An early start to the only full day in Paris takes us to the Arc de Triomphe at 10am. Just when I thought we left all the stairs behind the previous day, more appear on our way. Me and my 4 friends climbed up to the top of the Arc and enjoyed the view of Paris from up there.

The amount of detail on the actual Arc is fascinating. All these old buildings throughout Europe have been really awesome to look at in general.

Once we got down again we took a walk along the Champs Elysees (the big road from one of the photos above that drives up to the Arc. Along this road are many shops and restaurant – everything stupidly overpriced. Even the McDonalds was crazy expensive! To be fair, it was the fanciest McDonalds I’ve ever seen, selling pastries and fancy ice cream and stuff.

Since 2 of our friends only arrived late the previous evening the group decided to split up so that they can go see the Eiffel Tower and we can go have a french lunch at a less expensive place. We went to a restaurant in Montmartre where the prices were less than half of what it was on the Champs Elysees.

My friend really wanted to have snails since they don’t get them in Australia at all. The snails served in France is a lot different to what we get in SA. Just spiced with some herbs and other things, and served in the shell! They give you a tong which you are supposed to use to hold the snail, and then you can theoretically scrape the snail out of the shell. My friend tried to crush the shell. At this point people started looking at us funny so we just put down the fancy tools and used our hands to hold the shells while scraping out the meat.

The snails were actually really good. I was quite surprised as I’m used to them smothered in a creamy cheese sauce. I was less impressed with mains – steak and chips. The steak was well cooked and definitely not bad, I’m just spoiled with South African braai’s and people who knows how to braai a steak to perfection. For the non South Africans reading, a “braai” is a barbecue, I’m not sure if there is any difference other than the term.

I wanted to go exploring a bit north-east where I’ve heard it’s cheaper and quieter – less tourists. We got there and found a bakery where we bought eclairs for very cheap and headed out to the river to go sit and chill with our newly found treasure. By pure accident we sat close to the oldest vertical lift bridge in Paris.

After an eventful morning we decided to go back to the hotel for an afternoon nap. I chilled for a bit editing photos on my bed and then decided to go exploring the other side of Montmartre. I ate pretty ice cream which they shape into a rose with care and walked past more restaurants. It’s really interesting that the restaurants in Paris tend to turn their chairs to look almost cinema-like to face the street.

And then, my next bucket list item, the moulin rouge! I spent many hours of my life rewatching that movie, and seeing it in real life was amazing. One day when I’m rich I will go back to watch a show there (it costs roughly 100 euros). For now, just seeing it is good enough.

After walking around for a bit I went back to my hotel again and packed for my evening adventures. Paris definitely seems to be more of a night-time city than a day time one, as everything is highlighted in the evening and there is a lot happening in the evenings. I packed my camera, tripod and a jacket and headed off back towards the Eiffel Tower / Arc de Triomphe area to go an experience them at night.

I started with the Arc where I wanted to be the 1 million and 1st person to take long exposure shots of the arc. I set up my tripod in the middle of the road, and started taking many photos as the night sky grew darker. I eventually got a photo that I was happy with.

As I headed back to the Eiffel Tower I saw these interesting buildings.

I spent a bit of time at the tower again, taking even more photos of it. It looks like a completely different building at night.

During the time I was taking photos 2 of my friends were at the Louvre (there was only 2 tickets available for the day still and I chose photos), and the other 2 were back at the hotel after having done a walking tour through Montmartre. I made my way back to where my friends were and found them at some kind of fare close to the Louvre, which was still in high swing at 10pm.

Day 3

The next morning I overslept and almost missed my checkout at 10am. After I checkout out me and my 2 friends went for breakfast at a random restaurant close to our hotel. It was very strange that the breakfast consisted of a croissant, toast and some other form of bread. Almost like an entire bread basket per person, with coffee and juice.

We made our way towards FlyView where we booked a “Fly over Paris” 5D experience. As we were early we decided to go drink coffee and eat pastries and macaroons close by.

The 5D experience was really awesome. You stand inside a metal frame and put on a VR headset. The VR simulates you being in some kind of jetpack flying over Paris to visit the major sites. The metal frame thing that you stand in vibrates and moves slightly which makes the whole experience feel more real.

They had some green screens for us to play with afterwards, where you take a photo with some background. This was one of my favourites.

At this point it was time to start heading back to the hotel as my train back to Amsterdam left in 3 hours. I left all my luggage in my friends’ room as they stayed another night. Before packing up and leaving the hotel we went back to the restaurant we had our first coffee at, and had some more sweet things. I took a video of us walking from the station to the restaurant, to show the streets of Paris. It was raining at this point.

I really loved just sitting there looking at the street and listening to the rain fall down, especially after a really tightly packed 2 days. It was a sad reality when I had to say goodbye to my friends and go back to Amsterdam, where I spent one more night and then flew back to Johannesburg. My friends had a longer tour planned than my leave and money allowed for, and still went on to Germany, Switzerland and Italy before heading back to Australia. I wish I could have joined them!

Overall I really loved Paris, I just wish I had one or two more nights to spend there! The main thing that I really wanted to do was join the dancing groups next to the river. They had areas of (from what I could see from a distance) Salsa, Waltz, Tango and either boogie or lindy hop. Bucket list item added 😀