Home again!

Well, we're back.
Our "fly home" day was probably one of the longest days I've ever had the displeasure of being involved in. We were up for 22 hours straight by the time we got home and sat down for a minute. But before we talk about me being on a plane, you might be wondering "What happened in between the 30th of December and now?"
On New Year's Eve, we attempted to go to see the City of Paris catacombs, but they closed early! We got there an hour before they closed, but the line up was two blocks long. A museum employee came and told us that we could stay in line, but at that point it would take us an hour and a half to get close to the front. We decided it wasn't worth it to try our luck, and instead hopped on the Metro and rode to Notre Dame. We hadn't been inside yet, so we lined up to do that instead.
Because the inside of Notre Dame is nothing like the top (there's lots of space, it doesn't cost anything to come in, and there's no limit of people on a tour) the line moved really fast and we were inside in about 15 minutes. I was stunned at just how big it was. The church itself is huge, and then there's alcoves along the sides that hold graves, models of the church, statues, paintings, and the famous stained glass windows. We wandered for about an hour inside, taking pictures of everything and keeping quiet while doing so. There was about 100 people in the church praying when we walked through, spread out through the many pews. There were even priests there, taking people into booths for confessions. Once we were done looking at things in Notre Dame, we went back to our favorite restaurant, Pizza Enio! We ate and then went to our apartment to get ready for New Year's, which we thought was supposed to be a big deal.
Once we were ready, we went to Champs d'Elysses to see what was going on there. We'd read on the internet that it was supposed to be festive and a lot of fun. When we got there, we found that it was just very crowded. There wasn't anything going on other than people walking up and down the street, and all of the stores were boarded up. The police were out in riot gear, and all of the restaurants were super busy, because they were the only things open. We walked the street for a bit, and then decided we'd go check out the Eiffel Tower instead.
We walked all the way to the Eiffel Tower instead of taking the Metro, because the trains were so packed. The park around the tower was really busy, but wasn't nearly as crowded as Champs d'Elysses. We found a spot in the park, and watched the fireworks. The fireworks weren't nearly as good as the ones in Edmonton, we were a little underwhelmed. It was cool to see them light up the tower with flashing lights when the clock struck midnight, though. Once the fireworks were done, we walked a few blocks to a smaller Metro station hoping that a smaller metro line would be less busy. We were right! We hopped on a train that was nice and roomy, and took it home.
On New Year's Day, almost everything was closed (except Pizza Enio!), so we cleaned up the apartment and started packing. We got up really early the next day, took a taxi to the airport, and flew for 11 hours to Calgary. Once we got into Calgary, we found out that British Airways had lost Kassandra's luggage, and we had missed our flight to Edmonton. We lined up at Air Canada, got tickets and then went through the long (really long) security line up. Once we got back to Edmonton, we basically flopped over and fell asleep.

Centre Pompidou and Eiffel Tower

Today we went to Centre Pompidou, which is a big see through building that houses a lot of the art space in Paris. There's a Museum of Modern Art, a library, and some exhibition space. There's also a restaurant, a gift shop, and a kids playground. It's got some giant escalators on the outside that let you travel between floors. We went in to see the Edvard Munch exhibit. It was really interesting. There was a big timeline outside the exhibit that told us about his life, and then inside was split into themes. We looked at the different stages of his artistic career, from when he was 17, until he died. A lot of the paintings were very similar, with a slight change in how he approached them. I thought that this idea was very cool. He painted the same picture, with a different pattern or method, and then linked them together in a series. Once we were finished looking at his exhibit we went to the find some food at a local restaurant and then hopped on the metro. We took the metro all the way to the other side of the city to see the Eiffel Tower at night. It's very similar to the CN Tower in Toronto, where you're up very high and there's a glass area that you can take pictures of the city from way up high. The two other levels are interesting, with shopping on the second level, and a skating rink on the first level! The tower itself is pretty interesting with the metalwork and the way the lifts work. There's two ways to go up the tower, you can take an elevator or walk up the steps. If you walk up the steps (there's 602 of them) it will take you to the second floor, and it's about 10€ cheaper. If you take the lift, it will take you to the top, but you have to take two sets of lifts. They really pack people into those lifts! When we got to the top, there's a banner around the top that shows you which country you're facing, and how far away it is. Then there's a big line up at the top to get back down and there's not a lot of space at the top room. Once we took our pictures, we lined back up and went down the two lifts.

