Europe: Paris
Tay and I have always wanted to go to Europe. We figured we'd have to wait and go later in life when we had more money & time (because of course we won't be as busy later!). Then a few months ago, we saw a deal on an IG account I follow for cheap tickets to Europe, and it got us talking. Tayler has an internship this summer, but we were going to have a month off between school and the internships. We realized that's probably never going to happen again, and so we researched how to go to Europe on a budget, and we went for it! Next year he'll be prepping for the bar and then he'll start work. When else would we have an entire month off?
Before I dive in, here's the overall itinerary from our trip:
Paris --> London --> Switzerland --> Italy
Paris
Tay: We stayed in a tiny little Airbnb apartment in Paris. We ended up in a fun part of town where it felt like a pretty authentic experience. Paris was really fantastic. There are little bread shops and pastry shops all over on the corners--even in the more residential area where our studio was. We enjoyed baguettes, crepes, and I enjoyed pain au chocolate (crescent rolls with chocolate in them), and a tasty panini. We decided to make dinner on our own often but eat some of the authentic food for dinner or lunch in each city. I couldn't help myself from the pain au chocolat twice. Super tasty. And the crepes. And the baguettes. Turns out we had all of those more than once because they were so tasty and fun.
Parisians have a reputation for being rude and impatient. We felt like people we that way near the tourist spots, but that closer to our apartment people were very kind and even offered to help when we looked a little confused trying to find an apartment or a street. They don't seem to mind personal space boundaries as much as in London or America. The little restaurants are tiny, and the patrons sit at little tables elbow-to-elbow and nearly back-to-back against the person at the table behind them. While eating, many sit out on the street or you can look in on them eating through the windows in the corner bistros. The tourists aren't shy either--it was a little stifling in Versailles palace, and sometimes you have to just push right past people sort of scraping your body against theirs. Again and again, I was reminded of the joke we consistently play on Chandler where we stand up extremely close behind him almost pressed against him. I remember he talked about some lady doing that at Lagoon, I think, and ever since that's been an inside joke. Well, that inside joke is what Paris was like again and again.
Becca: Looking back, Paris was our favorite place. We loved the matching architecture, walking for 20 minutes and bumping into all sorts of monuments, and the boulangeries and patisseries. We knew our studio Airbnb was going to be small, but didn't realize exactly how small. :) It was so fun to stay in a neighborhood above Paris (Montmartre, Paris) and walk with the locals. Our Airbnb apartment was, like many of the buildings, in a square shaped building. You open giant doors off the street and walk into a cute little courtyard that all of the apartments look out onto.
We found that the rumors of "snotty French people" were completely untrue--at least for all the locals we met. Maybe more true for those working in the tourist sites. One of my favorite memories was walking in the neighborhoods above Paris and seeing a little French boy go past us on his razor scooter, two baguettes in hand. It seemed so perfect. I also loved using the little bit of French I learned in junior high and high school--Je t'aime, Paris!
Tay: I think my favorite was the Louvre. We were amazed by how large it was, and how many famous pieces of art it held. We spent six hours there. It was very enjoyable. Not only was the art incredible, but the whole museum architecture was outstanding. Whether I knew this or not before, I definitely hadn't remembered that the Louvre was the palace of the French royalty for many years before Louis XIV moved to Versailles. We loved the art--famous paintings like the Coronation of Napoleon by Jacques-Louis David, several Michaelangelo sculptures, the Mona Lisa by da Vinci--but we were also enthralled by what seemed a considerably less popular section of the museum full of rooms and decorations from Napoleon III's time.
Becca: One of our favorites at the Louvre was the Winged Victory. It was absolutely beautiful to walk into the Louvre and see it at the top of a grand staircase. It's famous for the "wet t-shirt effect." It has a sheer, wet cloth carved into the marble--amazing.
Tay: We also thoroughly enjoyed Versailles, particularly the gardens. There were a couple amazing rooms in the actual palace, and the front of the palace from the street is beautiful. The gardens stretch for miles from the back of the palace, and we had a nice time strolling just a portion of the way into them.
