In which we go to Paris...

I promised you all some action (of the photographic/traveling kind) in my last post, and here it is: we went to Paris! Look, here's Notre Dame:

For my birthday, Joe and Matt combined forces for us to spend a couple of days in Paris. The itinerary included tons of walking, eating everything in sight, drinking wine, and more walking. While things got off to a rough start with a 5 am walk in the pouring rain through Edinburgh to catch our bus to the airport, by the time we arrived in France, our clothes were almost dry and we were ready for adventures.

First up, getting lost. Our shuttle dropped us off at this massive traffic circle, and my map said it would be about 15 minutes to walk to the Arc de Triomphe. This only applies if you have the detailed version of the map printed out and know what "take the fifth exit" means. If you choose to just go with the first major street you see, you will probably spend about an hour walking around wondering why you can't seem to find a giant arch. On the upside, we found a lovely park (see picture above) and it was almost 60 degrees and sunny, so it was hardly unpleasant.

Eventually, we made our way in the right direction, saw the Arc, and headed down the Avenue des Champs-Elysées towards the Louvre.

Inside, we saw the Mona Lisa (obviously)...

...and Matt found his sculpture likeness.

Then, we met up with our friend Leshu, who is on sabbatical there, and ate the best falafel EVER in the Marais. I've never completely understood the obsession with falafel, but this stuff was pretty life-changing. Okay, everything we ate was amazing. Let's just get that out of the way now, shall we?

After the falafel, we wandered back to our hotel (which was lovely and had custom art on the walls of each room) in the Latin Quarter, then to Leshu's flat in the 6th for wine, cheese, baguette, and pâté. We logged at least 7 or 8 miles that day, so we headed back to the hotel fairly early to get some rest, where I caught some old episodes of SVU dubbed in French. Amazing.

The next morning, we wandered through three or four street markets, learning about and tasting various foods (yes, that is an easy way to get me to buy things - clever vendors) and tried our first French croissants for breakfast. We also spent a lot of time checking out the amazing graffiti around the city, including several incarnations of the white man pictured above. From the markets, we headed off to the Eiffel Tower, because every good tourist should probably go and see it at least once. This gave us a chance to explore some new areas, get the requisite shots of the Tower, and then head back walking along the Seine.

After fortifying ourselves with a giant feast of moules-frites (mussels and fries), and giving our failing legs a brief respite, we went on a little book tour of the area. Ian had mentioned this was his favorite bookstore, and I have to agree. It was a little bizarre that everything was in English, but not only did they have a piano upstairs for playing but also little typewriters scattered throughout for writing, and a beautiful reading room. Matt wanted a picture out front to "affirm" his status as an English major:

By this point, my legs were dying and no amount of Nutella on crepes (heavenly) could sustain us for more walking, so we picked up some more cheese, bread, and wine to go with our market purchases and headed back to Leshu's flat for birthday feasting. Behold the glory:

We had an early shuttle to catch (and 4.5 miles to walk to catch it, because we really wanted to make sure our legs were truly exhausted/see as much as possible), so we called it a night after a few bottles of wine and more cheese/bread/olives/sausage than my stomach should probably allow. Happiness: