I believe everyone will fall in love at the first sight for this city. To me is a bit of both as I've seen the good and the bad. Yet, still unforgettable memories.
Arrived in Paris by bus (which supposed to be at 7 a.m. but actually arrived at 5 a.m.) freakin cold! Obviously I cannot check in to my hotel so we only dropped our baggage and went straight for breakfast. Stopped by at Henry V station. It was located alongside of the famous Champ Elysees street. Funny how I can get full only by eating a croissant, 2 toast with jam and a cup of hot chocolate. If I ate that in Indonesia as my everyday breakfast I would already be dying before 12. Somehow my body adjusted really well there.
We strolled down the street and ended up spending 3 hours at Sephora. Oh, I already mentioned "we" as if you already know. I did this whole Eurotrip with my sister by the way. She live in Netherlands.
The highlights of my trip to Paris are:
1. Food was great! (as I would expected, obviously)
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| Arc de Triomphe |
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| Whatever-that-is-near Place de la Concorde |
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| Musee du Louvre |
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| Eiffel Tower |
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| Eiffel Tower |
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| Notre Dame Cathedral |
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| Pont Alexandre III |
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| Lines of Pre-Wed shoot. Fun fact, most of them are Asian |
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| Mesmerizing |
I got the chance to eat at this traditional restaurant near Moulin Rouge. We need to book weeks before visiting to be seated inside. Really low ceiling, not so great decoration but food was great! I finally ate escargot in France! YAY! Verdict was..chewy..
I also managed to eat duck confit. This...would be the highlight of our dinner. Crispy skin yet tender on the inside. The sauce also complements the duck really well.
Finally ate Nutella crepes as well.
2. Lavish palace
There's always some kind of "art" incorporated to old buildings, either small details of logos to sculptures on the wall. I went to so-obvious Louvre but did not get inside the museum because the queue was so freaking long. So we only went around the upper part of the museum. But still, I cannot believe that back in the old days, these people managed to build this very detailed sculptures mounted to the wall only for the aesthetics.
I also went to Versailles!
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| Chateau de Versailles |
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| Chateau de Versailles |
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| Summer Villa |
Let's have a real talk right now. I cannot get over how luxurious this palace was. Gold gates and roof ornaments, a HUGE palace with sooo many paintings, and each room has their own "theme". Did I also mentioned that this palace area was LITERALLY HUGE? I mean, they had this main palace at the very front, then they got huge fountains across the "backyard" then they still got Summer Villa/Visitor Villa and at the far back, Marie Antoinette managed to build, yes you read that correctly, build a small village resembles her childhood village where she used to live. I even take this little train ride just to explore the whole palace area. I haven't even started talking about the inside right? marble floors and gold plated everything was standard. I am mesmerized looking at their dance hall. Full of mirrors and chandeliers. It was really gorgeous!
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| Grand Ballroom |
3. Gorgeous Coastline
On the last day in Paris, we went to Nice. Although we arrived with gloomy weather, I instantly knew that this place is amazing. We only stayed for 1 night in Nice. To be honest, Nice is our "transit" city because our main goal is to get to Monaco. We take a 20 minute train ride and found ourselves traveling around the coastline of Nice leading up to Monaco. Fun fact, Monaco's train station is the cleanest among all other country I've been in Europe and smells really good!
Too bad we arrived almost noon, around 4 p.m and the weather was also quite gloomy so we can only strolled around for 2 hours and surprisingly the city was kind of empty. Not so many people are around.
Nice was definitely somewhere I want to grow old at. Slow-paced-city, nice Mediterranean weather where you get a bit of the heat and the breeze. The city was not crowded at all, which I like. I already imagined myself going to a small shop every morning to get my freshly baked croissant and coffee to start my day.
4. Shopping
I mean, I'm probably not the right person to talk about this as I am obviously cannot afford any Chanel nor Hermés bag but you will feel the satisfaction even only buying from the-so-obvious-retails (read: Sephora) that satisfaction came when you went out of the store carrying the Sephora paper bag but it has Champ Elysee printed on the bottom. That exclusive feeling...
To summarize France (read: Paris and Nice) i would say that this country had a lot of history, although the culture might not be the best, this country live from the past and that what keeps it alive. The "art" part is well defined in here, everything is beautiful.