Becca: The Hall of Mirrors was on of my favorite parts of Versailles (Louis the XIV, the Sun King's palace). We also loved just walking up to it from down the street, the gold fence and gold roof glittering in the sun. The gardens were beautiful, and we learned that the lake they put in was a mile long, made to make Versailles seem like Venice. They even imported gondolas and gondola men! Versailles was SO crowded inside the palace, though. It made it a lot less enjoyable than it would have been otherwise.
Tay: Of course we also enjoyed the Eiffel Tower, the Musee d'Orsay (a superb museum full of sculptures by Rodin and paintings by impressionists Monet, Manet, Degas, Renoir, Pissarro, Cezanne, as well as post-impressionists including Van Gogh), the Arc de Triomphe, where Napoleon and then Hitler marched through Paris, Notre Dame (the very first thing we saw right after stepping out of the subway), Sacre Coeur ("Sacred Heart" cathedral), the catacombs under Paris. At the catacombs, all I could think of was the old Disney Hunchback of Notre Dame movie where they go into the place with the skeletons and people are disguised as skeletons and sing "have you been thinking of courts and of miracles, put them together and hello! you're here! Where the dead can walk! And the blind can see!" Can anyone else hear/see that in their minds? Sainte Chappelle cathedral, Pont Neuf bridges, seems like maybe another museum, but I can't remember one right now.
Becca: It was neat to see the Eiffel Tower up close, but it didn't give me the magical effect I thought it would until I saw it at night, all lit up. We went and saw the Arc de Triomphe "on our way" to get dinner. Turns out whenever we made a plan like that, we ended up not getting food in time and I would get a little grumpy. Bad habit. We learned about halfway through our trip to just go find food, because we had too many late nights getting dinner way past when we should have. Sacre Coeur was beautiful and white on the outside, but compared to Notre Dame I didn't think it was as impressive (though it had a great view of the city).
Notre Dame
Catacombs
Eiffel Tower
Tay: We left SLC at noon on Monday and arrived in Paris after a 14-hour voyage at 9 a.m. Tuesday morning. As I mentioned, we knew we would be essentially flying through the night to Paris and wanted to have the energy to explore rather than face severe jet lag. Sleep proved nearly impossible for the flight. It didn't help that they had personal TVs on the back of the chairs and dozens of interesting movies to watch for free... I really did try to sleep at one point during the 10-hour second leg. I listened to a whole album of Andrea Bocelli but never fell asleep until about two-hour nap just before landing. Before that, it seemed anytime one of us got close to sleep the bathroom available chime would ding, a baby would cry, or our pillows would slip from what was a surprising amount of jostling from turbulence.
It sounds like the flight was terrible, but it was fine. They served pretty good dinner and breakfast. We weren't expecting any food except the crackers and juice, so we were glad our snacks would last us a little longer through Paris. That and we didn't actually pack much in the way of snacks because our bags were pretty full by the time we left Utah.
We've traveled pretty light, and I'm proud of us for doing so. It has made it easy to get to a new city and hike around without having to detour for early check-ins at our apartments to drop off heavy bags. We've also managed to find grocery stores in both London and Paris pretty close to our apartments which have made buying daytime walking snacks easy. We just unload the smaller of our two bags and use that throughout the day when we can leave the rest of our stuff in the apartment.
Becca: In terms of luggage, we each took one backpack (pictured below). Tay was all a perfect husband should be and carried all the heavy stuff. I had my left shoulder go numb for most of the trip just from wearing a backpack so much, but it really wasn't bad. They did get a little heavy when we had everything packed + water for the day, but it was never too bad. :) Most of our Airbnbs had washers, so we only had to wash our clothes in the sink two times, I think. I would TOTALLY recommend packing as light as you can!
Friday afternoon we took a high-speed (top speed 180 mph) rail to London over the French countryside and under the English Channel. The ride wasn't particularly enjoyable as we both felt mildly car sick most of the time. We were also exhausted from miles of walking for three days straight, but there was little chance of sleeping comfortably on the train.
