Paris

After Switzerland, we headed to what was probably the highlight of the trip-Paris! We got to our hotel, and to our pleasant surprise, it was VERY nice and new and clean and had a really neat decorated restaurant and bar. Everyone ate dinner at the restaurant then we went on a night time city tour of Paris. It was so beautiful to see everything lit up at night. We went by all of the main tourist attractions, then went to the top of the Eiffel Tower. It was so cool to do at night! There weren't as long of lines and the view of the city lit up was so pretty. It was, however, probably the most cold and wind blown I have ever been in my whole life! The tower goes into disco mode every hour on the hour, so it was pretty to see that at night as well. At the bottom there is all of these African men trying to sell you crappy Eiffel Tower gear and they just won't leave you alone. It's funny because a lot of the people we were with got the same stuff for completely different prices-moral of the story: If you buy stuff from these guys, you can get it for practically nothing-they'll take anything!

The next morning we went to the park in front of the Eiffel Tower to get pictures, then we had the whole day to explore. Adam and I started out by going to the Louvre. It is amazing how big and pretty and detailed this building is! There is enough to see in it to last you a lifetime, so we basically just went to see a few main things we were excited about: Mona Lisa, Apollo's Palace, Venus de Milo, and Napoleon's apartment. After the Louvre, we went to the Notre Dame (there was a guy dressed like the hunchback outside of it). It was so awesome, but the line was SOOOO long so we didn't go in. Afterwards, we went to the Latin Quarter and found this cute little bistro to eat lunch at. We had real French onion soup, escargot, a goat cheese/apple/green salad, and of course wine! Everything was delicious and didn't disappoint! The French sure do know how to practice portion control though, which I like! Despite what everyone says too, I thought French people were nice-the servers, our hotel staff, even a girl at the train station who gave us a coin!The rest of the afternoon we walked more and saw the Palace of Justice, we shopped (and I got Kristie a Christmas present I love!), went by the Opera House, saw the Madeleine Theatre, then walked up Champs Elysee (shopping and Christmas stands). Then we hurried home to get ready for our last night in Europe!

One of the main things I wanted to do while we were there was go to the Moulin Rouge, which I was lucky enough to get to do! It was crazy getting there (Saturday night in Paris is super busy PLUS the drivers there are HORRIBLE), but we made it. We sat with a big group and they served us a nice dinner with lots of wine while a cabaret band played and people danced. Finally they brought our champagne and the show started! It basically is like a musical, a circus, and a strip show all in one. There were dancers, gymnists, a juggler, a vantriliquist, ponies, snakes, a talking dog, and lots of American songs (but mostly French). It was something I would definitely recommend everyone to do at least once in their life if they are in Paris and all the guys even agreed that it was awesome.

After the show, we all went to this bar next to the Moulin Rouge to hang out one last night! It was a really fun night and everyone had a really good time. It was sad that the trip went so fast and that we probably won't see most of these people we had such a good time with ever again!

All pictures from Paris: http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=8AbM3DRi0cuWP2&emid=sharshar&linkid=link5&cid=EMsharshar