Montparnasse & Les Grands Boulevards (Days 26 & 27)

Phonetics lab

Jardin des Grands Explorateurs

WHOOP!  On Monday I had my last day of phonetics lab!  That means I now have class for a total of two hours instead of three, AND it means that class starts at 9 am instead of 8 am.  Hooray!

Sometime after class, I went to Montparnasse to go on one of the walks in my tour book (National Geographic Traveler Paris).  I found a big beautiful fountain just a little off of the path I was following in the Jardin des Grands Explorateurs.  I loved it!  I thought the horses surrounding it were perfect.  That's just how my most of my horses look when I was them.  Ears pinned and all!

Some interesting lamps that I saw for sale

Eiffel Tower view from Les Invalids

While I was following the walk, I saw a little antique store on rue Delambre so I decided to go in look around.  When I walked out of the store, I looked at the window and noticed these two beautiful little (five or six inches) metal horse statues that might have been bookends.  They were SO pretty; one of them had its ears pinned back which reminded me of the statue, then the other had its ears forward.  I decided to go in and take a look, because I had been given some money for graduation with directions to find something special to get with it in Paris!  Whoops.  They (or hopefully it was the set and not just one) were something like 260 euros!  Darn.  Needless to say, I didn't get them.

I ended up going into a store across the street, Timanfaya, and found a silver bangle bracelet that I liked and ended up getting.  I've been looking for one since I got here; I found one that I loved in Barcelona but with the terrible exchange rate, it was just too expensive!

Basilique Sainte Clotilde

Basilique Sainte Clotilde

When I finished my walk, the metro entrance that I was in front of was closed with police standing in front of it, so I just continued walking.  I ended up walking a lot more and on my way I finally found this great church that I had seen from Notre Dame, Basilique Snainte Clotilde.  It reminded me a little bit of the Sagrada Famila from the outside. 

Musée d'Orsay

Assemblée National

From there, I walked a block to see the Assemblée Nationale, the lower house of the French Parliament (the upper house is in the Palais du Luxembourg), then down along the Seine river, passing the Musée d'Orsay and a buch of other buildings, until I reached Notre Dame.

Sacre Coeur

Monday night, Teresa and I went to Sacre Coeur to take night pictures.  Unfortunately I had us leave too late though, so by the time we finally arrived, the sky was pretty much black, so I didn't get any pretty pictures of it.  Oh!  There are these random guys who go around selling things (and running from the police), and at night they sell these little lightup things that they shoot into the air.  Well, as you can see in the picture to the left (the blue streak), those didn't help with my picture taking either!  Haha.

Anyway, I was glad Teresa was up for going, it was one of the few places that I was not going to go to by myself at night.  Sure enough, it was definitely uncomfortable to be there at night compared to the other places we've gone.  It had a great view of the city all lit up though!  We got back past midnight because it takes an hour to get there between the metro/transfers and walking.

On Tuesday, I had quite the interesting start to my day.  When I left for school in the morning, I got all the way to the metro and realized I had grabbed the bag with my books and my iTouch, but not my purse!  I thought I'd go get it, but didn't have my keys, thought I'd just go to class, but didn't have my metro pass, then thought I'd just walk to class, but I didn't have a map!  Boo.  I ended up getting to class and afterwards waited for my roommate.  Luckly it was her last day of phonetics (my last day was the day before), so her last day of coming to our building!  I borrowed her keys and got my purse.

Picnic goods that I won at CEA

After I got that mess sorted out, I went to CEA because I won a picnic in a raffle!  CEA gave each of us 25 tickets when we came into Paris and each week they have a couple of prizes that we can win using the tickets.  I won a key chain last week and this week put in a bunch of tickets and ended up winning the picnic.  Yum!

Place Vendôme

I ran the food back home then went to Les Grands Boulevards to follow a walk in my tour book.  At one point the walk took me to Place Vendôme where I saw stores for Cartier, Chanel, Louis Vuitton, and Dior.  Whew!

Saint Augustin

Saint Augustin

While I was walking, I saw one of the churches that I had noticed from the Notre Dame, so I went off the path for a little bit to check it out.  It had a Spanish sort of feel to the inside, with a pretty exterior.

Laduree: macaroon store

Laduree macaroons!

Towards the end of my walk, I walked by Ladurée, a store that sells wonderful macaroons.  Teresa and I plan on going to a macaroon place soon, but since I was there, I wanted to try one.  I tried the rose flavor.  The only way I could describe the taste was that it was beautiful!  Tasted like a rose.  It was really good; definitely better than the ones I had tried in Dijon!

Some performers for the Fête de la Musique

As I walked around the city, I saw several musical groups setting up to perform for the Fête de la Musique, a music festival that celebrates the first day of Summer.

At 8:30, Teresa and I left for the Eiffel Tower to stand in line and go up inside!  Ohh gosh!  It was fantastic.  Our timing couldn't have been better.

Ticket to go up in the Eiffel Tower

We made it up just as the sun was setting, so we saw everything while there was light, but saw the sunset, and got to see the city lit up at night.  We went on the second (middle floor) and third (top) levels.  When we came back down I think it was too late to go to the first level (the elevator had stopped at the second platform when it first dropped us off).  We left around midnight.. she's amazingly patient with me and my picture taking and I'm very grateful!!