l'anniversaire à Paris..... day one and two

Paris was AMAZING!!!
We has such a great time, did heaps of the touristy stuff and it was a great celebration for our first anniversary!!

Thats right we have now been married for one whole year!! I cant believe how quick the time has gone by, it seems like yesterday we were rushing round getting all organised for the wedding but at the same time it seems ages ago and we've done and seen so much and had such a great time this year!

So Paris...
We traveled by the Eurostar train through the channel tunnel, which was a really quick and easy way of getting there, we arrived about 11 in the morning and the first day we went and had a look around Montmartre. At the bottom of the steps to the Sacré Coeur there were heaps of guys selling string bracelets, which i got succered into getting one. i was just a bit too slow to say no and it was too late once the guy had tied all the knots... jeremy thinks i'm silly and a push over. ;)

we looked through the beautiful Sacré Coeur which looks out over the city from the top of the hill and even climbed to the top of the dome for spectacular views ( the first of many sets of stairs we climbed this trip!!!). As we came back down there was a man singing on the steps in front which was cool, he sang 'in the jungle' in french which was hilarious! we wandered around the wee streets and markets looking at all the amazing paintings that people were painting and selling on the roadside (not that we could afford any sadly cos they were lovely) and ate crepes which we ordered in halting french!!

we walked down to the Moulin Rouge thinking that we might go to see a show there but it was massively expensive so we settled for just looking through the window and we had dinner is a wee cafe somewhere!

the next morning we ate heaps at the buffet breakfast at the hotel (this was the best bit of the hotel mmm) there was heaps of food to choose from including croissants and rolls and ham and cheese as well as cereal and fruit. mmmm unlimited croissants!!!!


We had bought the Paris museum passes which meant that we didn't have to queue at most of the palaces we visited on the pass which was super. so day two took us to Notre Dame, splendidly huge and filled with tourists, included on our passes was the climb up the towers of the cathedral, even though it was raining the view was again amazing, paris is such a beautiful city, it seems very white and all the central city buildings are several stories high and the river running through the center is lovely. The Seine is much prettier than the Thames in London.
we had a look around the Crypte Archéologique du Parvis which is the archaeological remains of the original city of Paris under the square in front of Notre Dame!!!!
We then headed along to Sainte Chapelle. we had to queue for a bit here cos they had to security scan everyone cos its in the same place at the justice court!!! Sainte Chapelle has the most amazing stained glass windows ever, they go right the way around the upper story of the chapel, depicting most of the old testament and are so detailed. (I'll definitely put up some photos once we get our computer).

we wandered around the streets again in the afternoon looking at the beautiful bridges crossing the Seine, especially the Pont Alexalandre III which has golden statues on it, and the huge buildings. Like London they're very keen on their Gold everywhere in Paris!!! we ended up at the Musée du Louvre which is open late on friday nights so we poped in to look at the most famous things whilst it wasnt too busy. There was still a pretty big crowd around the Mona Lisa which was actually pretty small and not as amazing (to my uncultured eyes anyway)as a lot of the other paintings, some of which are huge!!!! The Venus de Milo was lovely though and worth the hype. how cool anyway to say we've been there and seen all these famous things!!


Later in the evening we went up the Arc de Triomphe to look at all the lights of Paris. The view was again amazing, the Eiffel tower was all lit up blue and looked so cool. we didnt manage to get any good pictures cos it was really windy so they all came out blurry but we tried anyway so have heaps of pictures of the Eiffel tower in the camera!! it was awesome watching the traffic negoiate its way around the roundabout which surrounds the Arc de Triomphe, there are no marked lanes but about four lanes worth of traffic!!! actually watching the traffic everywhere was pretty funny, drivers seem to change lanes with no warning and it all seems pretty chaotic, luckly we were walking or taking the metro!!!

Thats all for now, stay tuned for the next installment of our trip

Love Gem and Jez


PS Happy Birthday to Mum, Rosie, Zanny, Jo and Karyn for the beginning of September