2nd Day Exploring on My Own

Well really I have explored more than two times on my own, but this was a whole afternoon that I went out by myself. Usually I am going out to meet Eddy somewhere or running errands. I think that I am getting really good about knowing my way around the city and that is a really satisfying feeling. Plus since the metro system runs just about everywhere you can never really get lost since you are bound to run into a station every couple of blocks. That is always a helpful thought when roaming around a strange city by yourself. At first my parents and Eddy were a little worried about me taking the metro by myself everyday, and to be honest I was a little nervous about it too. But after taking it with Eddy or our group of friends a few times before I did it myself I felt pretty safe about it. There are plenty of young women on the metro by themselves and they do it everyday, (that goes for old ladies as well). Plus a couple times a week I see groups of school children using the metro by themselves, without supervision and they are 6 years old. So I am definitely sure of the metro's safety, and just in case so I am not too trusting I still keep an eye out, don't worry.
In addition, the metro system is fairly simple to use. The French are really good about using lots of signs and arrows (that goes for on the streets of Paris too) so it's virtually impossible to get confused or lost. Lots of tourists like us use the metro when they come to visit. Every day you can see people bustling around figuring out their way. The only trick is to make sure you get on the train in time before the doors close. When the horn sounds that the doors are closing you better zip through or else the those doors are going to close (violently) on you. A few times I have seen groups of people get split in half as only half of their group makes it on the packed train while the other half has to waive them goodbye and get on the next train. Good part about that is that the trains come every five minutes or less, so you are never really waiting that long.
So now that my rant about the amazing transportation of Paris is over lol I guess I should go into what I saw while exploring. Since I came to Paris I have been trying to track down Monet's "Waterlily" paintings. They weren't at the Louvre, or the Orsay, so I figured that they must be at the Musee de l'Orangerie. I was right! The museum can be found in the Jardin des Tuileries. This garden is between the Louvre and the Place de Concorde. It was originally part of the Tuileries Palace, a palace built by Catherine de Medici after her husband King Henry II died in 1559. Later it was the residence of Louis XIV while he waited for Versailles to be built and Napoleon also lived there. Actually it was his main residence when he was in power. Part of the palace is now attached to the Louvre which is why you can see the "Napoleon Apartments." Only later the rest of the Palace and part of the Louvre were completely destroyed by fire. Today some of it has been restored and the gardens are open to the public.
I went to the gardens to check that out and to go to the l'Orangerie which is in the gardens and used to be a green house that stored orange trees during the winter months (makes sense right? lol). Anyway, the old green house (which must have been REALLY nice by the way) is now a museum that hosts works by Monet, Renoir, Picasso, and others. The surrounding gardens are now a play place for families, kids, and joggers. There is a theatre, trampoline, pony rides, Ferris wheel, and pond. I walked around the gardens for a while taking pictures before I went to the museum. As soon as I popped up from the metro and saw the gardens, they made me smile, they may be one of my favorite parts of Paris. The museum was also very special. The waterlily paintings (all 8 of them) are displayed in two large oval shaped rooms (see pics). Four paintings per room, each painting is quite large as it takes up a whole wall, it's very beautiful and impressive. The first room holds the waterlily paintings of sunrise to sunset, the second room has the paintings of waterlilies and willow trees.
The rest of the museum was also very nice with all the other paintings by famous artists. I highly recommend this museum to anyone visiting Paris in the future. It was my favorite!

Paris at Night

In my opinion everyone should see what Paris looks like at night. So now you all can share in the beauty of the Tower and the Champs Elysees. The picture of the tower is the last night that they lit it with the sparkle lights. They have decorated all the trees on the Champs Elysees with lights and then they also have lights that look like they are icicles dripping water. It is so cool!

A Day in London

On Saturday the 12th, we decided to go to London for the day. We boarded a train and 2 1/2 hours later, we were in London. Sara slept on the way there, but I just couldn't get comfortable. Anyways, once we got out of London, our first objective was to find out just exactly where we were. We exchange US Dollars for GB Pounds so we could have some spending money. We put down $60 and receive 23 pounds, depressing. Our first purchase was a map and some Burger King to refuel and figure our day out (Burger King is much better in the UK than in the states). After our quick snack and map look through, we decided to head to Big Ben which meant we needed subway (the tube) passes. This was an adventure in itself. We went to an automated teller and bought 2 tickets but only received one. This led to us standing in line to get our other ticket. We got a nice guy who helped us through the process, but made us say we were Canadian before we got our tickets, hmmm, America isn't well liked there. Well, us Canadians then hopped on the tube which is packed and headed to Big Ben. As soon as we walked up from the tube, BAM, Big Ben was right there and boy is it big. To get it in a picture, you literally have to walk about half a mile away. Across the river is the eye of London (the big ferris wheel) which seemed really fun to ride but we couldn't because it wasn't operational that day. From there, we walked around to the front of the parliament building to West Minister Abbey and then took the long way through parks and churches to Buckingham palace. We missed the changing of the guards, but there were still some guards there we got to see walk back and forth. The palace is quite large and is surrounded by parks and other statues. From there, we headed through Green Park to the tube to head to the British museum to spend our last hour and half in London. It was a sprint through to see as much as we could see. A personally favorite spot of mine was the room of the history of currency and printing currency. It was amazing to see how currency has evolved from the weights of certain metals to the printing of bills and coins. They even had a currency mint from the US that was used until the 1960's. We spent maybe 45 minutes there so we had time for a quick bite to eat. We had about 12 pounds left to spend so we headed to a local restaurant to have some fish and chips. We did and it was really good. After our quick meal, we jumped on the tube to head back to the train station to come home. It was a day that was tiring but filled with many memories that we will never forget. Probably the best thing about London was being somewhere where they spoke English and not French.