Paris, at long last

When I first started writing about Switzerland, I mentioned that I had never written about it before. The same goes for Paris. I have written a few posts about going there, but my only actual touristic visit of the city was ages ago, when I was still in Angoulême (and before I started this blog). Then I went there for another "tour" with my father, but I didn't take much photos. So this will be the first documented trip of Paris on this blog.

My parents were leaving on Monday's flight from Paris, so we went there on Saturday to do some sightseeing before they left.

We took the train from Lyon early Saturday morning, checked into the Ibis hotel, one of the Accor hotel chain (Etap, our hotel in Switzerland, is part of the Accor chain as well).

On the way to the hotel, we saw a yellow bird singing on the metro.

The guys in the red shirts were filming...I wonder what for. Let me know if you see a video of this bird anywhere!

After leaving our luggage at the hotel, we left for France Miniature.

We had to take the Transilien (a type of suburban train) from La Défense to La Verrière, then a bus to Elancourt-France Miniature (the Sqybus line 411 or 412, which is in zone 5 of the Parisian public transport; we can use the same ticket as in Paris itself). As we walked to the La Défense station from our hotel, the weather was fine so we seized our chance to take some photos (in case it rained the next day...my parents' trip was plagued with rain -_- ).

(From the same website that said I could go to La Verrière, I found out that I could also have taken the train from Montparnasse to Rambouillet, but I'm not sure where to go from there)

la Défense, near our hotel

the view away from La Défense
You can see the Arc de Triomphe at the end of the Champs-Elysées (the long road)

turn around and you see the Grande Arche de La Défense

don't ask me what the wooden car was doing there

a colourful tube thing
The plaque says that this is "Le Moretti", built in 1990

the tubes up close

I definitely don't know what this is

the arch with the colourful modern art statues on the left (the yellow, blue and red "statues"), and a huge "swimming pool" :P

It's not really a swimming pool, of course...I guess it's just another thing they call art.

in the middle of the arch

At this point we left for France Miniature, which was a great park, though I will skip it for now.

When we got back, we had dinner in the hotel, then as it wasn't raining much (just a few drops which seemed to be stopping, and again, we were afraid it would rain the next day), we decided to go out.

the Arc de Triomphe at night (or should I say dusk?)

there was a flag strung up in the middle of the arch (normally there isn't)

and flowers there, too
It was the 8th of May (which had quite slipped my mind), anniversary of the 2nd World War victory.

But that was as far as we got that night, for it began to rain. -_-

The next day we made our way to the Arc de Triomphe again (it was a good starting point, since we were staying at La Défense)

the arch by day
Lovely, isn't it? (I like this monument better than the Eiffel Tower)

Then we went to see the Eiffel Tower.

Palais de Chaillot across the bridge from the Eiffel Tower (I never really noticed or cared what it was before)

the Eiffel Tower
(see Palais de Chaillot behind it?)

there were ponies

the École Militaire (military academy) at the end of Champ de Mars (the grassy area beside/in front of the Eiffel Tower (which is the "front" of the Eiffel Tower anyway?))

Invalides

Place de la Concorde, the largest square in Paris

famous for its obelisk

Then there is the Seine river.

cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris ("our lady of Paris", in case you didn't know)

the Louvre pyramid

the smallest in the series of "arches-in-a-line"
There was the Grande Arche de la Défense, the Arc de Triomphe and this, the Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel

the upside-down pyramid that everyone wanted to touch (making it impossible to get a clear photo)

Then we go up to Montmartre to visit the Sacré-Coeur (I had never been there before either). The metro station is buried deep inside the hill, and we unknowingly climbed up the stairs to get out (there was a lift, but we waited for a while and gave up, thinking "never mind lah" -_- )

the stairs and the short cable-car going up to the Basilica

Basilique du Sacré-Coeur (Sacred-Heart Basilica)

people putting on a show, which meant that it was VERY crowded there!

There were so many people on the basilica steps that I didn't attempt to go up.

the view (don't ask me in what direction it is)

There was this guy who balanced a football on his head...he really was quite good. (though the ball did fall off once when we were there)

another photo of his acrobatics

Then we went back to town.

the town hall, which is highly mundane beside all the other attractions in Paris
(We didn't even try looking for it, we just stumbled upon it :P )

Georges Pompidou centre

We wouldn't have gone to see this if there wasn't this bakery nearby that Kak Asilda recommended. It's called Chocolats Pralus, and its speciality is the praluline, a wonderfully yummy brioche. We went into the shop and wanted to buy one, but they had run out of small ones (the large one was too big for us).

Okay, that's all for Paris, I'm tired of it anyway. I never really liked Paris, despite all the hype around it. What I really liked on this trip was France Miniature...I will try to get around to writing about that sometime. (at least the people coming to my blog will be able to read about Paris now :P )