Family Trip Report - London, Paris & Amsterdam - July 2016 PARIS DAY 5

Paris Day 5 7/12 continued

We made the short walk from the plant market to St. Chapelle. There was a line to get in, but not long. Son decided he did not want to go in. As he reminded me, I had promised less churches this trip (heavy sigh). He found a bench in the shade near the entrance. We left our picnic supplies with him. At least he wasn't sitting inside the hotel room this time! This was one of the things I was most looking forward to seeing. I've always loved glass art of any kind & was excited to see this church. Husband & I knew what to expect from watching (repeatedly!) our RS videos. We purchased our tickets & made it thru security fairly quickly and went into the lower part of the church. It was pretty here & we spent a short time looking around, but I think daughter was wondering what I was so excited about seeing. We headed upstairs & were blown away by the beauty all around us! Now she understood! We probably spent about 30 minutes just taking it all in. Finally decided it was time to go & we headed out. Husband went to find son, daughter & I to find a restroom. We'd seen one on our way into the Church, but it had a long line when we came out. I asked someone, a worker in the government building I think, the location of a restroom (in French, I'm getting good at this!) & she directed us to another one. Our most used phrase in French was "where are the restrooms, please". This had a shorter line, but only 1 stall & no one ever came out. We finally gave up & went back to the 1st restroom. Line was shorter now. Met up with husband & son - it was picnic time!

Paris Day 5 7/12 continued

We decided to have our picnic in the park behind Notre Dame. On the way it started to cloud over & looked like rain. We found a bench & proceeded to picnic, passing the food back and forth. The strawberries were a little disappointing. We'd had strawberries in France at one of the ports on our Med cruise in 2014 & they were the best we'd ever tasted. Husband talked many times since then about going back to France for the strawberries. These didn't have a lot of taste, just like the ones back home. All the fruit & vegetables at the market had a sign letting you know where they came from and the strawberries did say France. So who knows, a little later in the season & different part of France? Maybe that made a difference. Everything else was great, especially the cheese! Daughter saw what looked like wedding photos being taken so she went over to look. She said it was probably a fashion shoot rather than real wedding photos. At this point it started to rain, so we made our way back to the hotel. We all wanted to rest a little before our afternoon activities.

I had booked another City Wonders tour for 4:30 pm - "Eiffel Tower, with 2nd floor access". We hopped on the Metro & rode to the Trocadero stop to meet our guide. Our guide this time was Randa, another girl from the U.S. who'd gone to France, fell for a Frenchman & stayed. She had a very bubbly personality and reminded us very much of husband's sister. If you closed your eyes you would have thought it was his sister talking! We were set up with headsets & Randa walked us across the bridge toward the Eiffel Tower giving us the history of the Tower along the way. This was the first time the kids had seen it up close. We had wanted to go earlier in the trip, but with the Euro Cup games, the Tower had been closed for group tours. We could have tried to purchase tickets on the Tower site, but we wanted the tour w/info. Turns out that the Tower had been completely closed yesterday as some soccer fans had trashed some of the area after the finals. A fan zone had been set up in the Parc du Champ du Mars to watch the games. I think the Tower was opened back up later in the day for ticket holders, but we were glad our tour was today. Don't want to come all the way to Paris & miss going up in the Tower!

Randa got us to the front of the security line, spoke to the guard & our group was allowed to enter right away, rather than waiting. We got in line for the elevator with Randa letting us know what to expect & where the best place was to stand. Daughter was getting nervous as she does not like heights. With the angle, the elevator ride felt really strange! Finally, we were on the 2nd level. The sun had come out by now & it was beautiful up there. Hot actually & we were all bundled up afraid it would be cold. Randa gathered us together & said if we wanted to turn in our headsets, we were welcome to look around on our own. I think a lot of people use this tour for the quick Tower access, not for the actual tour. The whole group wanted to stay, so Randa took us around to each side pointing out the different sites in the distance. After that we turned in our headsets & said goodbye to Randa. Husband looked into going to the top level, but he didn't want to wait in that long line!

We headed down to the 1st level, trying to encourage daughter to stand on the clear areas and look down. The rest of us have no problem with heights, so we walked all around checking out the view down below. Finally got daughter out there! She was clinging on to me at first, but soon enough was posing for pictures & forgot about her fears. We had seen all we wanted, so husband & son decided to walk down. Daughter refused because of the open type staircase, so we took the elevator down. We made our way back to the Trocadero Metro stop, taking pictures of us in front of the Tower along the way.

Paris Day 5 7/12 continued:

We got off at a Metro stop near the hotel, but not the closest one. We took our time finding a restaurant, checking out the specials on the boards. We found a good one & placed our orders. My son had ordered apple juice. I went to the restroom & when I got back he said "look Mom, they gave me beer!". It was not really beer, but his apple juice in an enormous beer stein! They must have thought he looked thirsty! We enjoyed our meals, but the onion soup was better at the restaurant the other day.

We took our time at dinner & walking back to the hotel. Tomorrow was our last day in Paris & we had one more "must do" planned.

They could have easily given him beer.. he probably looks 16 and was with his family.. so he would be allowed to have a beer.

Really enjoying your report. I was just in Paris 4 months ago & really miss it. I have England & Switzerland on my list of next places to go, but have that itch & desire to return to Paris. I just love being there.

During my trip to Paris in 2013 I ordered onion soup at three different cafes and each one was different than the other. Enjoying your trip report. How wonderful your children are being exposed to different cultures.

Hi Pat: yes, he easily looks 16 or older. He's the tallest one in the house now as he likes to brag! He was offered alcohol both on our trip in 2014 (food tour & melon liquor/limoncello in Italy) and on food tours on this trip. He tried the melon liquor & still talks to this day about how awful it tasted! He didn't want to try anything this trip although we would have been fine with him having a small taste.

Yes, BrushTim, we're feeling the same way about missing Paris. My husband originally thought he wouldn't like Paris, but he now talks about going back (just the 2 of us this next time!).

I could go for some onion soup today, Pam! My daughter & I both love it, so we liked trying the soup in different restaurants. I hope the kids appreciate traveling. I know my daughter does! My son is more set in his routine, so traveling really throws him off. It's harder on the overseas trips with the time change. We've learned that sometimes we just have to let him be (such as staying in the hotel). No one ends up happy when we force him to go someplace. Hopefully he'll look back on our travels & appreciate them more someday!