Paris Part Un

Okay, I’m back in Cam now, which means I finally have time to write about Paris.  So much happened in two days, so I’m splitting this trip up into TWO blogs!  Super exciting.  This blog will cover day one.

Notre-Dame: On our first full day in Paris, we decided to start the morning out right with a trip to the Cathedral of Notre-Dame.  We waited in line FOREVER, but it was totally worth it, if only for this view:

Somehow, miraculously, we trekked up 400 stairs in record time (seriously, I think it took us longer to walk up the 100-some stairs in our hotel than it did to scale Notre-Dame).  At the top, I was excited to come face to face with the cathedral’s collection of beautiful gargoyles.

We walked up some more, very steep stairs and got to see the bell tower.  We made some necessary Hunchback of Notre-Dame references before departing.  After climbing down the 400 stairs, we went into the actual cathedral and swooned over the stunning stained glass windows.  

I lit a candle and said a prayer for my family, then joined Anna, Ange, and Gucki outside for the rest of our adventure.

Montemartre: For (a very late) lunch we traveled to Montmartre.  After I stepped off the tube, I was greeted with this sight:

We headed to Le Deux Moulins for lunch. This is the café Amelie works at in the movie of the same name.  There was a huge picture of her in the restaurant and her face graced our menus.  I had my first Croque Monsieur and then stole the paper placemat, which was an awesome collage of Amelie drawings.

After lunch (dinner…by this time?) we wandered the streets of Montmartre, popping and out of shops.  The town was still lit up for Christmas and the lights made the whole experience that much more (as Angela would say) precious.

 

Montmartre is a massive hill, so we did more walking up steps.  The view was well worth it.

Eiffel Tower: Anna and Ange insisted that I see the Eiffel Tower at night, so I agreed.  This may sound cheesy, but seeing the Eiffel Tower in the pitch dark, all lit up—it actually took my breath away.  

I had always assumed it was a big tourist attraction, but seeing it for myself, in real life, I realized how outstandingly beautiful it is.  What a sight. This awful picture (above) does not do it justice.  My friends and I linked arms and stood at the balcony and shivered in the cold and laughed hysterically at nothing. I stopped to realize how wonderful life is: standing at the Eiffel Tower, in Paris, with friends, on a lovely crisp night.

Home of Hemingway: As the end to the night, we went to Le Deux Magots, the café where the likes of Hemingway and Sartre ate (or, in Hemingway’s case, drank) and wrote.  I felt inspired just sitting in the same place where Papa once sat.

We ordered incredibly rich and incredibly expensive cake and coffee.  It was worth it, though, just being there, enjoying the night, being in Paris.

A fantastic first full day in France.

Bienvenue á Paris

So. Paris. For the longest time, I had no desire to visit France. Don’t know why. But then I read A Moveable Feast and ALL I wanted to do was go to Paris.  I mean, Hemingway and Stein and Eliot and Fitzgerald all lived and wrote here.  HERE!  I desperately wanted to go where they went and get inspired. And then Midnight in Paris came out and it was like my dream visualized on film. Amazing.

So. Paris. Here I am. And the beginning of my adventure is crazy and inspiring enough for its own post.

The flight was fine. I was afraid for a minute we were going to crash and burn, but then it was all okay.  We caught a weird train/shuttle vehicle from the Parisian airport to get into the city. I practiced my French with my friend, Angela, and got to use “merci” when two nice gentlemen helped me with my luggage.

We wandered in the pouring rain for a while, looking for our hotel, and finally found it: literally just a door in the wall smooshed between two restaurants.  At first glance I thought, my God, this place is a dump.  The neighborhood was quite lovely, all lit up with street lights, lined with fancy stores and cute restaurants.  But this place just had that feel: as if it had been around forever, lost in the corner of the city.  We trekked up a flight of rickety stairs and found “Reception”, which was just a small room that branched off the landing.  A spindly, very clearly drunk man greeted us at the door with a boisterous “Attenzione!”  Okay…what were we watching out for and why was he speaking Italian? This appeared to be our lovely receptionist. After various jokes that were a bit lost in translation, and some attempts at flirting/innuendos, he gave us our keys.

