Parc des Buttes Chaumont

Whew!  Paris got HOT while I was gone for the weekend!  This week it has been in the mid-high 90s!  I had been waiting for a good sunny day to visit a park that was on my list, so on Monday afternoon, I went to the Parc des Buttes Chaumont.  It was a really neat and VERY pretty park, but also was very busy when I went, and it was the strangest group of people.  I felt like every shady character in Paris (minus the Eiffel Tower selling guys) was in the park.  I almost left because I was kind of uncomfortable, but I ended up just making sure I ONLY walked where I saw groups with women or other women walking (it was weird, there were big groups of men everywhere and then creepy people on their own).  But again, such a strange mix.  Elderly, people with children, young people, and everyone who was shady.

Champs-Élysées

Anyway.  It was so pretty!  I didn’t take as many pictures as I wanted because I wasn’t always comfortable pulling my camera out, but I got pictures of what I went for, this gazebo up on a hill/cliff.  Very neat!  The park was definitely worth going to.  Along with the neat gazebo, it had a man-made little cave/waterfall area that was fun to see (no picture, was harassed a little there and pulling out my camera would have made it way worse).

That night, Teresa and I went to Champs-Élysées to take pictures for a bit.

Laudurée

our macaroons

On Tuesday after class, Teresa and I went to Laudurée (on blvd Madeline) and bought macaroons.  I tried the caramel with salted butter, raspberry, and two other flavors (they’re not listed, something like passion fruit and guava).  Yum!  The rose one that I tried last week was the best.

After that I went to the Musée d’Orsay.  I had forgotten about the awful lines to get into museums; not used to that!  I ended up standing in line for about an hour.  I loved the building for the museum, an old train station.  According to my tour book, the station inspired Grand Central Station in NY and Union Station in DC.  It had a neat mix of things, paintings, sculptures, furniture and artifacts.  No pictures allowed, though!  Oh well.

our picnic

That evening, Teresa and I took my cheese samples from Switzerland, a baguette, a bottle of wine, wine glasses and a blanket to the Eiffel Tower and had a picnic where we had our picnic when we first arrived in Paris a month ago.  Hah, we had wanted to buy the wine from a wine store so we could ask for advice on what would go well with the cheese, but after hauling all our stuff all around, we couldn’t find one that was open, so we went to the grocery store.  Since our wine tasting lecture several weeks ago was under two hours, we really had no idea what to pick!  We just knew that the professor had said that the wine that costs eight euros or more is usually good French wine.

 After staring blankly at the wines for a while, we finally decided to find something that was from 2007 (when we graduated from high school) with a price of around eight euros.  Then we realized we hadn’t brought a wine opener…. darn it!  Thankfully all the tourist shops sell them so Teresa bought one to give as a gift when she goes home.

had a little trouble with the cork!

It really was a lot of fun, I’m so glad we did it.  I had told Teresa we should eat the cheese I had brought back with some French wine, but had just thought we’d do it at the apartment.  I’m so glad she said we should take it to the Eiffel Tower!

Maybe thirty minutes into our picnic, it started raining hard enough that we had to gather everything up and run to a little shelter nearby.  I’m glad Teresa’s from New Jersey and wasn’t cold; it meant that I was able to wrap the blanket that we had been sitting on around me so I wouldn’t freeze!  We stood under the shelter with a bunch of other people who had been having picnics, and with maybe eight of the Eiffel Tower/drink sellers.

Once it stopped raining, we ventured back out and took some pictures of the tower and then went home.

Today I got all packed up because CEA made me move from my room into the room with Teresa so the two new girls would be in a room together.  Kind of was a waste of time; when we got here, the girls who were already here didn’t have to be in the same room.  Oh well.

bookstore

booths along the Seine, love them!

I went to see Midnight in Paris at the movie theatre.  I really liked getting to see all of the places I’ve gone while watching the movie!  Then I went to CEA to pick up a couple more raffle wins, a cookbook and Danish pastries.  I ate one of the pastries as I walked to the Notre Dame area to look at the tourist shops and booths along the Seine.  Towards the end of my walk, I walked by a bookstore that I had seen in the movie.

raffle win, Danish pastries

After I finished up some of my food in the apartment for dinner, I went with Teresa, Kathryn (other girl in our building) Katie, Kaylee, (all of us went to the Sorbonne through CEA) to rue Mouffetard for a little bit.  Tomorrow morning Teresa and I have a shuttle coming to the apartment at 9:30 to take us to the airport.  To London I go!  I’m supposed to have Internet access in my hostel there so I should continue to post!

Au revoir, Paris!