Fall Break
Trip Start
Sep 03, 2007
1
14
21
Trip End
Dec 22, 2007
Where I stayed
Paris, Île-de-France, France
Monday, November 12, 2007
With that said, my latest adventure was about two weeks ago now. It was fall break for all of us IES students. I was lucky that my boyfriend, Kevin, was able to come and spent this week with me! We had been planning it for quite some time and he had been saving money up so we could go on this adventure together. We decided that we would spend time here in Roma and Paris. I had been to Paris before, but knew going with Kevin it would be a completely different experience.
Kevin arrived on Sunday morning at 6:45 in the morning, now as many of you might know, in order to fight jet leg you are suppose to go right into the schedule of the time zone you are in. Perhaps Kevin now wishes he had flown in at a later time!!! :- ) The first day I took him to the major sights in Rome, Coliseum, Pantheon, Trevi...etc. We had fun, for the most part....and I say this because Kevin was extremely tired and I was not. I think I was pushing too much and expecting him to be really excited when in actuality all he probably wanted was to sleep. I had forgotten how hard jet leg can be. So I later apologized for this and realized that I probably wasn't being completely fair with him. Despite this we still had a nice day and managed to have a good first day.
We stayed at a hostel in Rome called The Beehive. This was my first time staying in a Hostel where you are in a dorm room. It was interesting how people were coming in and out. When I had to get up early, or come in late I always felt bad about making too much noise. But I guess when you come into a hostel that is just part of the deal, so I'm sure people didn't care. The hostel was so comfortable and the staff was so friendly. Also, they had a vegetarian café on the bottom floor which was amazing. They have two cooks who make everything fresh. We had a delicious breakfast there one morning.
The second day we went to the Vatican/St. Peter's. Luckily we didn't have to wait to long in the line, sometimes it can be hours. But thanks to Rick Steves ( my hero) he gave us the right suggestion of a good time to go. We wandered the museum/Sistine Chapel and St.Peter's Basilica. It was really nice- by the time we were done though we were pretty worn out though as sight seeing can go.
We had an early night because we had to wake up at 4 AM to catch our flight to PARIS.
Paris, beautiful Paris. We were both really tired from waking up so early once we arrived to Paris, but that didn't stop us! Our hostel was located by Monmartre, a church on a hilltop which has beautiful views of Paris. We walked to the top and took in the view, it was beautiful. After that, we went back to the hostel and got bundled up for the rest of the night. Let me tell you, Paris is amazing at night. I think most cities in Europe come alive in the night time. We walked to the Eiffel tower and it is amazing at night. Our first night we treated ourselves to a really nice dinner, Kevin had duck, which he is still talking about! And I had some salmon. Plus the dessert was delicious.
The next three days we did a combination of museums and the major sights of Paris, which of course included plenty of walking-Something I have found hard to avoid while in Europe! It's all good though, after eating all the delicious food it is necessary to walk it off!
Speaking of walking it off, the night we decided to go up the Eiffel tower, somehow we ended up in the line to climb the stairs in the Eiffel instead of taking the elevator! We went to the second platform, not all the way to the top. You can't climb to the top via stairs...only elevator. We decided that the second tier was good enough for us, besides, according to Rick Steves the best views are from the second tier! J I definitely felt the climb in my thighs the next day! But hey, we saved quite a bit of money by climbing it ourselves...who needs an elevator!
Aside from the sights, Paris has some wonderful culinary delights. We had croissants every morning with coffee, baguette sandwiches, crepes, delicious wine and of course duck for Kevin. Oh and I must admit, I had starbucks in Paris. My Chai Tea latte tasted so good after not having it for so long!! I definitely miss the food of Paris, it was such a nice change from Pizza and Pasta which is basically all Italy has!
We headed back to Rome Friday night and had one more full day together on Saturday. We went back to a couple sights and did a little shopping for things to take back- which later turns out to be a major disappointment due to the airlines loosing baggage. I'll post a couple photos of the how Kevin's bag full of his gifts was returned to him...it's pretty disturbing.
So that's about it- we had such a wonderful time together. We totally had the Paris metro system down, read maps and saw some amazing sights together. I am so thankful he was able to come and visit. I'm not going to lie though, after he left I felt more homesick than I did before! This week was tough in that department, but I know I will pull out of it so I can make the most of the rest of my experience here.
