Paris

Day 1

I arrived in Paris from my overnight train ridiculously early in the morning, and having had little sleep on the car (there were no couchettes left when I booked my ticket, so I was stuck with a reclining seat).  After getting to the station and having a little breakfast, I set off to figure out transit passes for Colin and I for the day.  Once all of that was sorted, I caught the bus to the airport to meet up with Colin.  The bus was soooo busy - apparently the rail line to Charles De Gaulle Airport wasn't working, so everyone and their mother were taking the bus.  Unfortunately I made it to the airport after Colin had already landed, but we managed to meet up and get back on the bus to downtown Paris.  We went straight to the hotel to drop off our bags, shower, and get ready for the day.

This first day we covered a lot of sights.  We visited the Musee d'Orsay, and went up the Eiffel Tower.

After the tower we went on a Seine River boat tour, it was quite neat seeing the major landmarks from the river.

Colin passed out about 2/3 of the way through the boat tour, so he got a nice 20+ minute nap in (a good thing since he'd gotten very little sleep on the plane).  After the boat tour, we went to a restaurant along the river.  Just as we finished dinner the sun had set, and the Eiffel Tower became lit up, and there was a light show.  It was really neat to see.

We then made our way back to the hotel....walking in the rain for a good portion of the journey.  We had to transfer Metro lines, and the easiest way to do that was to walk from the Musee d'Orsay to the Louvre.  But, while that was the easiest way, it wasn't exactly fun in the rain (it had started raining while we were on the Metro from the Eiffel Tower to the Musee d'Orsay).  But, we arrived at the hotel, dried off and went to sleep.


Day 2

Colin and I had a slow start to our day today.  After sleeping in, I went out to get some supplies for breakfast, while Colin stayed at the hotel and did some work.  We left the hotel to go to the FedEx Paris depot, only to find out that my camera had still been sent to Amboise (even though I asked that it be re-directed and stay in Paris).  So that was no good!  I'm still camera-less, and I have no idea when I'll get my camera.

Today we decided to walk the Champs Elysee.  We started off at the Arc de Triomphe, and worked our way towards the Louvre.

We stopped in at the Swarovski store and the Luis Vuitton store.

We stopped for lunch along the Champs.  After making it most of the way down the Champs, we decided to detour and visit Notre Dame.

After our busy day of touring we got on a train headed to Rome.