Paris Overview

Line for the elevator

Arc de Triomphe

Part of the bridge on Pont Alexander III

Outside the Louvre

one small room inside the Louvre

Basilique du Sacre Coeur

Cimetiere du Pere Lachaise

Inside the catacombs

Relaxing in a bar

Our view from our hotel

I've always known I was a saint

Protecting my sandwich from the finches

Jardin du Luxemberg

Jardin des Plantes

Notre Dame

Pantheon

I've been procrastinating on writing up the part of Europe. It was so much fun and we did so much. Paris was the best place that we visited. We definitely need to go back. Four days was definitely not enough time!

When we checked into our hotel and saw our view, I was amazed. We could see the Eiffel Tower. The sunsets were amazing! We never needed to leave our room (if we didn't care about seeing anything).

One of our days here was our "day of the dead". We visited the catacombs and the Cemetiere du Pere Lachaise. This is a very famous cemetery. Jim Morrison, Author Wilde, and we even found a couple David's (painters). We got there too close to closing, so we actually couldn't find Morrison's grave before we had to leave. Afterwards, we relaxed at a near by cafe. We saw a dog do his business on the sidewalk and were betting how many people would hit it on this very small sidewalk. The catacombs were so cool. There were stacks and stacks of bones everywhere. I kind of freaked Jason out by almost hitting some bones with my backpack. Our little joke is that I still have Parisians stuck to the bottom of my flip flops. We couldn't get over how many bones were down there. It was fun and interesting to see this.

We took one stop off the metro to see Basille. It was a huge round about. We walked around the round about and got back on the metro. The metro is the best thing. We need that here. You can go anywhere so much faster and you don't have to rent a car. If you get lost, just hop back on and find your way. (it's almost impossible to get lost.)

That night we got a bottle of wine and some bread and headed over to the Basilque de Sacre Coeurto watch the sunset. On our way we saw Van Gogh's house where he killed himself. That's when we realized the=at we forgot our corkscrew. I had to go into a wine store and have a guy open the bottle for us while Jason waited outside. That would be impossible to do that in the US.

After we got back to our hotel, we were getting hungry again and needed some energy. All the cafes and anything that served food was closing. The ONLY thing that was open was Domino's. They have those everywhere over there. It was kind of like McDonald's. And, yes, it tastes like cardboard over there, too. We couldn't really taste anything with what we'd been drinking that night anyways. We really wish that we had cafes here. I love eating and grabbing a cold one outside. I can deal with the heat and everything as long as I'm outside with a good beer. There didn't seem to be as many flies as we have here (which is a good thing).

The one thing that I really wanted from this trip was an authentic futbol jersey. The main street (ave. des Champs Elyees) had major shopping. We stopped into a Nike store and picked up my Barcelona jersey. I know I should have gotten a France jersey, but I had my heart set on Barcelona. We continued on our way to Arc de Triophe. They were having a ceremony for the Air France plane that crashed. It was interesting to watch. We didn't go to the top, since our next stop was the Eiffel Tower. I wanted to go up at dusk and stay for the sunset. We had some time to kill, so Jason grabbed a chocolate and banana crepe. That was pretty good, but I wasn't impressed. The food wasn't great. We saw on a menu that you could order pigeon. We double checked it in our phrase book, and yes it was actual rodent birds. We didn't eat there.

During the day, The Eiffel Tower is very unimpressive. It's ugly and made from iron. At night, it's a different story. Every hour, it sparkles. We got to choose which line to get to the middle platform (we didn't go to the very top). One line was taking an elevator, and the other line was walking up 328 steps to the mid point. The line for the elevator was about 2 hours long and the walking line was about 15 minutes long (that's how long it took us to walk up the stairs). Once you get up there, you can see everything. It's a different point of view than from the hill we were at the night before.
There is a park called Jardin du Luxemberg. In the middle of the day, there are hundreds of people sitting around with their friends just hanging out. Another beautiful park was Jardin des Plantes. This park had a zoo near by and a BBQ place to eat at, and a some sort of maze that went up to a small hill. This park also had a branch for the University of Paris Ag. department. So many plants everywhere!

We also saw the Pantheon and Notre Dame. We accidentally came across the Pantheon, and stayed to take some pictures. Not a lot of people were there (which was a good thing). Notre Dame had such a huge line to go inside, we decided to save our line patience for the Louvre.

