Paris

Getting There

After spending a couple of days during Christmas at Disneyland Paris (which will probably be my next blog post), we took an Uber into downtown Paris. Our first stop was our Hotel Muguet, our home away from home for the next two nights.

Hotel

Hotel Muguet was a cozy boutique hotel that we loved. It gave off true Parisian vibes with its fancy linens, large (openable) windows, and croissants at breakfast time. The staff was amazing! They gave us restaurant recommendations and truly cared about our experience. We weren’t in the hotel often because we only had two days in downtown Paris with so much to see.

Attractions

Our first stop in Paris was to see the Arc de Triomphe. We didn’t have enough time to go up in it, but this was the first icon we saw. After this, we knew we weren’t in the USA. After snapping some photos, we took a stroll down Champs Elysees. There are so many shops here to pop into! We grabbed some cliché Paris souvenirs and moved on.

Next on our itinerary was a walk through the famous Paris catacombs! This was on Rachel’s to-do list as soon as we planned this trip. Our excursion was a self guided audio tour which took us about an hour to get through. There are so many interesting facts about the catacombs! I won’t get into that here so I highly suggest you check it out for yourself. Seeing the bones and skulls during the walk made the atmosphere extremely macabre. Be sure to not touch the bones and show respect for the dead in the catacombs.

After our catacombs tour we took a stroll down the historic Rue Cler. Rue Cler is another shopping street, but this street contains more locally sourced shops, markets, and restaurants. We found a quaint Parisian restaurant for dinner then we made our way towards the iconic Eiffel Tower.

It was about a half hour walk to the tower, but we soaked in the sights as we trekked along. Navigation wasn’t necessary as we could see the famous site through most of the city. We took several pictures along the way as there are picturesque scenes everywhere you look. We finally made it to the tower, and it is so much bigger than you imagine it being. We opted for lift tickets all the way to the top (yes you can go up in the Eiffel Tower all the way to the top level). Keep in mind how windy it may be when you are 906’ (276m for the metric folks) above the ground. While it may not be ideal to take selfies with your hair blowing all over the place, this is the best location for cityscape photos. It is truly breathtaking. That was an extremely busy day one in downtown Paris, and day two was equally as busy.

After getting our day started with coffee and croissants, we started our day at the Paris National Archives Museum Hotel de Soubise. The hotel was first built in 1371! Walking through this building was like walking back in time. Also, admission to this museum is free! We spent about an hour strolling the grounds then hopped in an Uber to our next destination.

Up next, arguably the most famous art museum in the world, the Louvre. Be sure to get tickets in advance, they can (and usually do) sell out. We did not have near the amount of time we needed to see even half of the Louvre. We spent a few hours perusing the museum; then we worked our way to the Mona Lisa. Don’t ask me why this is one of the most influential paintings of all time. There was a crowd waiting to see the Mona Lisa when we got there. You are herded towards the front like cattle, and after thirty minutes I finally got close enough to get a decent picture with my phone. We walked down to the Egyptian antiquities section and explored many ancient artifacts and sarcophagi. The Louvre is much more than paintings, so be sure to allocate time to see as much as you can.

We left the Louvre and took another Uber to our next destination. The Palais Garnier, in my opinion, was the most beautiful interior of a building we saw on our trip. This is the opera house that The Phantom of the Opera was based on. The opera that was showing on our free night seemed a little outside our comfort zone. We missed being able to see The Nutcracker by one night! That would have been a memorable performance to witness at this beautiful opera house.

After we walked around the opera house we once again Uber-ed to our next destination (we took so many Ubers in Paris). After a short drive we arrived at Sacre Coeur. This translates to Church of the Sacred Heart. This catholic church was absolutely stunning. Sacre Coeur opened back in 1875 and was designed by architect Paul Abadie. If you’ve ever heard of the Parisian tradition of carving your’s and your significant other’s initials into a lock and throwing away the key, that happens right in front of Sacre Coeur in Montmartre!

Our last stop of the night was a little bookstore by the name of Shakespeare and Company. If you are a bookworm like my wife you would know this is a famous bookstore that acted as a living room for many famous authors and poets. The more famous ones include Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald. Rachel grabbed some books; then we made our way back to our room for some needed rest to head to our next destination!

Paris was fantastic! We did not have as much time as we would have liked, but we made the most of it. The city was so cozy for it to be so large. We know there is so much more to see. We’ll be back one day. Paris was cleaner than what I expected; however, the French manners and hospitality are nowhere near what we see in the southern USA. Anyway, that’s all for now. Check out the links below for where we stayed and what we did!

Links

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