Day Five: Paris

The Metro, the underground railway system throughout Paris, is single handedly the most dirty, scary place I have ever experienced. Daniel had constantly reminded each of us to keep valuable items tucked away in a zipper pouch we had tucked inside our pants. He also continually checked our backpacks to make sure the zippers were all to one side, and we couldn't forget to loop our backpacks through our legs when we sat down. Now, growing up with Pocatello, Idaho my entire life, I thought Daniel was being overly cautious. I was very wrong. As soon as you enter the dimly lit tunnels of the Metro you are greeted by all kinds of gypsies begging for money. Daniel's warnings and preparations paid off the morning of day five.

Day five was our day of sight-seeing. We had planned to see as many Paris attractions as possible on this particular day. We woke up extra early and headed directly to the Metro. I was getting used to latching onto Daniel, scanning my surroundings, and immediately applying hand sanitizer while on the Metro. This morning, the Metro was booming with young kids going to school and adults rushing to work. We quickly arrived at our stop and jumped off the Metro. We pushed through the exit gates and stopped to take a quick look at the map posted on the wall to make sure we were headed in the right direction. At that moment, we saw a hand push open the exit gate and throw a small black thing at John. Pictures and papers covered the ground around John's feet as we all realized it was John's black wallet that had been thrown. Daniel yelled, "YOU JUST GOT PICK POCKETED!" Instinctively, Daniel started running back through the exit gate in an attempt to find the hand that had thrown the wallet back to John. Before Daniel got through the gate, John informed Daniel that nothing was in the wallet besides pictures. John had removed his valuable items into the pouch in his pants and out of habit must have put his wallet back into his back pocket that morning. That experience convinced all of us that Daniel was right in being so cautious and protective. Even though the pick pocketer didn't get anything, and even had the courtesy to throw the wallet back, we still felt so violated. It was eery to think that a complete stranger reached into John's back pocket without John even feeling it. It certainly opened my eyes, we definitely weren't in Pocatello anymore!

The Lourve was the first sight on our list. The Lourve is a massive museum that used to be the king's palace. The building itself is incredible, as well as the art inside. Part of the palace was Napoleon's apartment and it has been restored to look nearly identical to his original apartment in the palace. The Lourve is also the home to the original Mona Lisa. It was pretty fun to go and see something so famous and historical!

Instead of riding around underground on the Metro all day, we decided to ride one of the double decker tour buses. The bus provided earphones that you plugged into the bus to listen to facts about all of the fabulous places being passed on the bus. It was such a fun way to experience Paris, and it sure beat that dirty, old Metro!

The next sight to be seen was the Arc de Triomphe. This is a massive arch built by the king for the soldiers to walk through after winning a battle. The Arc de Triomphe has a spiral staircase of 284 steps that we had to climb to reach the top and overlook Paris. 

After climbing up and then down the 284 stairs of the Arc de Triomphe, we ventured to Notre Dame to climb more stairs. We had to wait in a rather lengthy line to climb to the top of Notre Dame, so Daniel and I wanted to browse the little shops right across the street from the line while John and Robbie held our place. Daniel handed Robbie our backpack that contained our passports, Metro tickets, museum passes, contacts, souvenirs, and jackets, and asked her to keep track of it for us while we looked in the shops. We looked around the stores for a bit until we wandered back to the line to find that the line had moved forward and Robbie wasn't with John, nor was our backpack. Panicking Daniel asked where our backpack was. John said that Robbie had left it on the ground by his feet without telling him and she left to go look at the shops. So, when the line moved forward he didn't grab our backpack, because he didn't know it was there. Instead, moments after the lined moved forward, John noticed a man with a radio walked by with a backpack that looked just like mine and Daniel's. He didn't think anything of it until Robbie came over frantically asking where the backpack was that she had left on the ground by him. He told her he saw a man with a backpack that looked like ours, so Robbie quickly ran off to find that man. This was about the time that Daniel and I arrived looking for our backpack. Luckily, Robbie found the man, who just so happened to be a security worker at Notre Dame, and retrieved the backpack from him. Needless to say, we had two very lucky experiences on day five. John didn't get anything taken from his wallet, and we didn't lose our backpack! That was, however, the last time we left John or Robbie in charge of our things!
The Notre Dame was spectacular. We had to go up and down 317 more stairs to get the full experience. Notre Dame was exactly how I pictured it, of course I pictured it to look just like the Disney movie. We got to go to the very top to see the huge bell that Quasimodo, the hunch back of Notre Dame, would ring. I was a little disappointed that he wasn't there with Esmerelda, but they had a huge picture of him by the bell. 

The next couple hours of our day were spent shopping. It is so entertaining and fun just to walk the streets of Paris. You see such interesting things, like a guy drawing amazing pictures with sidewalk chalk! I really loved it! We even got to stop by the visitor's center to say hello to the missionaries.

The conclusion of our sight-seeing day was on a cruise along the Seine River. This river runs right through Paris, and on this river is when we experienced the rain we were originally expecting the whole trip!