We set off early Monday morning for the Kettering train station. About a mile and a half down the road, Bill turned to me and asked me if I remembered the passports. Ummm, NO!!! Of course, they were the one thing I forgot to pack. After zipping home to get them, it was a nerve-wracking next 20 minutes, trying to rush to the station, get the car parked, get all our luggage and kids in and over to the right platform, all in time for our train. Missing this train meant probably missing our train from London to Paris - not a good thing. We made it though, Bree and I rolling and dragging luggage like crazy while Bill rushed to get the car parked! Why does this situation sound so familiar??
The Eurostar was a very smooth and easy traveling experience. We sat at tables and could eat our packed lunch, the kids and I could get up and go to the bathroom any time - it was very convenient and very nice. Arriving into Gard de Nord, we went down a level to get metro tickets. Here, I was bombarded with gypsy beggar girls (while Bill and Bree were in the line for tickets) and after about 20 minutes of telling them I had no money, I gave them granola bars and they finally went away. These beggar girls are all over Paris and are a big annoyance - we are told they are of course scamming people.
After dropping our luggage off at our apartment (which turned out to be fairly decent and very much in the center of Paris), we set off for an ambitious afternoon and evening of sight-seeing. The itinerary - first, the Louvre, followed by the Arc de Triomphe (timed to arrive for the lighting of the tomb of the unknown soldier), and finished by a trip up the Eiffle Tower. In retrospect, this was crazy to do after an early morning and dragging three kids along. But everyone knows quite well that we are a little crazy!
The Mona Lisa was swarmed with people, making it somewhat difficult to have any appreciation for it. We toured through many halls of this museum - paintings, sculptures, ancient Egypt, you name it. Philip had a small tired meltdown about half-way down the Italian Paintings hall and I held him as he conked right out. Then Bill held him for a while and he soon revived. A detour down to the Starbucks gave us enough energy to continue on through the exhibits. The Louvre is not something that is tremendously easy to do with small children - they are not quite as interested as adults, let's just say. But they endured, and I was quite pleased with how much of this huge place we actually got through! We even careened back through the halls to get to the Mona Lisa right before closing - a now empty space condusive to art appreciation. I personally liked one of the other da Vinci paintings there much more, but what is my opinion worth?
The Arc de Triomphe is surrounded by ten (?) roads and is quite the impressive monument. We went underneath the arch for the ceremony - WWII vets bear flags and one lights the tomb, etc. It was very nice, if crowded. We then made the big mistake of deciding to WALK down to the Eiffle Tower - these things look a lot smaller on the maps!
If we were fresh and energetic, this would be a nice walk down the Paris boulevard. We were neither fresh, nor energetic. Well, at least, I wasn't. Hey - it had been a long day of walking for this pregnant mama!
At last we arrived and went up the elevator. Our goal was to go up while it was light, but have it get dark while we were there so we could see the lights. In this we were perfectly successful. We took a timely (due to a short rainstorm that swept through) detour into the cafe for a pretty awful meal, hit the top level, and came down just as the lights came on and started flashing. Philip conked out yet again, poor guy, but this time carried by Bree. Bill and children took the stairs down. After some photo ops across the Trocodaro (where Philip briefly revived, but somewhat grumpily) we wearily headed home.
Tuesday was a much needed day of touring the city on a double decker bus.
Paris is an ornate city, every building's facade a fanciful decoration from a variety or eras. We wound our way through the city, crossing the Seine several times and seeing every highlight along the way. Ending that tour at Notre Dame, we decided to climb the towers of Notre Dame. This involved LOTS more spiral stairs, but you get up close to the gargoyles and the various statues, the famous bell, and other things that you would otherwise miss.
Bill had to quickly curtail his tour up the towers when Philip became excessively distressed needing the toilet. This is forever captured on film by his expression in our family photo on the tower. We went inside the church after descending and I found it to be very grim and oppressive - probably exactly what they were going for.