I thought the hike up to our room in our Scottish hotel was bad. I had no idea. We carried our heavy suitcases up six flights of long, narrow, winding stairs.  The hotel was itty bitty but extremely tall and we were on the top floor. By the time I got to the room, I was huffing and puffing and building up a sweat. When we opened the door to our room, I was pleasantly surprised. It looked just like the kind of place in which Hemingway would have lived and written.  Small, with the slanting beams of the attic sticking out of the walls.  Two small, old beds. One tiny sink. A little breakfast table and two wicker chairs. But—three windows that opened up wide, revealing the far-reaching Parisian streets, the twinkling city lights, the white rooftops, and (in the distance) the top of Notre Dame.  It was so French, so old, so wonderful.  The receptionist told us the place was built in the 1650s, and I believe it.  I could literally feel the history oozing out of the floorboards.

Starving, we dumped our belongings and went to a grocery store.  Shopping for groceries in a foreign language is…interesting.  Anna and I kept asking, “Ange, what’s this mean? What about this?” We ended up with apples, baguette sandwiches, onion chips, cookies, Orangina, and (of course) a bottle of wine. 

Major problem: no bottle opener.  We asked our receptionist for a bottle opener (he was drunk after all…he was sure to have one), but he couldn’t find it.  So he took us on a hunt. First we went across the street to a little open food shop, but no luck there. Then we crossed back to our hotel and stopped in at an Asian market where the woman behind the counter kindly provided us with a bottle opener. With our wine breathing in the cool night air, we heaved ourselves up the six flights back to our room. There we enjoyed our feast, listening to Edith Piaf and the Amelie soundtrack and the chatter of Paris from outside our windows.

What a lovely welcome from Paris.

They Gave Us Fire and Told Us to Go Have Fun!

Happy Hogmanay everyone! Having spent St. Patrick’s Day in Ireland, I decided to continue the trend and spend New Year’s in Scotland (next year will be Easter at the Vatican!...maybe).  The city was packed and the festivities extended over three days.

Day One, The Torchlight Procession: We picked up our torch on the Royal Mile and were really excited to join the whole city in a massive firelight exodus.  We gathered at St. Giles Cathedral where the whole city and then some were packed into the streets with flaming torches.  Initially it seems like an awful fire hazard, but we got over that worry fast.  The procession started with bagpipes, drums, and marching Vikings, and then we were all heading down the Royal Mile and the Mound.  In the dead of night, surrounded by thousands of people carrying torches, listening to bagpipes…I felt like I was marching into battle.  It was awesome.  (This was aided by my friend’s 300-style shout of “THIS! IS! HOGMANAY!”) 

We marched to the top of Calton Hill where we got a fantastic view of the city.  There we proceeded to watch the most spectacular fireworks display I have ever seen.  Not only was it coordinated to epic Scottish music, it came from every direction, in front of us, behind us, above us, and was accompanied by an amazing light show.

When that was done, we marched back down the hill, disposed of our torch (now burnt out), and headed home.  The best view of the night, though: looking out over the city, seeing thousands and thousands of lit torches lining the streets of Edinburgh.  Beautiful.

Day Two, Hogmanay Street Party: We spent the day doing a bit of shopping and eating, then prepped for the night out by having a liquid dinner of “tea”. 

Gucki, of course, joined in.

Then we headed out to dangerous Princes Street, which was so packed, you could hardly move three inches without getting an elbow to the ribs.  We met some interesting characters, including one man who skipped me in line at the Port-a-loo, then proceeded to ask, “Are you going to piss your pants? Cuz I’m going to piss my pants.”  All right then, sir.  Feel free to go ahead of me.  We also ran into a group of young men who couldn’t tell the difference between a crepe and a samosa.  One of these gents is the “nude man” I mentioned earlier.  Though Ange corrected me, saying that he wasn’t really nude, I think peeing into a bottle in the middle of the street involves a certain amount of nudity. 

Still, despite the semi-nudity, the atmosphere was awesome.  Bands were playing loudly, different sounds from every direction.  The air smelled like cooking beef and rain.  The whole of Princes Street was lit up with hanging lanterns and Christmas lights in the trees.  The centerpiece was the Ferris Wheel (which, sadly, we weren't able to go on), which stuck out like a massive, glittering jewel along the skyline.

