..Carly's London Living..: Bonjour from Paris

(Let the BACKPACKING weekend begin!!)

Our weekend to Paris was amazing and definitely eventful. From the very beginning we had crazy stories and memories. I thought I almost got left behind because I am a zombie in the morning and didn't hear them say they were leaving. I nearly had a heart attack. And since it was three in the morning and tubes dont run that early, we were taking a bus to the train station. When we got to the bus, Sharon's bus pass was out of money. Luckily the bus driver helped us out. And as we were sitting on the bus, another bus was driving alongside us and one of the passengers straight up pulled down his pants and mooned us! And then we all laughed our heads off, and the bus drove by again and he mooned us yet again! When we arrived at what we thought was the station, it was closed.

We eventually found the real station and it was open, but we were there so early that we had to wait in an empty hallway before we could go through customs. And then of course we finally made it through when Kaylee's bag got fully investigated. And then we were split up on the train. Luckily I was placed by Liz. I couldn't sleep so I did homework, listened to music and wrote letters and postcards. When I woke up I had a panic attack thinking we were already a the station and I didn't have my stuff put back in my bag and that they were going to leave me. Morning is not quite my forte. But through all of this, I was still on cloud nine, since we were on our way to PARIS!!

(Liz and I on the EuroStar... under-water train??)

From there I took over as group leader. We got metro tickets, then we wandered the streets for fun, and headed to the louvre then wandered and got a little lost but we made it there thanks to kind french pedestrians and maps. On our way we got les pains au chocolate. After the louvre we meant to go to the notre dame bur went the wrong way and instead walked through les jardins DES Tuileries them back along the seine. We discovered some crazy government building which was cool. Then we made it to st chapelle which was gorgeous. The stained glass was spectacular. Thanks Liz for the suggestion! Then we got ham and cheese crepes and went into he notre fame cathedral. We were inspired to take fun pictures outside then head up the 400 stairs to the top of the notre dame bell Tower. We saw the bell and went through a tiny door then made it all the way down the door.

(Group shot outside of the Louvre)

(Ashley and I by the Notre Dame Bell) (She's my Spring/Summer roomie)

Then we went to these old Paris crypts. We thought they would be the catacombs, but we were wrong. It was still cool though, and there were some gentle heaters. Praise the Lord. From there we made it over to the Eiffel tower, got some pictures then grabbed us some dinner. Some got baguettes with geese and I got a ham sandwich with Annie and an evion. Wow I love evion. Best water ever. Then we met with Allison brown and raced to keep up with her and her friends as we ran to a young single adults crepe night and institute activity. They stopped on the way so Ashley could get chocolate. I found hazelnut milka. Heaven. And the crepes at the crepe night were so Yummy! So cool being with the locals f our age and Sein how the church works over here. Same church. Same hymns. Different language. Craziness. Apparently if a woman can flip a crepe six times then she will get married in the next year. Liz is doomed. I'm obviously too little for that so I didn't even try. Haha or I was just shy and couldn't speak good enough french to talk to the people there and felt a little nervous.

Oh, and the funniest thing happened to me. A stranger freaking slapped my face on the metro!! I was just minding my own business waiting for the next metro-train to arrive; we were all so tired that we were sitting there like sleeping bunnies. The train starts pulling up and this guy just turned, walked 1-2 feet up to me, then did a back-hand slap on my left cheek. It wasn't that hard or anything, but I don't know why he felt compelled to do that. It happened so fast that my only reaction was surprised/shocked/confused/entertained. Then he just turned and disappeared in the crowd. I hopped on the train so I wouldn't miss it, turned back around to hold on, and saw the tall black man just looking at me from outside the train door. He was so close to the door that I worried his nose would get stuck when the door closed. Liz thought it looked like he freaking kissed me, so I guess I'm lucky! Who knows? It may have been some strange Parisian curse or something. Hahaha, oh the strangeness of my life sometimes! Too much fun!

Then we made it home to our hostel. It smells awful and is loud, but it's perfect.

Basically, this day was crazy. We smashed in a weeks worth of sites and activities in one day, and somehow survived. Some of our troop struggled near the end, but we all survived it and are happy and healthy and are definitely well-used.

So let's be honest here. I am dreadful at making Blogger put my pictures where I want them to be. These pictures below are a little out of order, but you get the idea :)

(Allison Brown from my French class @ Olympus High & I)

(London Crew)

(A couple from Prague took this picture for us. They gave us their email and are going to give us Prague travel ideas for our travel week in Prague. Victory!!)