Bonjour from the city of lights

So after a rainy day and all of us having our fingers crossed the night before praying for NO rain....we woke up to a much better day! I roomed with three really sweet girls, two from Mexico and one from Malaysia.

L-R: Notre Dame Cathedral, Palace of Versailles, Arc de Triomphe, Mona Lisa @ the Louvre, Sacre Couer, the Eiffel Tower

Me and a few others who I had met on the bus decided the night before on a plan for the day (well I kind of coordinated the sites we were going to see)....the first of them being the Palace of Versailles: which is centered a bit outside of the city.

So we headed out to conquer the metro train which everyone seems to say is easy to navigate, but I don't know I agree with that. We headed to the Palace which is absolutely beautiful. It was adorned with good all over the gates and entrance. Their is so much history behind this palace. It was the home of Louis XIII originally, but it was constantly being added on to and embellished until King Louis XIV's death in 1715.

We then headed into the city, to go up the Montparnasse Tower which is a tall building which you can walk up and see the whole city from, the view wasn't as great as I imagine it could've been due to clouds which were still lingering but it was still great to get a view of the city.

We then went on a search for the famous French Crepes which France is known for. You would think that crepes would be much easier to find, but not so much. We were walking around for 30 mins or so before we finally found a cafe that had them. The crepes were good, but to be honest I thought they were slightly overrated: oh well, at least I can say I had them. 

Now we were off to the Jardin de Luxembourg, and we walked through and watched some street performers and took in the nice weather, as it had cleared up by now.

Now that we had a chance to chill out in the gardens, we were off to Sacre Cour. When we first go to Sacre Cour we were a bit intimidated by the hill with steps that we had to climb to get to the top but it was SO WORTH IT!!! The weather was beautiful and clear, and the view was absolutely amazing! You could see the city so perfectly. People were sitting on the front steps and hanging out, kids were playing, street performers and people drinking beers while enjoying the view, it was probably one of my favorite sites while in Paris (other than the all famous Eiffel Tower of course)

From Sacre Cour we went on to The famous Moulin Rouge. We then hopped back on the metro to head to outlast two sites before hitting the Eiffel Tower.

We arrived at the Arc de Triomphe and grabbed a few pictures there and then headed on over to the Musee de Louvre.

I had originally planned to just take some pictures at the famous Louvre pyramid and and not go into it, well man did I luck out or what....so we were meeting some others from the tour there as well, and when we did they told us that nobody checked their passes when they went in and we could probably use them to go in ourselves if we wanted. So we were like heck yeah....and so basically....we got in and got to see the Mona Lisa for free!!! Always a plus!!! The Mona Lisa as you can see from the picture is soooo small...nothing like you would expect or that you are used to seeing based on the way the painting is portrayed in movies and magazines.

After we did this, we went on the way to the Eiffel Tower for us to end our day with a picnic on the lawn in front of the tower with some of the other tour mates. We took pictures of it before it got dark, as well as after the lights turned on lighting the beautiful tower up, all while eating and drinking wine on the lawn!!!! 

Talk about a tiring, yet completely AMAZING first day of the trip!!!  :D

Aurevoir for now Paris, off to Avignon then Barcelona I go.....