Before I dive in, here's the overall itinerary from our trip:
Paris --> London --> Switzerland --> Italy
Paris
Tay: We stayed in a tiny little Airbnb apartment in Paris. We ended up in a fun part of town where it felt like a pretty authentic experience. Paris was really fantastic. There are little bread shops and pastry shops all over on the corners--even in the more residential area where our studio was. We enjoyed baguettes, crepes, and I enjoyed pain au chocolate (crescent rolls with chocolate in them), and a tasty panini. We decided to make dinner on our own often but eat some of the authentic food for dinner or lunch in each city. I couldn't help myself from the pain au chocolat twice. Super tasty. And the crepes. And the baguettes. Turns out we had all of those more than once because they were so tasty and fun.
Parisians have a reputation for being rude and impatient. We felt like people we that way near the tourist spots, but that closer to our apartment people were very kind and even offered to help when we looked a little confused trying to find an apartment or a street. They don't seem to mind personal space boundaries as much as in London or America. The little restaurants are tiny, and the patrons sit at little tables elbow-to-elbow and nearly back-to-back against the person at the table behind them. While eating, many sit out on the street or you can look in on them eating through the windows in the corner bistros. The tourists aren't shy either--it was a little stifling in Versailles palace, and sometimes you have to just push right past people sort of scraping your body against theirs. Again and again, I was reminded of the joke we consistently play on Chandler where we stand up extremely close behind him almost pressed against him. I remember he talked about some lady doing that at Lagoon, I think, and ever since that's been an inside joke. Well, that inside joke is what Paris was like again and again.
Becca: Looking back, Paris was our favorite place. We loved the matching architecture, walking for 20 minutes and bumping into all sorts of monuments, and the boulangeries and patisseries. We knew our studio Airbnb was going to be small, but didn't realize exactly how small. :) It was so fun to stay in a neighborhood above Paris (Montmartre, Paris) and walk with the locals. Our Airbnb apartment was, like many of the buildings, in a square shaped building. You open giant doors off the street and walk into a cute little courtyard that all of the apartments look out onto.
We found that the rumors of "snotty French people" were completely untrue--at least for all the locals we met. Maybe more true for those working in the tourist sites. One of my favorite memories was walking in the neighborhoods above Paris and seeing a little French boy go past us on his razor scooter, two baguettes in hand. It seemed so perfect. I also loved using the little bit of French I learned in junior high and high school--Je t'aime, Paris!
Tay: I think my favorite was the Louvre. We were amazed by how large it was, and how many famous pieces of art it held. We spent six hours there. It was very enjoyable. Not only was the art incredible, but the whole museum architecture was outstanding. Whether I knew this or not before, I definitely hadn't remembered that the Louvre was the palace of the French royalty for many years before Louis XIV moved to Versailles. We loved the art--famous paintings like the Coronation of Napoleon by Jacques-Louis David, several Michaelangelo sculptures, the Mona Lisa by da Vinci--but we were also enthralled by what seemed a considerably less popular section of the museum full of rooms and decorations from Napoleon III's time.
Becca: One of our favorites at the Louvre was the Winged Victory. It was absolutely beautiful to walk into the Louvre and see it at the top of a grand staircase. It's famous for the "wet t-shirt effect." It has a sheer, wet cloth carved into the marble--amazing.
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| Winged Victory |
Tay: We also thoroughly enjoyed Versailles, particularly the gardens. There were a couple amazing rooms in the actual palace, and the front of the palace from the street is beautiful. The gardens stretch for miles from the back of the palace, and we had a nice time strolling just a portion of the way into them.
Becca: The Hall of Mirrors was on of my favorite parts of Versailles (Louis the XIV, the Sun King's palace). We also loved just walking up to it from down the street, the gold fence and gold roof glittering in the sun. The gardens were beautiful, and we learned that the lake they put in was a mile long, made to make Versailles seem like Venice. They even imported gondolas and gondola men! Versailles was SO crowded inside the palace, though. It made it a lot less enjoyable than it would have been otherwise.
