Our group of 8 woke up early and took a metro to the Eiffel Tower. Silly me believed the weather channel and wore a dress hoping for sunny weather. The first hour or so it rained, and none of us had umbrellas so we got pretty wet! There were two options when we arrived, either take a 30 second elevator, or walk up the 700 stairs to the second floor of the Eiffel Tower! Of course being as young and active (and dumb) as we are we choose to walk. It was one of the best decisions we made all day! we walked up to the first two floors and took a million pictures. Once we got to the second floor, they wouldn’t let you walk up any further so we bought a ticket and rode to the top. It was amazing, everything down below looked so small. Paris is huge! We looked out across so many rivers and buildings, it was one of the best views I have ever seen.

We walked down the tower after numerous pictures and were starving for some food. We quickly went to a nearby bridge where we got a better view of the entire tower and took fun pictures with the group. We grabbed a bite to eat and then we split up once again. Some guys went back to take a quick nap, while the rest of us went to what was supposed to be a popular flea market. I personally have been to much better flea markets, but we didn’t want to leave empty handed so all the girls bought scarves. Scarves here are worn everywhere in a variety of ways, you see women with all different colors and styles of scarves. After the flea market we went home all took quick naps and met up for our second night in Paris.

We wanted to see the Arc again during the day, and ended up being there at the exact time that soldiers were doing some kind of ceremony. We did a wonderful walk down the Champs-Elysees, which had every overpriced store that i could imagine, but it was a fun walk down. While on the street we stopped at a delicious Italian restaurant, reminded me a little of the Olive Garden, but not such a chain restaurant! After dinner we walked to a nearby park that was near the opera house and the Museum and played a quick games of charades while we waited for it to get dark. This was very amusing as we all took turns acting out such things as octopuses, double decker buses, and other members of the group. We were wanting to see the Eiffel Tower lit up at night so once 10 pm came around we began walking over to the tower. Every hour it lights up and sparkles. We found a comfy spot on the grass under the tower and sat for about 2 hours, enjoying each others company and the beautiful sight in front of us! We got our last crepe of the day, sharing again, but just as delicious.

Finally, we wanted to see the Moulin Rouge from the movie. I love the movie and thought it might be something fun to see. If you have ever seen the movie, it makes it look like it is in the city of paris and is a sight to see. Anyways a few hours later we were all very disappointed! To arrive at the building we had to walk through the “seediest” (as Josh would say) area of town i had seen yet. We felt like we were in the red light district of Paris. Not a fun area to be in, especially at the time of night we went! Luckily us girls had strong guys to protect us Anyways, once we arrived at the Moulin Rouge, it was a building with a cheesy looking wind mill on the top. Huge waste of our time! I guess we had to go to see it, and now realize what we weren’t missing out on!

We went home finally that evening and fell fast asleep in anticipation of spending tomorrow at the Tour de France.