13 April 2013

Travels: Paris Day V

The other loves of my life. Caramel, milk chocolate, creme brulee, hazelnut, olive oil, coffee, dark chocolate;
chocolate passion fruit, dark chocolate, black currant, rose, passion fruit, olive oil and praline, wine.
On Saturday we slept in (again), but can you blame us after Friday? Saturday was focused on sweets as we stopped at Pierre Herme (again! one can never have too many macarons...) and searched for some candy shops I had looked up. None of them worked out (they simply didn't exist at that address anymore), but we did get to peruse some shirt/tie shops and stumbled upon an organic burger food cart run by Americans with a man taking orders translating. Quite impressive actually, and I don't have any pictures unfortunately, but it was a few streets from the Opera and near a food market.

The day continued at a much more relaxed pace at the gardens of the Louvre. The line to the museum was huge compared to the previous day, which made me feel pretty clever. We did stop in to get chocolates and lunch (the Louvre is a bit like a mall with all its shops). The gardens had more sculptures, a couple of ponds and loads of tourists, but it actually was pretty cool because I hadn't really encountered tons of tourists except up the Champs to the Arc and Notre Dame (though, I didn't really notice the people then).







We continued our walk to a metro station and emerged a few streets from the Eiffel Tower. Aided by my boyfriend's superior navigation skills, we found the right direction and soon were in front of the most iconic fixture of Paris. I'm not really sure why people call the Tower itself romantic (or "get married" to it), but it was certainly impressive. One couple thought so, at least, as they walked and took pictures in front of it, newly married with a white dress and everything (so much cheese).



The line certainly took long enough, especially when all I could think about was ice cream, but eventually we were allowed up and came to the edge to see this:

Bonus points if you can find Notre Dame.


Toward the business district.

The Seine.
Lovely as seeing the city was, being up that high was way too cold so we climbed down after a little more exploring (the Tower has a movie theater, restaurant and even a dance floor, but we were looking for less expensive plans). As we walked away, it became dark enough that the on-the-hour sparkling lights would start up. We saw a little of the show before we fell into a metro station again.

Dinner was in order and we found a lively Italian restaurant with comfy orange chairs and enough French people to make me certain it was a good decision (French people, instead of only tourists, at a restaurant indicates that it will likely be good, or at least won't be awful...). The girls at the table next to us kept ordering rounds of thinly sliced raw meat, which was impressive by the third giant tray. Instead, I went with a red Beaujolais (the first I'd been able to find since I'd sampled one in the States; I was actually really happy to see it on the menu) and their special pizza: goat cheese and tomato with greens on top, which turned out to be a very good idea as I nearly ate the entire thing on my own. For dessert, I ordered chocolate, coffee and coconut (super tasty) ice cream which came with biscotti. While we ate, we talked about the metaphysical and logical impossibility of the Doctor, limits in calculus and my experience with silly customers as a waitress back home.

Coke and wine? Yes. Water? You'd better make a point to ask for that.
So innovative with their square shaped salad bowls. It looked good, though.
Chewy crust and proof that Europe actually puts salad on pizza: awesome.
Yummy. Coconut was definitely my favorite.
 I don't know if it's the weather or the food or the foreignness, but Paris is so nice. Any unfortunate aspect (not finding a certain candy shop, walking through a dirty metro station) is made instantly better by a slight breeze, pretty architecture and a good meal.

Day I. Day II + III. Day IV.

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