The Dang's: Paris Day 1: Sacre Coeur & La Tour Eiffel

On Tuesday, we said "Farewell" to London and "Bonjour" to Paris!

We checked out and left our London hotel around 7 am.

It was a quick tube ride to Euston/St.Pancras Station where the EuroStar is now located (last time I was in London it left from Waterloo Station).

Goodbye Leicester Square Tube Stop

Our train left for Paris at 8:31 London time, and we arrived arround 11:45 Paris time (one hour ahead). So it was quite a short ride at 2 hours and 15 minutes.

However, our troubles began once we reached Gare du Nord. All we needed to do was buy some Metro tickets (carnets) to get to our hotel. After waiting in line, we discovered the ticket machines wouldn't accept our credit cards because they didn't have a chip in them (which is common in Europe). And we didn't have any Euros yet as we had been using the Pound in London.

Irritating! So we looked for an ATM. Same problem. Our only alternative was to wait in the humongous line for a live ticket seller and hope that our credit cards would work there. I even tried to ask a few different security guards if there were ATMs anywhere nearby that took non-chip cards, but they didn't understand my piecemeal French and English questions. Ugh. So that line took about an hour. Lucky for us, our credit cards worked there and we never had that problem anywhere else the rest of our stay. Instead of getting Metro Passes, we opted for 2 carnets (packs of 10 Metro tickets). This worked out perfectly.

The only good thing to come of that fiasco was that by the time we reached our hotel at 1:45, our room was ready! We relaxed in the room for about an hour and then headed out for Montemarte.

In one of my previous visits to Paris, we had stayed in Montemarte. However, I hadn't explored it much. We took the Metro to Abbesses Station, and then started our climb up the windy streets on the hill. Montemarte is quite charming with stone streets and interesting architecture.

At the top, was the Basilica of Sacre Coeur.

From the church steps, there is a really nice panoramic view of Paris.

We enjoyed the view of Paris for a bit, and also took a quick peek inside the church. It's not terribly old, only having been completed in 1914, but it certainly is lovely. Of course no photos are allowed inside.

On our way back, we both got Nutella crêpes at a little crêpes window- Adam's also had banana in it. Delicious!

Next up was the Eiffel Tower. It was just a short ten minute walk from our hotel which was quite convenient.

I had tried to time it so that we could be on the Eiffel Tower at sunset so as to enjoy the views in daylight and at night. Even though there were long lines just to buy tickets and go up, it worked out.

We enjoyed sunset from the second level, and I enjoyed pointing out all the different sights in Paris to Adam.

Photo by Adam

Like the Arc de Triomphe.

photo by Adam

We then had to wait in a ridiculously long line to go to the top. We were in line for about an hour. And it was cold and windy. I definitely appreciated the hot chocolate I bought! Though from our spot in line, we had a nice view of the sun setting over Paris.

We finally made it to the top, and enjoyed seeing the city all lit up - it truly is the City of Lights! We were at the top when it "sparkled" for the first time that evening at 9 PM. It was like a bunch of strobe lights going off, which was a little intense, but neat.

Adam took this really cool photo with a long exposure from the top. I'm obsessed with it and may or may not have it as my desktop background at work. I wish I could take credit for it!

photo by Adam

Then it was another huge line to go back down; this time only about half an hour. While it was a lot of waiting around, it was definitely worth the experience. I've been up in it twice, but never at night. Which was really cool.

It was 9:45 by the time we made it back down. Since we had the tri-pod with, Adam took some night shots of the Eiffel Tower. Then we waited until 10 for it to sparkle again and Adam took some more photos. It was really pretty to see it "sparkle" from the ground as well.

This shot had a long exposure so it shows all the little sparkling bulbs lit up.

photo by Adam

The "sparkling" effect with different shutter speeds -

photos by Adam

Since the whole Eiffel Tower experience took longer than expected at 3 hours, we still hadn't had dinner and were too tired for a restaurant. We found a little kebab place by our hotel and got an order of fries to split. And a GIANT bottle of Orangina. I was pretty excited! I have an Orangina obsession.