Paris June 7th -9th 2010

Paris June 7th -9th 2010

Arrived in Paris at 7 am. After the boredom of the 8 hour wait at Dax for the train the uncomfortable sleeping conditions and strange noises in the reclining seat section had almost seemed refreshing. I spent an hour or so becoming accustomed to the frustrations of the Parisian metro system then located my hostel in the south of the city and dumped my luggage. First thing I did was walk down to the Eiffel tower, which seemed to appear and disappear from behind buildings at every turn. This was causing a slight problem for me as I only had the unreliable map from the lonely planet to navigate by. According to said map there was meant to be a tourist info office ( and access to a better map ) at the tower site. Once I got there however the tourist office was nowhere to be found…..hmmm I was beginning to have major gripes with this guide book.

Despite this the tower itself was impressive and the walk to it from the hostel allowed me to take in the better aspects of Paris. The layout and architecture were better than what you would find in London without a doubt. I was feeling pretty good in spite of the lack of sleep…in fact I have come to realise that sleep deprivation gives you a mild high. I can see now why certain Cardiff based painter/decorators are inclined to stay up for 3 days on end without aid of stimulants ( Cardiff guys will get that ).

Next I walked along the banks of the Seine toward the Louvre. Again the sites were impressive and I began to realise how big the centre of Paris is compared to London . By the time I got to the Louvre I was pretty much exhausted and was contemplating putting off viewing the museum until the day after. Managed to find another wind and went in though. Saw the Mona Lisa and Venus D’milo amongst other treasures…pretty cool alright!

It was only upon leaving the museum that I saw a sign saying it would be closed on Tuesdays ( tomorrow in this case). I congratulated myself mentally on making the right choice on veiwing days. It did seem bizarre that the only place the museum had advised it would be closed Tuesdays was on a small sign that you could only see as you left the museum having already been there!!….I would find out over the next 2 days this kind of thing was common in Paris . Spent the next couple of hours trying to find a tourist office and map in vain…made it back to the hostel around 6 after sampling a Parisian Kebab on the way. ( not as good as Barcelona kebab for those who are interested)

The “aloha “ hostel did not live up to the description given to it by the guide book…what had drawn me there was the mention of “great drinks deal at the in house bar”. However when I checked in I discovered the “in house bar” consisted of a vending machine selling overpriced cans of Heineken. Also the majority of the people staying there seemed to be kids on school trips and there was a 2am curfew. My grudge against lonely planet was growing larger!!…..Decided to go up to the local supermarket and buy some cheap beer ( I say cheap relative to the hostel prices …Paris is the most expensive city I’ve ever been to).

Beer in hand I wandered the neighbourhood looking for some “action”, there didn’t seem to be much going on…After a while I spotted a guy who was staying in the same room as me doing exactly the same thing with Heineken in hand . I introduced myself turned out he was from Brazil and had an unpronounceable name. He advised me to use his nick name “mozzarella”. A cool guy we had a good chat while drinking cans outside the supermarket and taking turns to buy more…after many a can had been drunk we went back to the hostel to use the facilities and met two girls from Denmark and New York who were staying in another room. We ended up drinking together in a local bar until the 2 am curfew. Had a lot in common with the girl from New York who’s name was Amber so we made plans to hang out together and explore Paris the following day.

The next morning brought about the worst few hours of the whole trip for me so far. Had made plans to meet Amber at 11 after dropping my luggage at Gare du ’Lyon . As my train to Switzerland was leaving at 7.55 the next morning had decided before I got to Paris that I wouldn’t book a room on the second night and would stay up all night somewhere in stead. So I figured it would only take a hour or so to drop my bags at the station I would be leaving from the next day , plenty of time to get back to central Paris for 11am…how wrong I was..oh how wrong….

The situation wasn’t helped by my hangover or my choice to wake up early to get the free hostel breakfast ( the first time so far on the trip). I took me longer than I thought to get to the station and when I did get there had to walk for ages to find the luggage lockers. The signposting in the station seemed to be as well thought out as at the Louvre. I asked many times in my best French “excuse moi mouisuree..ou est le Consieeres?” By the time I asked the third member of staff I had to resist shouting at his slow and dismissive answer ” tout suit mon amie!!!…je suis tres retarde pour un rendevous avec un beaux fille!!” .

When I did find the lockers I didn’t have the 4 euros in coins I needed and the change machine didn’t take 50 Euro notes …had to spend another 20mins finding an atm machine…the closest of which was about 50m up the road…I began to curse Gare du Lyon and stated to feel like the disgusted “ late for a plane” American you often see in the London underground “God what is wrong with this country man!!!”. The situation was worsened when I got back to the lockers as the change machine was now broken meaning I had to buy a over priced Pepsi to get coins…once the stuff was in the lockers and I was on the metro back to town began to chill out a bit and laugh at myself…“Its still way more fun than credit management” I realised. Eventually got to the meeting point an hour after I was supposed to, and luckily my friend had waited and was just about to leave when I caught her.

We spent the afternoon walking towards Sacre Coeur…and saw an odd protest at the Arc de Triomphe on the way …a couple hundred hospital workers dressed in scrubs throwing firecrackers and lighting petrol fires surrounded by about 50 riot police in full gear..we waited around I the hope it would kick off but we were disappointed when the all walked off down the Champs-Elysees without a punch being thrown.

The walk up to Sacre Coeur took a couple of hours but it was worth it for the view at the top. Having decided not to go up the Eiffel tower the day before and spend the money at the museum this was my first view of all of the city and it was well impressive…definitely the coolest city ive ever been to on first impressions (despite the lack of efficient signposting). We spent the rest of the day drinking cans of beer at the gardens near the Louvre and then found a cheap bar for the evening. As amber was staying at the same hostel again that night she managed to get me inside the building even though I had checked out. Unfortunately there were no spare beds in her room so I couldn’t sneak an extra nights sleep for free. We said goodbye at around 1.30am and I sat in the communal area using the free wi-fi until 5am when I left to get the metro back to the train station.

By the time I got to the station I was hallucinating through lack of sleep…Almost had a Bad Lieutenant moment when I found out , after lugging all my stuff from the cursed locker room to the main platform, that my train would be leaving from a smaller platform right back next to the lockers…“arghhhh arghhhh what is wrong with this country man“….Eventually got on the train and fell asleep instantly….

In summary France was an interesting week and a half , one of 2 halves you might say…the lazy week in Leon sleeping in couldn’t have been more different to the all go no sleep 2 days in Paris….overall though I would say it came very close to Spain in terms of enjoyment but didn’t beat it.

Next stop Lausanne in Switzerland.