After a pretty awesome first day in Paris, the next day consisted of walking, walking and more walking. Who knew that Paris was such a big city. I was expecting it to be similar to London but what can be considered the centre is much larger. We would walk for a couple of hours, then found some WIFI to do a bit of work, then walked a bit more.
We walked form the Louvre, along the Champs-Élysées and all the way to the Arc de Triomphe. Being in these infamous streets was something else. I remember a while back, when France actually had a decent football team, seeing videos of millions of fans celebrate the world cup win along the Champs-Élysées. When I hear the word “Champs-Élysées” this is what I think of. To me, this euphoric feeling was somewhat transposed as I strolled along the relatively quiet street.
There was a small grass area with some plants and some trees. It looked quite out of place in downtown Paris so I was, of course, beckoned over. A huge cherry blossom tree was the centrepiece of…I guess you could call it a garden. When I lived in Edinburgh, I had the most amazing walk to Uni. Down a hill with an amazing view of the sunrise coming over the castle, followed by the path down the meadows park lined with Cherry Blossom trees. For a few weeks every year, a slight breeze made this feel like a scene out of the movie “Hero”. Very colourful and very surreal.
I couldn’t really put my finger on it but there was something just a bit cool about Paris. As I explained when I compared Hong Kong to Singapore, the squeaky clean mentality is not always the best. Not everything worked so well in Paris. For example, changing lines on the subway could often involve a 15 minute walk. However this didn’t matter as it was Paris, and Paris can do whatever Paris wants!
The next night involved, shocker, more drinking. We went to a pretty cool underground club that was so different to the other places we went to. Paris and London have a lot of super pretentious, velvet rope type VIP clubs that will happily take ten Euros from you for a beer. I have never liked these types of places, part of the reason why I like going out in Budapest so much. This particular place we went to in Paris (I have no idea of the name), was a fairly nice restaurant on top and then you downstairs and there is a stone cellar with a bar, dance floor and lots of people. It reminded me a bit of a bar in Budapest called Szoda, damn I missed that place.
Nursing hangovers, the next day was to be the most interesting by far. A trip to the Eiffel Tower, the epitome not just of Paris but of all France. You can’t not see the Eiffel Tower from just about anywhere in the city. Walking up to it is something quite different. It really is stupidly huge. There was a 1 hour queue for lift tickets at one of the pillars. This seemed crazy so I took a bit of a wonder round and found out you could take the stairs for a lot cheaper and without waiting. It didn’t look that high so it was a no brainer.
After 10 or so flights of stairs, we reached the first level. There was a nice overpriced cafe there selling croissants so it seemed like the perfect opportunity for a cheesy Facebook profile photo – croissants on the Eiffel tower. Yes, my sense of humour knows no boundaries, no need to applaud. 6 Euros well spent!
The view from here was pretty cool, and we were barely 1/4 of the way up. The hike to the second level was a little longer (thankfully those croissants gave us the energy boost that we needed – remember, still hungover here) . The second level was awesome. The view was really amazing. It was the perfect day for it too, really clear weather.
I stood in line for close to 40 minutes for the elevator ride to the top. This was probably one of the craziest elevator rides in the world. You are so high up but you feel as if you are completely outside (there are no actual walls on the Eiffel Tower). The view is incredible and it keeps going on and on and on. I couldn’t believe how high we actually went up. The difference between the second level and the top is so huge. See the picture below for a comparison between 1,2,3.
I have been up many tall buildings before: Tokyo Metropolitan Govt building, Shanghai’s Jin Mao Tower and New York’s World Trade Center. It is a completely different experience being up high on a structure like the Eiffel Tower. The raw height isn’t so important as the exposure to the elements is. You can literally feel the tower shake in the wind. You can feel the wind in your face since there are no glass windows. You are effectively outside, but without a solid building beneath you. The overpriced champagne bar at the top were charging €10 per glass. While my hangover prevented me for even considering getting ripped off, I did like the idea of having a bar at the top.
The walk down was considerably easier on the leg muscles. Overall the Eiffel Tower was characteristically the highlight of my Paris trip. Yes it was full of tourists and merchants peddling the Eiffel Tower memorabilia. Despite this, I thought it was seriously awesome and it was a far better experience than I had imagined.
That night, we had dinner at a small restaurant with our host Clement. There was something inherently Parisian about sitting outside, eating dinner, and watching the world go by. Good times.