Wednesday was devoted to seeing Versailles. We took the double decker metro out to Versailles, much to the kids' delight. Approaching the courtyard, Abby was waylaid and consequently terrified by a big black dude vendor. She was listening to a podcast on my iphone and the guy was asking her to give him the iphone. We grabbed her and hustled away from that. Every room of Versailles is marble walls, gold trim all over everything, painted ceilings, and lots of gold stuff around the room. This is only topped by the Hall of Mirrors, which is more of the same but then has mirrors every few feet to reflect all the opulence. We diligently listened to our audio guides and toured room after room of this.
Out in the gardens, I quickly figured out that there was no way this pregnant mama could haul herself around the miles of gardens. It was decided after some debate to get two golf carts and do the driving tour.
This proved to be lots of fun and very relaxing. Bree managed to stay on the road and everything - no driving into fountains or crashing into trees! I did feel a bit ripped off though because none of the fountains were in operation at the time.
Thursday was "clean up" day - getting to the things we hadn't made it to yet. We decided on Sacre Couer for the morning. Arriving there, we started the pilgrimage up the many steps. Bree was briefly harrassed by some vendors (one even grabbed her arm) and I had to yell at them. Bill our great protector had fallen behind us to deal with Philip.
We did finally make it up the long and steep climb to the top. The weather was very hot and sunny and we were tired! In fact we were so tired that we couldn't muster up the enthusiasm to go inside the church and settled for some photo ops of the city view from the top. After looking around, we discovered a gondola that goes from top to bottom - part of the metro. Of course we find it AFTER we have climbed all the way up! It was a nice way to get down though.
We grabbed a crepe lunch at a cafe nearby and then headed over to Georges Pompidou. This is a modern art museum and the building is designed inside out - the escalator is on the outside of the building. We knew there was no way we could enjoy the inside exhibits at that point, so we just took a ride on the escalator up to the building's top.
Then it was off to Starbucks for some rejuvenation. We still had a couple hours to kill before our train left, so we hit a nearby park/playground for the kids to let off some steam. After trying out a few different playgrounds, we decided to stay at the one with the big sand pit. The kids promptly began building their sand castle and had a great time getting completely dirty.
It was a very tired little group that got on the Eurostar back to London that evening! Friday morning, Bree had to fly back to the US, leaving Philip in tears as we pulled away from the airport. What a trip! It was perhaps a little ambitious for our group, but in the end we saw so much stuff!
We found that the attraction prices were pretty good - many of the things were completely free for children which was a big help for us. But food and especially water were very costly there. I think that it's tough to travel with small children because they are not inclined to want to eat the different foods they have never encountered. Joseph and Abby gamely tried some different things but mostly did not like them. When eating out, this can be very frustrating - sometimes wasting money. At just turning the age of four, Philip was in a state of exhaustion quite a bit of the time, and museums etc are just not going to cut it for four year olds. This was realistically the only way we could do this trip at this point in our lives, but for future reference, I would probably not want to do such an extensive sight-seeing thing unless the kids were older, or it were just adults.
I also felt very "nervously watchful" over the kids at all times. On the metro, the doors close lightening fast and we just didn't want a child's limb getting caught in it or something horrible. This actually does happen. So each of us three adults always had a kid in hand, and when the metro was crowded, we would end up yanking them inside with us, pushing and shoving to get the both of us in without leaving anyone behind. There was one time when we all got on the metro and I looked around and there was no Abby. It was so crowded and I started calling out to her - she had been crushed up between people and was a few rows away - she crawled through the people to get back to us. These experiences are not calming to parents!
The kids were also very scared of the big vendor guys that were everywhere. The beggar girls were annoying, but not particularly scary. At any rate, it is no small thing to keep little children with you and watch over them. On the flip side, I guarantee that Joseph and Abby will remember that remarkable trip forever and it most likely was very broadening for them to experience. I know that Bill, Bree and I had a great, if not tiring time! So Paris dream came true and we packed enough into our four days to last us a good long time!