Tay: Of course we also enjoyed the Eiffel Tower, the Musee d'Orsay (a superb museum full of sculptures by Rodin and paintings by impressionists Monet, Manet, Degas, Renoir, Pissarro, Cezanne, as well as post-impressionists including Van Gogh), the Arc de Triomphe, where Napoleon and then Hitler marched through Paris, Notre Dame (the very first thing we saw right after stepping out of the subway), Sacre Coeur ("Sacred Heart" cathedral), the catacombs under Paris. At the catacombs, all I could think of was the old Disney Hunchback of Notre Dame movie where they go into the place with the skeletons and people are disguised as skeletons and sing "have you been thinking of courts and of miracles, put them together and hello! you're here! Where the dead can walk! And the blind can see!" Can anyone else hear/see that in their minds? Sainte Chappelle cathedral, Pont Neuf bridges, seems like maybe another museum, but I can't remember one right now.
Becca: It was neat to see the Eiffel Tower up close, but it didn't give me the magical effect I thought it would until I saw it at night, all lit up. We went and saw the Arc de Triomphe "on our way" to get dinner. Turns out whenever we made a plan like that, we ended up not getting food in time and I would get a little grumpy. Bad habit. We learned about halfway through our trip to just go find food, because we had too many late nights getting dinner way past when we should have. Sacre Coeur was beautiful and white on the outside, but compared to Notre Dame I didn't think it was as impressive (though it had a great view of the city).
Notre Dame
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| I loved the square shaped trees all over Paris! |
Catacombs
Arc de Triomphe
Sacre Coeur (& view)
Musee D'Orsay (some favorites: Degas & Monet)
More of Paris
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| Sainte Chapelle |
 |
| Pont Neuf |
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| Seine River |
Tay: We left SLC at noon on Monday and arrived in Paris after a 14-hour voyage at 9 a.m. Tuesday morning. As I mentioned, we knew we would be essentially flying through the night to Paris and wanted to have the energy to explore rather than face severe jet lag. Sleep proved nearly impossible for the flight. It didn't help that they had personal TVs on the back of the chairs and dozens of interesting movies to watch for free... I really did try to sleep at one point during the 10-hour second leg. I listened to a whole album of Andrea Bocelli but never fell asleep until about two-hour nap just before landing. Before that, it seemed anytime one of us got close to sleep the bathroom available chime would ding, a baby would cry, or our pillows would slip from what was a surprising amount of jostling from turbulence.
It sounds like the flight was terrible, but it was fine. They served pretty good dinner and breakfast. We weren't expecting any food except the crackers and juice, so we were glad our snacks would last us a little longer through Paris. That and we didn't actually pack much in the way of snacks because our bags were pretty full by the time we left Utah.
We've traveled pretty light, and I'm proud of us for doing so. It has made it easy to get to a new city and hike around without having to detour for early check-ins at our apartments to drop off heavy bags. We've also managed to find grocery stores in both London and Paris pretty close to our apartments which have made buying daytime walking snacks easy. We just unload the smaller of our two bags and use that throughout the day when we can leave the rest of our stuff in the apartment.
Becca: In terms of luggage, we each took one backpack (pictured below). Tay was all a perfect husband should be and carried all the heavy stuff. I had my left shoulder go numb for most of the trip just from wearing a backpack so much, but it really wasn't bad. They did get a little heavy when we had everything packed + water for the day, but it was never too bad. :) Most of our Airbnbs had washers, so we only had to wash our clothes in the sink two times, I think. I would TOTALLY recommend packing as light as you can!
Friday afternoon we took a high-speed (top speed 180 mph) rail to London over the French countryside and under the English Channel. The ride wasn't particularly enjoyable as we both felt mildly car sick most of the time. We were also exhausted from miles of walking for three days straight, but there was little chance of sleeping comfortably on the train.
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