When I arrived in Paris around noon, it was grey and cold, but still the same old Paris. I had unfortunately grabbed the wrong map of Paris in my packing haste - I at least had the bus and Metro maps, but not the streets - and so I took the Metro to the general area of my hotel and hoped to find it on the street maps of the arrondissements (quarters) posted in each Metro station. No such luck. About an hour into my stay in Paris and I was already bumming free WiFi off of the McDonald's across the street from the Gare du Nord to get directions. Hôtel Lorraine was conveniently right across the street from the Gare de l'Est (which, incidentally, is only a few blocks away from the Gare du Nord). At first glance, my room looked decent - it had its own bathroom, a double bed, and a TV; woo!; the only sketchy part was that the wood floor sunk when I stepped on it - so I left to do some exploring. I went to the Latin Quarter, which is my favorite area, to listen to some of the soundtrack of Notre-Dame de Paris (a French musical that follows the story of the Hunchback of Notre-Dame) in front of, oui, the real Notre-Dame de Paris. Then it was on to the Champs-Elysées, the upscale shopping street of Paris that leads to the Arc de Triomphe, a massive arch in a the Charles de Gaulle city square. There, I hit the jackpot - while Americans are preoccupied with Halloween and Thanksgiving during the fall, the French have decided in the past ten years that Halloween is pretty much out of style and what's all this about pilgrims and Indians? They go straight from the summer tourist season to Noël! There was a huge Christmas market along a huge part of the Champs-Elysées, complete with endless booths of food, hot drinks, and homemade gifts. They had real fruitcakes (you know, the ones made out of brick-like material), le vin chaud (hot wine - no cider in this country), and "magic" heating pads.
I walked all the way up the street until I got to the the Arc de Triomphe. I had business to do at that Arc. When I visited Paris after high school, I wasn't allowed to go up to the top of the arch because I wasn't yet eighteen (I was, in fact, two weeks away from turning eighteen) and I didn't have a parent with me. Well, I was determined to go up to the top of that arch this time. The only way to get up to the top is by climbing a tall but thin spiral staircase inside of one of the legs. There were people stopped, heaving and huffing, at several points during the way up. It was quite the climb. The top was worth it, though; even though it was cloudy, I got to watch the city dim and all the lights come on while I was at the top, and it wasn't crowded at all. There's also a great view of la Tour Eiffel from there.
When I finally dragged myself away from the view, I went down to the Louvre because students get in free after 6P.M. on Friday nights. I really love that museum; it is way too overwhelming when you think about trying to see the whole thing at once, but I have focused on the French and Italian paintings for my last two visits and I really enjoyed the evening. Then, since I had a big day planned Saturday, I decided on going to bed early. After about an hour of watching French TV in bed, I started to notice that my hotel room had kind of a strange aroma/feeling to it. The no-smoking rule had obviously not been followed, and I had to ball up my comforter and ban it to one corner of the room. Still, around the second or third time I woke up during the night, I decided that there were remnants of the Black Plague still lingering in my room. It just felt weird. And I was becoming increasingly worried that the floor was going to snap when I took a step and I would end up in the room below me.
Early Saturday morning, I had a train ticket from the Gare Montparnasse to the city of Rennes. It was a nice ride; I enjoyed seeing the style of northern towns. The scenery was all very green and the houses up in the area have black roofs instead of the typical southern red roof. I had about an hour and a half to wander around Rennes (and grab a quick café). It's an adorable town, much bigger than I had expected, and in true French fashion, there was very little open on a lazy Saturday morning in the off-season. It's also very cold up in the northern region, although the sun was peeking out in Rennes, and I was kicking myself for forgetting to bring a few scarves. The bus was easy enough to find, and it was only about an hour to Mont Saint-Michel, a medieval fortress isolated on the northern coast of France. Nearly as far from Cannes as one can possibly get and still be in France. Mont Saint-Michel was one of the sites that I really, really wanted to see in France, but it's difficult to get to and takes a full day (with train and bus time), so I was so happy to finally get there. I'm still milking my position as a European Union student and I got into the Abbey at the top for free! It was fabulous; the Abbey was constructed by Benedictine monks in the dark ages and also served as a military stronghold over the years (one that never fell to enemies, at that) as well as a prison at one point. The architecture was almost closer to that of castles in England (after all, it's not very far from the United Kingdom) than the rest of the French castles I've seen here. The Abbey was freezing cold (the only heating was in the gift shop, of course).
