Trip Report: France & Switzerland Day 2 – Paris

Sunday August 29, 2004

Today, despite our best efforts, we slept in until 8:30 a.m. Then, it took us a while to get going, because our funky showerhead makes cleaning up hard.

We went to Les Delices au Fourneil, around the corner from our hotel, for breakfast, and had a pain au chocolat and OJ. Then we took the train to Versailles, arriving around 11 a.m.

The place was packed with thousands and thousands of people.

It took about an hour to get in, get through security, and buy our tickets.

Then, another hour to tour the State Apartments.

The Hall of Mirrors was under restoration, but luckily a section of it was still visible – this was my favourite part of the palace’s interior.

We then proceeded outside, to tour the gardens.

We left the palace around 2 p.m. and had lunch in Versailles at Classe Croque. Chad had a Dandy chicken baguette, and mine was L’Artiste, with mozzarella and basil.

We took the metro back into Paris, and went to the Eiffel Tower.

We had won passes by entering an online competition, and these allowed us to skip the line. We went up the tower, visiting all 3 floors, taking the elevator up and the stairs back down.

Then we walked over to the Arc de Triomphe and Champs-Elysses, which was also packed with people.

It started raining a bit as we began looking for a place to eat dinner. We wound up going for French fast food at a restaurant called Quick. Chad had the cordon bleu combo, and I had chicken strips and salad. We walked back to our home neighbourhood for dessert, where we found a creperie and ordered a chocolate and banana crepe to share.

Exhausted from the day, we headed back to the hotel to watch the closing ceremonies of the Olympics.

Some observations about Paris:

There are tiny Smart cars everywhere.

Not as many dogs as you would think.

The Champs-Elysses does not have all the expensive shops; they’re on the side streets.

There is a lack of variety in the food in the areas we have visited – it’s all paninis, baguettes and croque monsieurs, or chicken roti/steak tartare/frites.