We made the mistake of trying to wander the streets.  We proceeded to squish through the massive and heavily-packed crowd for twenty-five minutes before we decided to turn around and head back to our spot.  It was terrifying and hilarious; we were linked together in a chain and moving involved a lot of pushing, bodily contortions, and American boldness.  

The fireworks were lovely, though not as good as the night before.  Afterwards, we took part in the World’s Largest “Auld Lang Syne” rendition.  No one seemed to be singing the same words at the same time, but we had a fantastic time.  The practicing we’d been doing for the past two days certainly paid off!

Day Three, Hogmanay Games: Sadly, we didn’t really get to take part in these games.  The lines were way too long.  But we did get to show our support.  We picked teams.  You could either be an Uppie (those from the North, represented by an eagle wearing an aviator helmet and glasses) or a Doonie (those from the South, represented by a stag wearing a monocle and a mustache).  We decided to be Doonies (I’m from southern Wisconsin and now southern England).  We got to wear our badges (which you can’t really see in the picture) around the streets and on our climb up Arthur’s Seat.

And that was Hogmanay!  Oh so much fun and spent with fantastic people.  

Moors, Coos, and Emos...Oh My!

Ah, Scotland. Edinburgh was the first non-US city I ever visited, and it holds a special place in my heart.  I fell in love with Scotland after being there only 8 days and I couldn’t wait to go back.  I got my chance when  my friend, Anna, suggested the Hogmanay Festival for our New Year’s celebration.  As the largest (and possibly only) official New Year’s festival in Europe, it sounded like an excellent idea.  I’m going to save Hogmanay for another blog post; this one will detail our non-Hogmanay adventures in Scotland this time around.

We stayed at a hotel that was absolutely gorgeous.  Unfortunately we had to walk up eight flights of stairs to get to our room, but at least it was good exercise.

Because of Hogmanay, Edinburgh was super touristy.  That was okay, though.  My accent didn’t stick out too much and we got to enjoy all of the cute bagpipers out on the streets.

The weather was…typical.  Last time we were in Scotland (in July), it rained every day.  Now, December/January…it rained every day.  Thankfully I brought my new windbreaker jacket, which kept me warm, and my Hunter wellies.  Anna was smart and bought a pair of arm warmers which I stole from her as often as I could.

Anna took us to see her old uni, Edinburgh University, and then we went to Emo Square where she used to watch the emos every day.  They must have migrated for the winter because they were all gone, so Anna and Ange had to fill in the gap they left behind.

We wandered ALL over Edinburgh, exploring fun little closes for which Scotland is known.  We brought Gucki (our traveling gnome) along with us on our adventures.  

Besides Hogmanay, the major highlight of the trip was hiking up Arthur’s Seat, a huge hill right off the Royal Mile.  It was incredibly muddy and windy and FREEZING but we had a ton of fun and laughed the whole way up (when we could catch our breath).  At the top, we planted the Scottish flag, popped open a bottle of Bucks Fizz (the cheapest “champagne” we could get at the store), ate some sugary waffles and cheddar cheese (don’t ask), sang a bit of “Auld Lang Syne”, and welcomed in the New Year.  The view from Arthur’s Seat was stunning; if you ever go to Scotland, you must make this one of your stops.

On the way back to our hotel, we stopped in some touristy shops where Anna tried on the Highland Coo hat she’s been eyeing up for days.  

We had dinner at The Elephant House, the café where JK Rowling wrote the first HP book, using the great view of Edinburgh Castle as inspiration for Hogwarts.  In the women’s restroom, the walls were covered in notes of thanks to Rowling and quotes from the books.  I couldn’t resist leaving a thank you note of my own.

Last time I was at The Elephant House, I drew a picture of an elephant that the staff posted up on the wall.  The photograph I took of it ended up in an online guidebook to Edinburgh.  This time I drew another picture and…

…they put up this one too!  Huzzah!

Such a lovely end to my trip.  Tomorrow I’m hopping on an early morning train for London and then it’s Paris!  But first, as promised, a Hogmanay blog.  Check back soon for stories of nude men, cups of “tea”, and playing with fire.