paris, day 4

7/30
ok here’s the thing. at this point, we had seen everything we wanted to, we needed to do laundry, we needed to repack all our junk, and we needed sleep. so we took a day off. we slept in, watched some netflix, went and found a laundromat and did laundry, then went back home and packed. yes, i completely understand that we were in paris so we should have stayed busy every second of every day and seen as much as we could blah blah blah. you can do that on your trip. we didn’t want to work ourselves to death because we have a lot of those days ahead of us. so we gave ourselves a day, and it was awesome. a little before dinner, we ventured back into the city, walked around the palace of justice until we got kicked out, went and found dinner (it was tasty), then went to the eiffel tower.

side note: on the way, we found the replica of the replica:


aaaaand we’re back to the eiffel tower: we hadn’t seen it do its sparkly thing, and we needed to. while we were waiting, we went to get a crepe, and we asked the lady about what one of them had on it, and she told us it was 3 euros and 50 cents. so we asked her what was on the crepe again, and she held up 3 fingers. we asked her for a third time, and she wrote the price down on a paper and pointed at it. so we gave up and bought it. it wasn’t that good.

but you know what was good? that dang eiffel tower sparkly trick thing. i really liked it. the tower lights up as soon as it gets dark enough, then the sparkling happens when the sun touches its skin…wait, different story. it sparkles at the top of every hour after that.



trust me, the sparkling was cool. you can only see like 7 of the sparkles, but i have a video. it’s cooler.


























then we went back, got a different crepe, this time with nutella (obviously tasty). tayte dropped a huge gob of it onto his shoe. don’t worry we’re getting rid of them when we get back. especially since he’s almost worn a hole right through the bottom. something about how we walk everywhere.

then it was time for bed.

paris, day 3

7/29
versailles day. woot.
a couple of the interns went to paris a few weeks ago, so naturally we were asking them for advice. the one thing they kept telling us was: don’t go to versailles. it’s overrated. if you have to go, just go to the gardens. but don’t go to versailles. you’ll regret it. let’s see. what else? oh yeah…don’t go to versailles!!

so we went to versailles.

it was cool on the outside, and kinda cool on the inside, but they were right: it is kinda overrated. mostly because there’s 8.7 kajillion people every where you look. but it’s a cool place. and the gardens? gorgeous. we ate the bread and cheese we brought while watching people attempt (but fail miserably) to row. all in all, we had a grand time.


fun story: on the train home, i fell asleep. i woke up as somebody ran into my shoulder on his way off the train. i vaguely remember hearing him say “pardon” but i thought it was tayte, hitting me in the shoulder, telling me to get off the train. so i groggily stood up and looked to the exit. thankfully the real tayte pulled me back down again. #besthusbandever i can’t be trusted for at least 10 minutes after i wake up in the morning, but it’s like 27 minutes after a nap. i’m so out of it. obviously.

anyway. once we got back to paris, we decided to hit up the arc de triomphe. and since it’s us, we are never satisfied with just looking up at stuff. so we climbed all the stairs to the top. it was actually pretty cool because of all the streets that meet up at the arc.


so.


many.

stairs.


































we were so grateful we didn’t have to cross that crazy roundabout to get to the arc. they had a little underground tunnel that led to the stairs.
otherwise we would have died.







then tayte decided he wanted to go to the hotel d’invalides, which was basically a military museum. it had napoleon’s tomb, as well as some other military schtuff. it was mighty coolio.


“do you have a tube of cannonball wound ointment?”

then we went to the rodin museum, mostly because it was across the street. i mean, who is rodin? i had no idea. he just sculpted some stuff and has a museum named after him. so that’s cool.


what can think the unthinkable?







-an ithberg

as my girl beyonce always says, if you like than you shoulda put a ring on it.























then we went for a tasty dinner at a place i picked (aka we walked past it and the prices were good). tayte ordered snails. ugh.

…ok they were good. whatever. then we took our full tummies and put them to bed.
1 more day. another day, another destiny. on this never-ending road to calvary… (see what i did there? it’s appropriate because we’re in france.

paris, day 2

7/28
the best thing about being in paris for so many days is that we never felt in a rush. we didn’t feel like we had to get up super early or work ourselves to death every day, making sure we saw everything. there would be time for it all.

so our next day, we woke up and went to the train station to buy our tickets that would take us to mont-saint-michel, our next stop (see later post). let’s just say that we had everything planned out perfectly for this next trip, but it wasn’t gonna happen. it was actually pretty frustrating. buuuut the one silver lining is that the guy booking our tickets was none other than flint lockwood, in the flesh. this is not a joke. for those of you who don’t know who that is, here.

slap some broken glasses that sat on his face awkwardly, and this is who we had to deal with. i should have sneaked a picture.

after the train fiasco, we made our way back to notre dame (aka my favorite). this time, our plan was to stand in a different line for 2 hours, then climb all the stairs to the top. but seriously. we climbed up a whole heap of stairs and we found ourselves in the middle of the two pillar things. then we climbed up a few more and we were on the tippity top of one of the pillar things. i felt like quasimodo. i actually sang the song “out there” which was very appropriate. i wanted to climb the spire thing like he did, but i wasn’t able to get past the wires. dang.
line of people waiting to get into the cathedral.

note: this is not the line we stood in.

ours was much, much longer.












see? right there, in between the pillar things.

not quite big enough to be “big marie,” so i’m gonna go with “louise-marie.”


if you have no idea what i’m talking about, culture yourself and watch the dang movie. good grief.































same line of people, but from higher up. see how they’re smaller?