Paris, part deux

Well, we've had a few more days in Paris, and they've been fun, even though the weather has turned sour on us. It's been rainy and cold the last few days, so my Space Jams have stayed safely in my luggage. I wish I'd brought some other pair now. We went to Disneyland Paris two days ago, and while some of the rides were very fun, it was really quite different from the Californian version of Disneyland. I've been to California Disneyland 4 times, and I really enjoy it there. It's an immersive experience for each ride, and the lineup areas are part of the fun. They take you through tunnels or buildings, and they really build up to what the ride is going to be about. It's really cool. Disneyland Paris was not very immersive, and I really felt like that aspect was missing when we went. We would go on a ride, and line up for a long time, and the line up experience was not fun. It had nothing to do with the ride, there was just nothing going on outside the ride. All of the rides were like this, and when all of the line up areas were outside, with no shelter, that made lining up for rides an experience that was determined by the weather. If it was a nice day out, you'd be okay. But since our day was cold and rainy, that's what lining up was like. The rides themselves were similar to Disneyland, but the roller coasters were more extreme. Indiana Jones was very different. Instead of riding in a car with a lap belt that ducked, weaved, and swung around turns, the European version is a small roller coaster that loops upside down, and corkscrews through small spaces. Not themed towards the movie at all, but still fun. We left Disneyland Paris late in the afternoon, and took the metro back "home". The day before that, we went on the tour of the top half of Notre Dame. It was too late to go into the cathedral and see any of the windows, so we decided to go up the outside of the building. They lead you up 402 steps to the very top of the bell towers, where we got to see the original bell, and some panoramic views of Paris from Ile de Cite! The views were very cool, and we were pretty high up. When you're on top of one of the few tall buildings here, you can see for a very long time, because there's a zoning law that says buildings can only be 7 stories high. The area around Notre Dame is always packed, and there's a square on top of the crypt that is usually full of people wandering around, taking pictures.

Mr. R in Paris!

Well, we landed in London, and Heathrow Airport is really, really big. We had to take a bus from where we arrived to another terminal, and that took at least ten minutes going down tiny roads and through tunnels. Then we ate at a weird English restaurant called Giraffe. The food was ok. I had sausages, eggs, some weird tomato beans and fries. Then we took turns napping and got on our plane to Paris. Once we arrived, we got our bags and then had to walk all the way across the airport to the train station. At the train station, we got on a train, went a few stops and then the train broke down! We had to get off, and wait for a train that wasn't full to come before we could resume our trip into the city (It only took about ten more minutes). Once we found our stop, we got lost inside Chateau Les Halles, Paris's biggest subway station. It was very busy on Christmas Eve. We had to call our contact in Paris to help us find our exit. Once we got out, we found our apartment, and went to sleep. The next day, we got up on Christmas and walked around to see what was close to us. We found a supermarket (which is more like a corner store in Canada), the Louvre (the biggest museum in the world), and the Notre Dame cathedral. We ate at a pizza place, and then walked home. I was very glad to have my iPad as it let me watch the NBA games, and my Knicks won. I'll post some more pictures later this week. I hope everyone is having a good winter break!

What Mr. R. is doing on Winter Break

This Winter Break, I'm spending 10 days in Paris, France. I'm super excited because I've never been before. I'm looking forward to seeing lots of tourist attractions, looking around the city at the architecture and viewing the museums. I'm not looking forward to the long flight. It's going to take over 8 hours of me jammed into a tiny plane seat to get there.
It's supposed to be warmer there than Edmonton, so I'm not packing any big jackets, just my small one. I'm planning on taking a couple different pairs of shoes, and maybe purchasing one pair while I'm there, if I can find them. There shouldn't be any snow on the ground, so I'm taking my Space Jams. I'm leaving at lunch tomorrow, so Mr. Crawford is taking over Room 6 for the afternoon.