Haven't done anything quite so crazy as my last couple of posts, but saw some cool stuff, so here it is.
After Pamplona I made my stop on the French Riviera in Beziers. Had some good luck as I got into town during some big town festival where they had a concert in the main plaza which was right outside my hotel room:
The next day I spent at the beach. This isn't really a tourist beach... I think it's where all the French people go since the tourists are at Cannes, Nice, etc. Was surprised to see some French kids playing football on the beach. Not soccer football, football football.
After Beziers, I went to Lyon. Every French town has 2 or 3 Notre Dame's. This is one of Lyon's.
Here was the view out of the hostel, not too bad.
Like most things in Europe, Lyon was created by the Romans. Here's some of the Roman ruins. Just the old stones...not the big concert set up.
Took a daytrip from Lyon to Bourg-en-Bresse, a small town like 30 minutes away and caught the Tour de France. There was a lot of sitting around and waiting considering the actual bikers going through took all of 10 seconds. Still a cool experience and I got a lot of free crap from the parades.
After Lyon, it was on to Paris. My first day I hit up the real Notre Dame. Me looking very authoritative:
You can climb the steps up on top of the cathedral to get a close look at the gargoyles:
You can also get up in the bell tower. In this next picture I wasn't imitating the hunchback, that's just how my back looks after carrying my huge backpack all over Europe.
After that I went over to Champs-de-Elysses, a huge strip that leads from the Louvre to the Arc de Triomph and beyond. Here's the Arc from far away (obviously).
Teresa you were right, Champs is crazy. Every kind of store you can think of. Chanel and Dolce next to McDonald's and Virgin Records. Car dealerships, night clubs...anything you can think of.
My first night also happened to be Bastille Day night. Bastille Day I think is like France's 4th of July or something. So once again I got fireworks, and once again there was no music. If you're gonna take the time to plan a big fireworks show, set it to music. I mean come on, that's like eating pumpkin pie without whip cream. Sure it'll taste pretty good, but just that little extra step and you have an immaculate creation. Metaphors (or is that a simile? I've been out of school too long) aside, I thought the French were artistic.
They did do one cool thing though. They had lights on the Eiffel Tower that made it look like it was sparkling. I have a video of that and some fireworks, but once again, I can't get the videos working. Well anyway, here's the Eiffel with it's normal night lighting.
I took that on one of the bridges over the Seine. As I was sitting there, three of the girls I had gone canyoning with in Switzerland saw me and came up to me and we chatted a while about what we had been doing since. Crazy coincidence.
The next day was a long one. I started out in the morning at the catacombs. The catacombs are quarries that run all under Paris that they couldn't dig in anymore for fear of collapse. Since the cemeteries were overflowing at the time and people were getting sick from them, they started throwing bodies down in the quarries. Today there's like 6 million bodies worth of bones down there, stacked in fun little rows. Nice to know I was down in a tunnel 150 feet underground with horrible ventilation with a bunch of corpses that were moved because they made people sick.
You couldn't use flash down there out of respect for the dead, so pictures were hard to come by. Here's one that at least shows something.
After the catacombs, I headed over to the Louvre. The Louvre is huge. I thought it was just paintings, but it's all kinds of crap. This is looking out from one wing over the famous pyramid.
Next few pics are all from the Louvre.
Here's Napoleon's mirror. I didn't know he was so Liberace-esque.
The Venus de Milo. Just a normal statue in my opinion. I guess it has some history though.
Here's the Mona Lisa room. It's the lone picture on that middle wall. It was a bit of a fight to get up to the front, but I eventually made it. Would post a picture from up front, but I'm assuming you all know what it looks like.
Next for my favorite pictures.
Didn't know he was so big in France... in the 1750's. But here's Keanu Reeves.
I think the correct answer in the 1700's to, "Does this dress make me look fat?" was, "Yes, huge. You've got an enormous ass honey."
After the Louvre it was off to Versailles. Here's a view from outback in the gardens looking at the chateau. Nice digs.
Here is the Hall of Mirrors where Louis XV held all his keggers.
That was a long day.
This morning it was time for the tower. Me in front.
And here's a view from the top. It's a rip off. There's 3 levels and you can take the stairs up the first 2. But you have to take an elevator up to the top which is another $5. Not horrible, but you have to wait 45 minutes at least to get on. And of course it started raining when I was up there to go along with the gale force winds.
Eventually got up there though. Here's the view from the top looking west over the main park (Bois I think).
And now you are up to the minute. Here was one last sign I saw on the way home that I thought was kind of funny. Apparently if you're in the Paris metro and lightning strikes, limbo under it.
Got to run. Out of time. Talk to you later.
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