Paris Sunday(3)- Versailles, Moulin Rouge, Nutella Crepe

Our third day in Paris, a small group of us went to Versailles. In case you don't know, Versailles used to be a palace, built by Louis XIV. It is also the Palace the Marie Antoinette lived at, and it a huge tourist attraction now. We were told that in order to not have to stand in a line to get in, you need to get there right when it opens at nine, so we woke up early planning to leave by 8, since it is about an hour outside of the city. To get there from Paris, you have to buy a special ticket and then ride the metro and a train. First of all, the train system is very very confusing so it took us a while to figure that out, and also, the connection of the metro to the train is actually like a 30 minute hike across town...at least the way we were told to go. So we finally get on a train and realize that we are actually on the wrong train, so we get off and try asking for help. The guy working hands us this flier that says that saturday and sunday of this week only, the normal train to versailles is not working. We were so pissed becuase all of this could have been prevented if the guy we bought our tickets from would have just told us. So, basically we had to go back to where we started and by this time it was already 10, meaning, we had spent 2 hours and ended up in exactly the same place we started. It was really frustrating, but finally at least we knew we were in the right place. We got on the train and rode to Versailles and then had to walk another 15 minutes just to get to the Palace. The front is cool, but a lot of it was under construction, and the back and the gardens is what it is really known for. We were all worried when we got there that we were going to have to wait in line forever for a ticket, but it turned out that there was practically no line at all. We started with the gardens in the back. They are huge and on an axial plan framing views of fountains, a lake and so on. It was pretty, but not what I was expecting because they had a lot of it turned off or covered. I am sure it is absolutely beautiful in the summer when the peak of the tourists go visit it and they have everything running though. All the fountains were turned off, there were no flowers and most of the statues were covered. The fountains were still pretty and very intricate, but it would have been much better if they were on. We walked around the garden taking pictures for a while and joking around about how much cooler it could have been, and then we went inside to tour the actual palace. It was cool inside because everything is just so intricate. There are these huge paintings covering the entire ceiling, and furniture made out of silver and gold. Also, this is where the hall of mirrors is. It is this huge hall with one wall made of windows opening to the gardens and the other wall solid mirrors. It is so pretty in there. The king and queens chambers were really cool too with the royal beds and stuff like that. When we were leaving, we looked at the line and it was really long, so we were glad we made it when we did. Also, it was starting to rain, so on our walk back to the train station we got kinda wet. We stopped along the way at just a little bakery and picked up some lunch because it was about that time. I got some quiche lorraine and an apple tart, and then we took our lunch and ate it while we were on the train. It was really nice because the train was a non stop train so instead of the 45 minutes it took us to get there, it was only about 15 minutes. The quiche was the best quiche i've ever had, and I am sad to say that La Madeline just doesn't compare. When we got back into Paris, we met one of the other girls, Maoi, at the Arc de Triumphe to climb it and see the city. Getting there we had a bit of a mix up becuase we had to ride the subway and we didnt know which stop we were supposed to get off at. Using our context clues and well educated brains, we knew the name of the famous shopping street it is at the end of, and the other stops around that street said nothing about the arc de triumphe so we decided that was our best bet. Nope. wrong. We came up out of the metro at the other end of the street. And, the street doesnt look that long and you can see the arc at the end so we just decided to walk. Well, becuase of the one point perspective created by the road with the arc at the end, it looks a lot closer than it actually is. It ended up being about a 25 minute walk at a pretty good pace. We got there and took pictures and then took the underground tunnel to cross over to the arc itself (if you dont know, its in the middle of a busy roundabout). It was a public holiday in Paris that day, so there was a HUGE french flag hanging down from the center of the arc that made the pictures that much better because the flag is not normally there. To get to the top of the arc you have to climb stairs, how fun! It actually wasn't that bad compared to some other towers we have climbed to see views of cities, but it still got the heart pumping plenty. When we got to the top, it started drizzling and raining some. The views weren't as