaky. The view from the top was amazing. On the way down I took this picture, depending on what you think it's me holding up the tower or me climbing it, I prefer the first option.


It was great trip, Paris was a really cool city. And finally here is the best thing I ate in Paris (and yes I did have creme brulee). It was chocolate crepe we had on the first day there. It stands as the best French food I've had to date, but I still have many years left to try some other stuff.


I have midterms this week, but I have a field trip to the North East of Spain this weekend for some climbing and kayaking so stay tuned!