Paris Trip-Day 2

Sooo...on Thursday morning, bright and early, we weren't sure exactly where to go to find breakfast. We knew that most of the places close by to us weren't open, yet, and we hadn't ridden the Metro, yet, so we eventually reasoned that McDonald's was probably going to be our best bet. I mean, why not? We had only had it for lunch AND dinner the day before, but we were reasonably certain that our darlings were already having McDee's withdrawal. So, once again, we made the trek across the street for food. Now, the McDonald's in Paris had a cool little "easy order" kind of thing that had a touch screen where you could place your order in your own language. After about ten minutes of trying to figure out the machine and then going through each person to figure out what they wanted and then actually typing it in, we were sorely disappointed to find out that the "easy order" machine wouldn't accept Chris' Dutch bank card.

Good grief.

So, we proceeded up to the counter to try to begin the never ending battle of ordering food and wondering if you're going to actually get what you ordered. Honestly, I'm not really sure what we ordered that first morning. I think we ordered several breakfast combos, but we ended up with several packs of pancakes, a couple of egg mcmuffins of sorts, and several cups of juice that none of our pickies would drink. But, thankfully, they all three loved the pancakes!

So, with full bellies, we left to conquer Paris!

Oh, and I forgot to mention that while we were in the midst of driving with the crazies the night before, I discovered that the card in my camera was FULL! So, it was imperative that we go and immediately find a camera store to buy another card. So, the concierge directed us to the Virgin Superstore (as in Virgin Records!) and we bought another card. We took it out and placed it into the camera, but something was wrong with the card. SO....Chris took it back in to the store. The guy literally had to take apart a camera so he could "check" the card. After about ten minutes, he finally realized that we had indeed just purchased a faulty card, and he exchanged it. The second one worked.

We then began the next order of business...mastering the Metro. Now, most people that we had talked to about the Metro spoke very fondly of it, and we weren't too concerned about figuring it out; however, we had no idea about the Metro passes, how many days we needed them or if we needed zone 1-3 or 1-5. The lady at the Metro was very nice and spoke English fairly fluently...thank goodness. After about fifteen minutes of reading the Metro map, we decided we were ready! I'm SO glad we got to experience the Disney World busses back in October, because that was like a trial run to prepare us for the French Metro. The kids did great on this, and they got even better the more we rode it. So, in a matter of minutes, we arrived at our destination to get on the double-decker bus to tour Paris!

The bus tour was really great, and we got a great overview of the city and some historical background information, too. The tour lasted for about an hour and a half, and then it dropped us off at the *deep breath* EIFFEL TOWER!

And, let me just say that the Eiffel Tower is more breathtaking than I thought it would be. There was just something about seeing that iconic figure in person that was just plain overwhelming! The kids were just as overwhelmed as I was, and they couldn't wait to go up in it! Poor Ashlynn, though, had to go to the bathroom about midway through the bus tour, so by the time we actually got to the Tower, she was in dire need of the facilities! As we were getting in line to go up, I asked the man taking our tickets where the closest restroom was, and it was on the second level, which was where we were going. I assured Ashlynn it wouldn't be long and that all we had to do was just ride the elevator up, and then she could go potty. So we (and about 50 other people) crammed into the huge elevator and rode up to the second level. We jumped off and began to frantically search for the bathroom...no time for enjoying the beautiful scenery, just yet. Aaah...we found the restrooms! And, the line. I kid you not. We waited in a line for the bathroom for at least twenty-five minutes. Poor Ashlynn was a super trooper, though. She never complained, but became more excited as we inched toward the door. *Fun fact*... there were only three bathroom stalls for women on the ENTIRE second level, which is also the busiest level. So if you're headed to the Eiffel Tower any time soon, try to "go" before you go up, if possible.

Well, the views were amazing! When we got to the top (second-level top), it was pretty clear and sunny, so we got some pretty good pictures. The longer we stayed, the clouds began to roll in and then it started to drizzle. We ended up visiting both gift shops, eating some fantastically yummy ice cream and staying on the second level for at least an hour. It was awesome.

After walking around the tower at least twice and taking a bazillion pictures, we were finally ready to descend. When we got to the bottom, we began to look for the post office. I had read that if you mail items from the bottom of the Eiffel Tower, the postmark will be the Eiffel Tower, itself. So, we had purchased a couple of postcards from the gift shop and set out to find the post office at the bottom. My intent was to mail a bunch of cards, but I forgot to print off my addresses before the movers packed my computer, so sadly, we only sent cards to our parents.

After going up, walking around and coming back down, our McDonald's breakfast had long disappeared. We decided to hit one of the snack bar places at the bottom. We got each of the boys a HUGE hot dog. (One would have been plenty for both of them, but we didn't know that.) Ashlynn wanted a waffle...that she ended up not being nuts about. Chris and I basically ate what was leftover. :-)

Then, we decided we'd walk over to Trocadero to get some really good pictures of L'Eiffel Tower. So, we began to walk the block over, and it began to drizzle. Then, it began to rain. Then, it proceeded to pour. We ran under some trees, and a little guy came running over with a sack full of umbrellas.

Him: "Umbrella?"
Us: "How much?"
Him: "10 Euro."
Us: "No way!"
Him: "Okay...7 Euro."
Us: "No, thanks."
Him: "Okay...two for 10 Euro."
Us: "No,thanks."
Him: "How much you pay?"
Us: "3 Euro."
Him: "No."

And, off he runs to hit the next clump of trees with waiting tourists. In the meantime, it begins to be a monsoonal rain. And, it starts to rain through the trees. Here comes umbrella boy, again.

Him: "Umbrella?"
Us: We shrug.
Him: "4 Euro."
Us: "We'll take one."

We are crazy, gullible tourists...

Anyway, the rest of our evening consisted of going on a boat tour of Paris. The boat tour was incredibly relaxing. I didn't learn as much on that tour, but I did enjoy just riding and looking at all the buildings from a different angle. On a side note, this would have been beautiful at night.

We topped off our night with guess where?

McDonald's, of course.

Kids were thrilled.

We were not.