cool because of the rain, but it was still awesome and here's why. first of all because the way that the city of paris is designed, six main avenues fan out from the arc, so from the top you see them all and it looks cool, second of all, the eiffel tower is huge and in the pictures which is why its better to go up the arc than the tower, and then last and best, since it rained, while we were up there a rainbow came out over the city and we could see both ends! it was so amazing! From here, we took a metro to go to Montmarte, which is just like a hill or small mountain in Paris where there is a famous church, Sac Le Cour, and also it is famous for a little "square" area where a lot of the artists go and paint and sell artwork. When we got out of the subway, it was pouring. I mean absolutely pouring. There were all these people just standing at the exit of the subway so that they wouldnt have to get drenched. At first, we got a little sidetracked and forgot about the rain because the metro had an entrance that we studied in classes because of its design, done by hector guimard. the whole trip we had been wondering where it was in the city but didnt know how to find that out, and we just happened upon it, so it was really random. The other cool thing was that because of his design, you could walk further becuase it doubled as protection from the rain. the entrance to the subway was really crowded so, we ran to a church across the street to take cover from the rain and figure out what to do. We stood there for a while and then headed out to find Sac Le Cour. It was still raining, but it had let up some. Regardless, we got really wet. When we got to where we could see the church, we opted to take the furnicular up the hill because it was so steep. Before we got on, Anthony had to pee so we had to wait for him, and while we were waiting, several black guys came up to us and were like, hey let me tie this on your wrist, holding some string. I was like no, and tried to ignore them, because they tie it on and then expect you to pay them for it, but they would leave us alone and at one point the guy grabbed my arm and was like dont be mean, blah blah blah, and i was like dont touch me and yanked my arm from him. After that, we went to the top of the hill and took pictures of the outside of the church, but weren't allowed to take pictures of the inside. I tried looking for a postcard of the inside because i liked it because it is so different from other churches, but they didnt have any postcards. When we were done there, we attempted to go souvenir shopping, but we could only find one store, and also, since it was raining, none of the artists were there. i was pissed because thats the main reason i wanted to go there, but oh well, nothing you can do. Moulin Rouge is also on Montmarte so that was our next stop. Problem was we had no idea where it was or how to get there. We asked this lady how to get there and we did what she said, but it didn't lead us there, so we wandered for a while. Then Maio asked this chinese lady and finally got us there. It took forever because we had walked all over everwhere looking for this place. When we got there, it was cool, but kind of a let down. I took pictures of the windmill though. We walked down the street more looking for a place to eat with both onion soup and reasonable prices. Kinda hard to find. We ended up finding this place, and i ordered the french onion soup since we were in france! when we got the check, we thought they had done it wrong because what they do is put all the prices and stuff and then put the service charge. The tricky thing is the service charge is already added into the meals, not something extra we had to pay, but thats how it appears, so we ended up paying like 15 euros too much, but we decided to make that guys night and leave a huge tip because it was just easier than trying to go back and make change for everybody to have two more euros. After dinner we went back over to a place close to Notre Dame where we had seen some souvenir shops since we couldnt find any on MontMarte. Turns out it was so late that only two of them were open, but at least we got to look in two. I got a few things and then we headed back to the hostel. We got one last crepe, and this one i had nutella in. For any of you chocolate lovers, its heaven! It kinda made my stomach hurt because it was so much chocolate, but so worth it at the same time. Back at the hostel we just chilled in our room and stayed up kinda late talking about random stuff and laughing together. It was hilarious because we were talking about the differences in girls and guys using the restroom and about girls "airdrying" and "hovering" and so on. Our flight out was supposed to leave at like noon or something like that, and it was delayed. So far on our trips we have been super lucky and had no delayed flights, but not this time. It kept getting bumped back farther and farther and we ended up not leaving until like two something. This isnt a big problem except that we have class at 3 on mondays. Our flight was supposed to get back by around 2 and we ended up getting back around 5.