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Our time in Paris is flying by fast. Today is our 5th and the last of our full day stay here. We haven't made our way to the Eiffel Tower yet. We also haven't had a chance to go back to Louvre, visit Sacré Coeur in Montmartre, climb the Arc de Triomphe, shopping in Galeria Lafayette... The list just goes on--so many things we wanted to do but not enough time. The most important thing for us today was to go to the Eiffel Tower--our trip to Paris just wouldn't be complete if we missed it! We looked out the window after we got up--yippy! The sun was out! Our plan panned out--we saved the "best" for the last and we were rewarded with a sunny day! We walked out of our hotel. For once the weather was pleasant, and I was excited that I could wear my new sunglasses again.
We rode the subway to the Eiffel Tower. When we got there, there were already long lines of people waiting to get up there. I made my way to one of the lines. Geoff was restless, he was convinced he could find a faster line, so he took off to check things out. About 10 minutes later, he rushed back toward me urging me to follow him because he had found a much shorter line. I looked behind me, seeing the many people already gathered behind me--I was very relunctant to give up my position. But Geoff was very insistant, so I joined him. He took me to this line, and sure enough, it was MUCH shorter than other lines. But I wasn't entirely convinced because I suspected this line was not for buying the ticket to get to the top. I argued with Geoff that he had picked the wrong line, and a girl stood in front of us very helpfully informed us that this was indeed for buying the tickets to walk up to the first level of the Tower only. And we wouldn't be able to buy tickets for the upper levels when we get up to the first level. ::sigh:: After all that, I gave up my line for nothing! We ended up had to start all over again at the end of a new queue. As we stood there waiting to buy the tickets, the sun was shining very brightly. :) Adding the many people around us, it was getting pretty hot. I noticed many people around me were eating ice creams, and they looked so tempting. So I told Geoff to take Andy to get some ice cream. A little while later, Andy came bouncing back sucking on a popsicle--what happened to the ice cream cones? Geoff shrugged and said Andy wanted a popsicle instead. But, but, but, I wanted an ice cream... ::pouting::
The line was horrandously long, and it moved very slowly. Half way through, all of a sudden, a message displayed on the chashier's window that the top level of the Eiffel Tower was closed due to an overflow of people up there, and they were only selling the tickets up to the second level! How disappointing! I was quite upset that we couldn't get to the top level of the Tower, Andy started to complain it was getting too hot for him. Geoff jokingly told him that he could wish for a cloud to roll in to cover the sun up a bit. So Andy started talking to the sky how he wanted a piece of cloud to block the sun. Five minutes later, the sun started to disappear behind the dark clouds! Wait, we just got a break with the sun today, and it's disappearing again?! "Good job, Andy!" Geoff and I said sarcastically, "look what you've done to so many tourists here!" "But, but, I only wished for a puny little cloud above my head, I didn't ask for so many dark ones!" Andy "whined" innocently. I figured it was a good time to remind him the lesson of being careful about what you wish for...
Finally, after a long wait, we got on the elevator to go up. We learned that once we get to the 2nd level, if we wanted to continue on to the top level, we could wait there for it to be open again and purchase additional tickets to go up. But it would be another one and half hour wait at least. Uhm, maybe it's not such a good idea to go all the way up to the top afterall. We got to the second level, and we got a pretty good panoramic view of Paris. Andy was very excited to spot Notre Dame, Arc de Triomphe, and other land marks of Paris. We lingered there for quite some time to enjoy the view and snap pictures. By the time we were ready to go down, Geoff decided we should walk the stairs instead of waiting for the long line to get on the elevator. This really was his first really good idea of the day IMHO! The walking down the stairs of Eiffel Tower turned out to be very pleasant. By the time we got down to the ground, it started to rain again--pouring in fact! We were hungry again since our last meal was in the morning. Surprisingly, Andy wanted mussels again, and more surprisingly Geoff said he had enough and wanted something else! Knowing how good Geoff is with his sense of detecting good food--I trusted him to find another place for us to eat. Geoff decided we should head back to Saint Germain district. Sure enough, following his lead, we ended up in this little cafe restaurant called Le Pré aux Clercs on 30 rue Bonaparte. We ordered a feast--french onion soup, paté, warm mozzarella cheese with salad drizzled in Balsamic Vinegrette, lamb chops, and grilled duck. The food was fabulous--everything turned out very tasty. Andy couldn't get enough of the lamb, and he was fighting with his dad for the chops!
We spent a long time eating our dinner and drinking our wines, by the time we finished, it was already past 7:00 pm. I wanted to visit Galeria Lafeyatte afterward. But Geoff noticed that the ads from our hotel's pamphlet says it closes at 7:30 pm! Huh?! I had no idea Parisian malls all close so early, on weekends too! The only exception is Thursday when they close at 9pm.
Oh well, there was nothing I could do now, and it was pouring pretty hard again. So we decided to head back to the direction of our hotel. After all these days, I haven't had a chance to walk along Champs-Elyssie yet (Geoff had taken Andy there one night after I crashed into the hotel bed). So we ended up took a rather short stroll along the famed street in a soaking rain before we headed back to our hotel.
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From: (Anonymous)
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mick
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It was nice to get a respite from the rain for half a day. Poor Andy, he was rather defensive when we teased him that he brought the rain back to us!
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Andy is doing well with his pictures!
I hope you get some ice cream eventually :)
I love the style of this collage, btw! Very cute!!
From:
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Hehe, Andy and I teased him quite bit and gave him a hard time for that. I was pretty bummed we couldn't go all the way up. But then in retrospect, it probably worked out better anyway because it'd be too high up to take pictures of the Parisian skylines.
It wasn't until we got to Cannes that I was able to taste ice-cream! It must've been because I was denied the treat then, I now seems to want ice cream/gelato all the time!
Thanks!!