We slept for barely 3 to 4 hours, before getting ready at 3 am plus, to get the bus to airport. Sin May managed to get a few snaps of the beautiful dawn before the bus departs..
I overestimated the time we could kill before boarding, so when we finally sat down n ordered something for breakfast, there was not much time left to slowly enjoy our coffee and bacon roll... Sorry about that dear... Hate the feeling of rushing...
As if rushing through security check was not bad enough, we were stopped from boarding coz one of the air stewardess said Sin May's bag was too big... Damn it, we have not had any problems with our luggage in the previous flight.. As time is running short, we tried to repack the bag quickly... Finally we were able to squeeze the bag into the metal frame up side down as the base of the bag is incompressible and too big to be fitted in. Hehe, so we managed to get through without having to pay some stupid charges for overweight/oversized bag... Off to Paris!It was hot in Paris, after arriving at the Beauvais Airport, took an 1 hour bus to city centre, then took metro to the Montmartre area, where our hostel is located..
The common area and the lobby of the hostel is pretty nice, simple but comfortable, but the room we got was BAD! I'll talk about that later. As we arrived before check in time, we juz left our luggage in the luggage room then went out to the city centre.
Our hostel was just a minute away from the metro station, so good thing. We took metro to the station Opéra, as the name suggests, there's an opera house up there. Our first stop was to the Opéra Garnier, but strictly speaking, we did not enter the building or admire the building thoroughly, we just took some photos and the heat of the sun urged us to leave quickly.
We then walked along Avenue de l'Opéra, towards Musée du Louvre. The heat and the traffic had made Sin May mad. Although going to Paris is a lot of people's dream, but the reality is sometimes cruel.. Both of us don't really like Paris... Too crowded, too hot during summer, too much traffic, and too much bread... lol... Had some bad experience dealing with Parisians last time i came, so not really good. But i admire their city planning, and their architecture.. They have some really beautiful buildings there...
We've reached the outside of the huge Louvre compound... We decided to find a place to sit and have a drink before continuing. Had some tea n orange juice in a nearby tea house... Then we headed to the famous glass pyramid of the Louvre...
Took some pictures with the glass pyramid and the Arc de Triomphe de Carrousel juz outside of the Louvre. Interesting thing is that one can see the Arc de Triomphe from this small Arc de Triomphe de Carrousel in a straight line and there is another Arc de la Défense further ahead.
I've planned to visit the Louvre on the next day, but since we were there already and surprisingly, not much ppl in the queue, i thought, y not juz go today? But there seemed to hv something wrong... Y did the Louvre looked so empty today? Then only i remembered.. I planned the visit on the next day coz i knew the Louvre would b closed on tht day... zzz... Blur me...Then we continued with our walk, walking along La Seine river towards the Notre Dame de Paris... On the way we strayed of the original path n wandered into some areas unknown to us... But tht was a good thing, seeing things ppl don usually go n c in Paris....
As we were nearing the Notre Dame, Sin May suddenly saw some jetplanes roaring across the sky, n they came batch by batch, in a tidy formation... Fighting jets, bombers, n planes i did not know what they are called. There was probably an aviation exhibition or something like that... We juz stood there n watched for 10 mins as batches of planes flew by....
Finally we've reached the Notre Dame. As usual it was filled with tourists. Sin May was so hoping to find the ppl tht sell super cheap keychains there. But not a glimpse of them, mayb we were there too late, or they've sold out their keychains too early... I found the cathedral magnificent when i stepped in for the first time in 2009, but after going into several cathedrals, and into Notre Dame itself for the third time, the cathedrals looked more or less the same... Still it is a piece of masterpiece. Sin May did not find cathedrals very interesting though hehe...
After that, we found a restaurant in the nearby area n had our late lunch.
After lunch, we wandered around in search of the nearest metro station. Sin May was very interested in the western countries' pigeons which are not afraid of ppl... We saw a string orchestra performing and promoting their music in the metro station.
We went back to the hostel thinking of getting a good rest before going out again later in the evening... The nightmare started after we have checked in. A messy messy room, freakingly hot, and located at the most uncomfortable place possible. I don't know about other dorms, but the dorm that we got was at the ground floor, facing directly to an open space with rubbish bins just outside the kitchen. People will just gather outside at that open space eating, chatting, meaning, NOISY and NO PRIVACY. Plus it's freaking hot in the room and it did not have a single window so we had to open the door... Toilets were juz beside our room so we could hear ppl flushing, opening the tap etc... Our mood instantly turned murderous... We couldn't get another room coz it was fully booked. We felt very pissed by the condition of the room and we couldn't rest properly for later's activities. In the end, we juz took a very unpleasant nap n felt lethargy to go out...
But in the end, we still managed to drag ourself out of the hostel to visit Eiffel Tower. But we did not have time to go for a proper dinner already. On our way out, we bought some apricots at a nearby grocery store... BAD BAD DECISION.. Both of us got sore throat with a lot of sputum after eating the apricots.
On our way to make a transit, to take a suburb train (RER) to Eiffel Tower, we passed by this museum which Sin May claimed to look like a 'thousand layer cake'. I did not know what kinda museum is that but they were exhibiting some of Van Gogh's artpieces.
OK we finally reached the famous landmark of Paris -- Eiffel Tower. Eiffel Tower looked best at night, when all the lights were turned on n it becomes a golden tower. During daytime, it's juz a huge piece of metal.
While we were taking photos there, we met 2 canadian girls asking us to help them take photos... Well very cheerful n friendly, n they were doing the 'Eiffel Tower' pose in front of Eiffel Tower... When it was their turn to help us take photos, 1 of them squatted down in order to take a full view of the tower. The problem is, she was wearing a short skirt, n hence, upskirt. It was kinda awkward as i did not know where to put my eyes on, coz i would surely c it when i look towards the camera... The funny part was that she could told us somemore, 'Sorry to let u'll c my panty'... Gosh....When we got in line to buy tickets to climb the tower, it was quite late already n the top of the tower had closed for visit. Actually climbing to the middle is good enough already. We could see a lot of armies/police guarding the tower. Probably due to the increased threats by the Muslim extremists.. Eiffel Tower always got attacked first in movies when France is attacked by terrorists. lol
Night view from the tower was stunning, but quite cold up there. It was crowded, as usual with tourists... After going down from the tower, we took a few more shots n left... The RER was closed already, so we went for the metro station further away. It was quite late when we reached our hostel, n although it was midnight already, ppl are still talking loud n laughing in the kitchen area, juz right outside of our room. It was stated there that the kitchen would b closed by 12, but nobody cares. How inconsiderate.... Sucky hostel.... Anyway we managed to sleep due to exhausation.
(to be continued...)
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