Last day in Paris

My last day in Paris - I was determined to do a LOT today. I was aiming to walk from Notre Dame to Musée du Louvre, and then the entire length of the Champs-Élysées to the Arc de Triomphe, as well as fitting in a couple of gardens.

Don't forget to check out my Flickr set for Paris, which includes my favourite/best photos of Paris. I only ever include a selection here, my complete selection of favourites gets posted to Flickr:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/81692166@N05/sets/72157645070916388/

After leaving the apartment at about 9 in the morning, I headed to the first of the phone shops I was recommended yesterday. They hadn't heard of Ortel, the SIM card I wanted, so I ended up with a Lebara SIM, which will allow me to call and text the folks for free when they get over here. The free service covers all of Europe!

I then began my long day of walking by going to Notre Dame. I couldn't believe when I got there that the queue was so long - it was on par with the line to get into the Eiffel Tower yesterday. I hadn't ever planned on going into either, especially with only two days to see the city:

The queue for Notre Dame. Pass.

After taking a few exterior shots, I came across a nice bakery in the area that had fairly decent prices. I ended up getting a cretois, and had the first half on a bridge over the Seine, while doing some people watching. I've eaten raw tomatos and eggs so far on this trip - what is happening to me!?

A cretois on the banks of the Seine.

There are so many bridges over the Seine, let alone the famous ones like Pont Neuf and Pont des Arts. After doing some more walking, I had another break on a seat right on the bank of the river.

I found out later from my GPS photo app that I walked 20 kilometres today. In that time, I started to appreciate that the major attractions are not necessarily the most photogenic. The whole of Paris is nice, and some of the things to be seen in between are more than worth stopping at, like this flower shop:

Beautiful varieties of colours and smells here

The sights of the major tourist attractions are still amazing. I walked past the Louvre, Place de la Concorde, Champs-Élysées and l'Arc de Triomphe. The arch was undergoing construction and had a military ceremony when I got there, so I didn't take very many photos. Rather disappointing, as it is a fair way past Place de la Concorde, which is the last major attraction before it.

I then took the Metro to Musee de l'Armée. It was here where things went downhill very quickly. After not wearing a hat, I discovered that I had burnt my forehead. Went into my bag to get sunscreen out, and discovered that the lid had come off, resulting in sunscreen on the inside of my bag. And then I got to the museum and found out it closed to visitors entering the gardens just as I arrived:

 The Musée de l 'Armee

So having briefly taken some shots of the museum, which I will just have to visit next time I'm in Paris, I walked over to Le Jardin du Luxembourg. Yet another massive garden complex with a museum, flowerbeds, fountains and hedges. I ate the second half of my cretois here, then got on another Metro, this time to Montmartre:

Fountain at the Le Jardin du Luxembourg

Sacre Coeur is the main attraction there. People go to sit on the steps with magnificent vistas over Paris, and to see the church. I managed to get there at around dusk, so the lights went on while I was there. Everything in Paris is so photogenic:

The Parisian cityscape from Montmartre

The hawkers made the transition from amusing to irritating today. I issued my first 'casse toi, s'il te plait!' to a guy following me trying to put a bracelet on my wrist at the foot of Montmartre. Once you try to touch me, I will get mad.

That's the last of my travels in Paris for today, I'm on a TGV to Frankfurt tomorrow.

1 day down, 84 to go!

Today was my first of two days in Paris, which automatically meant that I was going to have to choose carefully what I wanted to see. I'd already come up with a plan of sorts, which involved missing out on some things I would have liked to see. An extra day would have made my plans much different.

Picking up on the RER ride to Le Bourget, where I'm staying, I disembarked at Le Bourget and walked the 15 minutes to my AirBNB booking on Avenue Couturier. For a few terrifying moments I couldn't get past the security door, until I realised I wasn't pushing the door hard enough.

Once I let myself in to the apartment, I sat down for a while and gathered my thoughts. After about an hour, I went out to the Tabac (tobacco shop) down the road that supposedly sold the SIM card I was looking for. Sadly, they didn't, but I did manage to negotiate talking in French with the Frenchman running the shop, which was an achievement.

I also went for a run around the Le Bourget area, including over a massive rail yard, where I saw something you only usually see in Europe, a train with two decks of cars. I also went past a Carrefour, which is kind of like the Woolworths of France, except they have more smaller Express stores dotted around the city as well as the enormous ones:

Trains with cars. Only in Europe.

After getting back to the apartment, I grabbed my camera, backpack and tripod before heading down to La Courneuve - 8 Mai 1945, the local Metro station. I successfully purchased a carnet of 10 tickets and headed into the city. My first stop was the tourist information centre, where I was given the details of some local independent phone shops. A job for tomorrow me thinks.

I snapped a few photos of the Opéra while I was in the area, then boarded a Metro to the Jardin du Trocadero (Trocadero Garden). From there my plan was to walk the length of Champ de Mars and try and make it to Notre Dame and the Musée du Louvre if there was time.

I had my first experience of street hawkers at Trocadero, selling small Eiffel Tower trinkets. They were all being politely rejected, until he approached a group of American tourists. Keeping the 'American tourist' stereotype alive, this escalated into a standoff between the hawker and a man, with a woman trying to track down the police with the line 'Can you get the police? This guy is irritating.' Said the American:

 A couple of my favourites from Trocadero Gardens

I learned so much in my first couple of hours of photography in Paris. It's much better to shoot away from the sun if possible, and I took this knowledge plus a couple of extra pointers the guys at work gave me before I left to improve my photography skills.

I eventually walked the whole of Champ de Mars, going from Trocadero Gardens and its fountains, to the Eiffel Tower, along the Champ de Mars and around the École Militaire (Military School), but it took much longer than I thought. I started the walk from École Militaire to Notre Dame at dusk, and made up my mind to stop when I got to the Musee de l'Armée, which had a fantastic garden. I made a note to try to visit it tomorrow:

My favourite photo of École Militaire

I had brought a small point-and-click camera with me, so that if I wanted someone to take my photo I wouldn't have to hand over my DSLR. But I gained new respect for the photography community today - there were enough people with good cameras that I felt absolutely comfortable giving them my own, all day.

I got back to the apartment having not eaten anything since breakfast, and realised I didn't really feel like anything. I sat around with Hassib and Kamel, my hosts, and watched the last of the first match in the World Cup.

That's the last of my travels in Paris for today, catch me again tomorrow for the Notre Dame, Musée du Louvre and the Champs-Élysées, among others. Be sure to check out my Flickr set for Paris, which will include my favourite/best photos of Paris:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/81692166@N05/sets/72157645070916388/