safe and sound

{This is a post I wrote directly after I returned from Paris. I have a good excuse for not posting for so long this time!}

Hello world.
Here I am, returned safe and sound from three chilly, wonderful days in Paris. Paris, you may have heard, is a big place, so I’m going to post all my photos event by event.

On the first day, after we arrived in Paris, we took a bus tour of the city seeing things like the Paris opera hall (a big thing with me), Notre Dame and the Champs Élysées. Afterwards we went to the hostel where we stayed for three nights, and left again not long afterwards to spend the evening in some small seedy corner of the city whose name I have forgotten. Rest assured it was lovely. We had dinner there (plus escargots) and spent some time exploring the backstreets.

The second day we spent a pitifully short time at the Louvre, then took the metro to the Eiffel Tower. Unfortunately we couldn’t climb it because of the ice and snow, but we were there all the same, proven by the Eiffel Tower-shaped pasta I bought. We had lunch near the Centre Pompidou, a modern art museum, and explored the streets a little. I also bought postcards, of course.
That night we had some free time at the Champs Élysées where I did some shopping and had dinner at a great Italian restaurant with some great people. Mmm, lasagna.

On the third morning we went to Montmartre where we visited the Sacre Cœur and bought lots of souvenirs. We had lunch near the Moulin Rouge, where I bought a beautiful pair of boots and an awesome T-shirt, then took the metro back to the Centre Pompidou and spent a couple of hours there. I couldn’t get into the gallery because I didn’t have ID on me, so I spent a while looking at their fantastic gallery shop (hello, French contemporary art home deco) then went up to the cafe and had coffee with a couple of frankly fantastic people I met there.
Afterwards we went to Saint Michel and saw Notre Dame (for ten minutes, and only the outside – who goes to Notre Dame and doesn’t go inside?!), then I spent the evening with those two fantastic people walking around the shopping district being crazy. We three had dinner at this amazing American 50’s diner we found (bagels, burgers and milkshakes) and I bought an ‘I heart Paris’ T-shirt (well, duh).
After helping get the many drunk exchange students back to the hostel (about 70% of them; another blog post to come) and getting patted down for alcohol we finally got some sleep.

Next morning we got up at six and took the bus to the airport. One of the fantastic people I met and I took trains back to our host families for the next five months, while the others got on the plane back to Australia.
I had lunch and wrapped all the presents I bought in Paris (attention, family!).

{Well, that’s about it. The reason I haven’t posted for a month is that I left my Australian adapter in the hostel room. So I’ve been without my computer at all for over four weeks – which has not been easy, I tell you. Anyway, I haven’t been able to transfer my photos from my *brand spankin’ new camera*, but they should be up in the next couple of days when my new adapter arrives.}

More to come,
elly xx.