we are literally standing on the tippity top of notre dame.


















i’m pretty sure they put all these wires here to make sure people like us don’t pull a quasimodo and climb the top of that spire, singing our hearts out.



























after pretending to be quasimodo for a bit, we hit up the orsay gallery. i mean, it had cool stuff.




replica of the replica of the replica.

you’ll see in a bit.

then we bought a lock, wrote our names on it, locked it on a bridge (technically, it’s locked onto someone else’s lock that's locked onto the bridge), and chucked the keys into the river. our love will now last forever...as long as the love of the owners of the lock we locked ours onto does.



the lock came with three keys. so we each threw one, then threw one together.





yeah, i know.
#precious






then we had some cold, gross seafood for dinner, called it a day, and went to sleep.

paris, day 1

we have officially begun our travelling across europe. up until now, we have had a home base (jena) and that was so nice because we weren’t hauling all our stuff everywhere. that was a nice luxury. now, we’re vagabonds, going from place to place, wherever the wind takes us. well, wherever the trains that we reserve take us.
first stop: paris.
the nice thing is that i probably won’t have to use a lot of words because all the stuff we’re seeing is super touristy. so that will be nice. just get ready for lots of pictures.
paris was an awesome city. it was so cool to actually go to all the places you’ve only ever seen in movies and pictures. we were there for 4 days, so we had  p l e n t y  of time to see everything we could ever want to see. ok. honest moment: it was so cool to see all the stuff we did. buuuuut we do think paris is a bit overrated. (don’t hate us.) that’s all i’ll say about that.
our very very first night in paris, we got in around 8, so we went to our airbnb where we were staying (we didn’t want to walk around with all our stuff on our backs). good news about our place: it had 3 floors. bad news: each floor was no more than 40 ft². oh how i wish i were kidding. here’s the proof:


kitchen/family room area.

tayte is standing in the corner, right in front of the stairs you’ll see next. he could have reached out and touched me.



this is the first floor.




stairs leading up to the next floor.



the nice thing is that they’re left/right foot specific.

the bad thing is that they’re left/right foot specific.

















second floor, aka the bedroom.
the bed mattress on the floor took up most of the room. also this room was no more than 4 feet tall, so neither of us could stand up straight in here.
tayte was up against the wall to take this (bending over, of course).


tayte probably then turned and sat on the bed to get this shot, the ladder leading up to the third floor.

the nice thing is that ladders aren’t the worst things in the world.

the bad thing is that it’s a ladder and shouldn’t be climbed if at all groggy. so if nature calls in the middle of the night/early in the morning, you best pay attention.

























this is the bathroom, yes on the third floor. there is the ladder you just saw, leading up to this lovely floor. that little red platform? yeah you don’t stand on that. it would probably break.
one thing you can’t see is the ridiculously tall ceilings. we’re talking vaulted ceilings here.
also the light didn’t work up here, so once the sun went down, all business had to be conducted in the dark.

because of the nature of, well, getting from the ladder to the tile floor, it’s dangerous to get on that ladder (whether going up or down) when sleepy/groggy, if wet, while awake, while wearing socks, at night, when in a rush, during the day, while holding anything, or while talking to anyone or anything.















you know how when you have little kids, and they wait until it is an absolute dire emergency before telling you they have to use the bathroom and then it’s a mad rush against time and nature to make it to the toilet in time?

just be grateful you don’t live here.























all that being said, it really wasn’t too shabby of a deal. it was a cheap place and it was a place to stay, so we can’t really complain.

anyway.
after dropping off all our stuff and taking a quick {somewhat dangerous} tour of the apartment, we decided to take a walk. and that is exactly what we did. we walked. we didn’t even take any pictures. we just walked around. it was nice to walk around after being stuck on a train all day.

7/27

our first whole day in paris. we started by going to the pantheon so we could get our museum passes. the pantheon is a museum, but it’s not the most amazing thing in the world. it’s pretty much where you go to get your museum pass because there is never a line there. but we figured it couldn’t hurt to look around a bit since we were there anyway.


good ol’ victor hugo. rest in peace, my friend.

















then we made our way to notre dame. let me tell you something about this thing: I. LOVE. IT. seriously. i think this was the thing i was most excited about seeing, at least in paris. man. it was breathtaking. yeah it was weird to stand in a line to go into a church and yeah it wasn’t as tall as you think, and yeah there’s no quasimodo or esmerelda or phoebus, but i didn’t care. we stood in that line, went inside, and loved it.


next up was the louvre. now here’s the thing. the line to get in here was absolutely ridiculous. but since we had museum passes, we literally walked right in. so if you’re thinking about going to paris and you’re considering getting a museum pass, DO IT. it will be worth it, i promise.




the crowd to see one of the most famous ladies ever.

we were in this mess for way too long.

again, i really wish my father-in-law had been here…







there she be.



















through the years, there has been a lot of speculation as to why she’s smiling.
i now know why.
she’s laughing at all the tourists that crowd around her little face, taking picture after picture after picture every time they move forward a foot.




but still…
#totallyworthit






















venus di milo




































after the louvre, we went up to sacre coeur. it was a pretty neat church. there were people everywhere, but it is paris, so whatever. we went up in the dome of the church, which gave us some sweet views.


this city be crazy. every time we had a view of it, i got a headache.















then it was eiffel tower time. and ok. this was cool. especially the part where we went up to the second floor and could see forever. the stairs on the way down weren’t quite so cool, but we enjoyed them anyway.



don’t worry.
we did.






















you wouldn’t believe how nerve-wracking this was.

1 day down, 3 to go!