After my self-guided tour, I walked back down the mountain. Just below the Abbey is a tiny town with narrow streets leading back to the base. You can see it pretty clearly in the pictures. The view from the top was breathtaking (much different from the Mediterranean) and the view of the mountain from a ways inland is also quite the sight. It's indescribable; you just have to see the pictures. Even more indescribable were the flocks of tourists bumbling through the town, cameras first, snapping photos of every sign of every shop (OMG! It's all en français! Is that how things are in France?), blocking the entire width of the itty bitty street. I am not kidding: One man was videotaping his ENTIRE journey up the front steps of the Abbey and through the roped-off line to the ticket counter. How exciting. I made sure to get in the way a lot and make some interesting faces so the video is a little more bearable for his poor family and friends to watch.
After walking inland to get some pictures of the Mont in its entirety, I grabbed some food and sat on some rocks by the bus stop to eat and make friends with some hungry brown chickadee-like birds. I had quite the following. More tourists took pictures of me, like I am Dr. Doolittle or some magical girl who has communicational power with avian species.
Back in Rennes, I had a fantastic salade de chèvre chaud (warm goat cheese salad - it is one of my favorite French plates) and tried the NOUVEAU BEAUJOLAIS!!!! (new Beaujolais red wine that just been distributed everywhere in France - there are posters on the streets for it and everything) which was also amazing! This was my favorite meal of the weekend. Then it was back on the train to Paris and to bed.
Sunday morning was grey and dreary and a little bit sleety. I tried to sleep in a little, and I made it until nine when the plague started getting to me and I had to get out of there. I did watch some weekend cartoons in French while I was getting ready - all six main stations were broadcasting different cartoons. Interesting. Outside, I wandered down toward the Châtelet area where I had seen a plethora of cafés on Friday. It took a lot longer to walk than I thought it would; Paris is so big that it can take ten or fifteen minutes to walk what looks like only a block on the map. It was okay, though; I got to do some people-watching and admire the Parisian-style buildings all around me. I found a café with a heated patio (not heated enough) for a crêpe confiture framboise (a raspberry jam crepe) - it was lovely. I took a walk to the Bibliothèque Nationale (French National Library). Unfortunately, it is in the middle of a huge renovation, and I couldn't even get a picture of the front of it because of all the ugly temporary offices sitting in front of the main entrance. I went inside, but you have to pay to actually see anything at all (even the library itself - you have to pay for a locker to store your coat and bag because they're not allowed). I didn't want to see the inside THAT badly, so I warmed up for a bit and then headed back out to find somewhere to sit and people-watch. Two really great things happened as I was walking in the direction of Notre-Dame: A French woman asked me if I was from Paris (Score! - even though I couldn't understand what she was trying to find) and I found a pet store right across the street from the Seine! It had parakeets and puppies and a couple of terrifying Persian kittens and - yes - pigeons for 39 Euros apiece! (Personally, I would just grab one off the street if I wanted a pet pigeon that badly...)
I had a less-than-lovely dinner experience nearby. My quiche was burnt and generally unappetizing, my waiter kept giving me weird looks, and on the big screen, we were watching - not sports as you would typically imagine at a restaurant/bar - but an Animal Planet special on les loups (wolves)! It opened with a peaceful scene of a squirrel eating an acorn in a snowy forest and graphically displayed the squirrel's final hours at the hands of Mr. Wolf. When the wolf's prey became larger and we finally arrived at a scene showing him rolling around in bloody snow, I decided it was time to be done. I went in search of a poster I had seen earlier for a gospel choir concert at one of the churches in Paris; I thought that might be a fun evening activity. Unfortunately, I suddenly started feeling horrendously sick and had to return to the plague hotel where I was sick all night with food poisoning or a flu bug or something. When 7A.M. rolled around, I couldn't even dream of getting up, hopping on the Metro, and transferring to a five-hour train, so I stayed in bed until I had to check out. I forfeited my train ticket and had to buy a new one when I got to la gare, and waited in the ice cold Gare de Lyon for two hours until the next train left, still quite sick. The end.
So, I have been in bed for the past two days. My room and bed have never ever been more amazing than after the plague hotel, and I have never been happier to return to Cannes after a weekend away. I'm supposed to leave for a weekend in London in twenty-four hours... We shall see.
Happy Thanksgiving to all; enjoy your feasts! If I make it to London, I will bee-line it to the nearest Chipotle, rest assured.
Also, here's a kick-off present for the holiday season - I want to experience one of these!:
Mont Saint-Michel! I've always wanted to go there, I'm so jealous :) sounds amazing. I hope I make it there some day, and I miss you!
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