I've never seen anything so big in my life! There are four wings in the Louvre. We were able to see what we desired in one wing. We were there for over six hours! Our feet were so sore, and the shin splints didn't help at all. On the map of the museum, we marked which sections we saw and what we need to see next time. To relax, we grabbed some sandwiches and beers and took a seat at a near by park (parks are everywhere). Little finches were starting to gather around us for our bread. I decided to hold a piece of bread in my hand and the little bird flew up, barely hung on and took the bread. How cute!! They started getting aggressive, so I had to hide my sandwich from them. I loved Paris and we need to go back. All I have to say is that four days in Paris is not enough time. We will be going back

4 Years already!!

Jason and I just celebrated our fourth wedding anniversary last night. We can't believe how fast time has went by. We have been together since October 2001 and that time has flown by just has fast as the last 4 years. Everything we do together is a blast, I've never had so much fun with one person before. I love my husband very much and I know he does love me too. Last night we went to Tahoe Joes and had a great steak. I can't believe how much food we ate. We are still full from dinner. For dessert, Jason had an awesome cheesecake and I had a mouth watering chocolate cake.

Even though it was hot outside and flies were coming for us, Jason suffered through it just to make me happy (I really wanted to eat outside). Our happy weekend continues today. We went to the Auburn farmers market and to a cute little pastry place. We finished our morning with a game a racket ball and a free BBQ at our gym. Tonight we will get together with some friends and have a great night.

I have such a great husband, I can't even describe! Many more anniversaries to come. Most people don't know, but one reason why we went to Europe was to celebrate our anniversary (the other reason was to celebrate Jason's graduation...in December).

For all of those wondering when we'll finish the blog on Europe, I'm still working on it. Paris is next and will take the longest to write up. It is coming, and I haven't forgotten.

They're posted!!

I've finally found the time to post all of the Europe photos. I've uploaded EVERY photo we took over there. If you're brave, and really bored, take a look! Leave us comments, so we know what you think. If you like a certain photo enough, you can even download it for yourself to keep or print out. Have fun!

http://jasonmichele.shutterfly.com/

luxemburg overview

part of the castle hiding in the park

view of the bridge from the park

jason is standing the castle

stairs to the top of the castle

bathrooms are everywhere here (even though you have to pay)

the view from the top

back side of the church

little town in the valley

it's so green here

that's us with the castle in the back

train station

trying to sleep on the train

luxemburg was another day trip that was on our way to paris. this was such a beautiful city!! we visited the city center which was a castle that had been built and re-built for hundreds of years. this is such a small town. we actually had too much time here. we explored what was left of the castle, the very green park, and all the animals we could see, and just wondered around.

brussels overview

the green protesters

yummy beer!

all that chocolate

galleries st. hubert

beautiful gardens

that's us!

so pretty

peeing boy

the wall that is attached the the modern building

it's after 8pm!

big, tall, gothic building

my new favorite beer!

protesters

our room

when we got off the train, we tried to figure out where we were, but we weren't on the map, so we ended up taking a taxi. the driver was insane! he was cutting people off, people were cutting him off. we almost got whiplash because of all the slamming on the brakes. i would NEVER drive in brussels! our hotel was nice brussels. it wasn't anything special. the hotel was in the middle of the Lebanese area. when we got in, we cleaned up and headed out to dinner. on our walk to find something to eat, we were getting all these hard stares from the locals. a few bars, probably wouldn't let me in. it seemed like all the men hung out together until about 6am, and then closed their bars and went home, then re-opened at 11am. when we were almost to the city center, there were about 15 cars honking their horns and yelling and screaming. it was so loud and obnoxious! it lasted about 20 minutes (until they passes us), they were driving so slowly.

when we found a place to eat, we were the only ones there to eat (it was only 7pm). we had such a big dinner, i couldn't even finish all my food. things were so much cheaper here. afterwards, we walked around town until just before dark. near our hotel, the streets were literally filled with trash. there was urine everywhere, but the trash was the biggest thing. it wasn't so bad as we got closer to the city center.

the next day, we went on a mission to find the little peeing statue. it was not impressive, i can't believe how many people crowded around this little thing. we then came across this old wall that was probably a part of an old castle, but it was attached to a modern building (looked like an apartment building).

we also ended up at the mall that i wanted to see (galleries st. hubert). it looked like a museum. there were chocolate stores everywhere! they were pretty pricey here, so we went outside of the mall, and bought a lot there. Belgium chocolate is the best!

in our europe book that we brought (printed in 2008), the map was completely wrong. some of the major streets were mis-labeled, or not even on the map. we were glad that the hotel people gave us a map. between the two maps, we were able to find our way around brussels. we had fun here, but they need to clean their streets better. this was the third city we wen to that had construction. i guess they're getting for the olympics in london in 2012.

the haag overview

city streets

more canals

pretty building

the car show

how did i take this picture? where am i?

jason next to his painting

once we left amsterdam, we took a day trip to the haag. we stopped off at he m.c. escher museum ad played around in there for while. it was pretty cool that they had an entire level that was all hands on. right outside, there was a car show (that my dad would have liked). there were

a lot of old foreign (to me) cars there. i'm glad we made a pit stop here. this was a cute little town. to catch the train, we had to walk to the othe train station (which was about 15 blocks), that was the furthest we'd walked at this point.