Having now lived in Paris for over two months, I was fully prepared to take on the responsibility of making sure Allie saw Paris the right way and expose her to the best things the city has to offer. If you yourself are ever planning a quick 2-day trip to Paris, I suggest using the following plan as your guide to hitting up Paris' must-sees (and must-eats) in that short 48-hour period.
So, Allie arrived very late on Friday, where I met her at my dorm. We planned to head out early the next morning, so instead of going out, we stayed up talking and laughing until we wore ourselves out. Saturday morning, we started our day by heading to the Eiffel Tower where we ate fresh baguette and pain au chocolat for breakfast. We snapped some souvenir photos and then hopped on the metro to the Arc du Triomphe for more photo-ops and a stroll down the Champs-Elysées, stopping at Ladurée and the 4-floor Louis Vuitton, of course! We strolled through Place de la Concorde and through the Tuileries before walking back on Rue du Rivoli to grab a chocolat chaud to-go from Angelina. We continued on to the Louvre to see Mona Lisa and Venus de Milo and walked around for a few before carrying on with our tour. As it happened to be "Jour du Macaron" at Pierre Hermé, Allie and I hit up the Rue Cambon boutique and waited on a 45-minute long line to score three free macarons each! Yum yum yum and so worth it! We then walked down Rue Cambon/Rue Saint Honoré area, stopping in Colette, my favorite store in Paris, to see Purple magazine's Olivier Zahm's photo exhibit. We then walked through Place Vendôme and up to the Opera house, before heading to Boulevard Haussmann to the grands magasins Galeries Lafayette and Printemps. Afterwards, we got on the metro and headed to Montmartre (can you tell this is my favorite spot in Paris?) where we watched some street performers on the steps of Sacre Coeur, wandered past cafés and artists, and finally sat down for dinner on Rue des Abbesses at a restaurant called Le Relais Gascon. We each had a ginormous salad (Allie a chèvre chaud salad, me a salade niçoise) which were both COVERED in this amazing thinly-sliced garlicky potatoes, and split a bottle of vin blanc. It started pouring so we moved from where we were sitting outside to sit inside, where we sat for maybe two hours, laughing and talking about boys and such scary topics as graduation, marriage and babies! It was still raining when we finished dinner, but decided to suck it up for just long enough for Allie to catch a glimpse of the Moulin Rouge, which was not far from dinner.
Sunday, today, we again woke up early and headed right to the Musée d'Orsay, where we enjoyed a breakfast of Nutella banana crêpes and cafés au lait while waiting on the long line into the museum. After finally making it inside and walking around the museum for an hour or so, we picked up a metro to Jardin de Luxembourg, walked through the park and up boul' Mich (Boulevard Saint-Michel) to the Latin Quarter. After a quick tour of the area, we crossed the bridge to Île de la Cité to check out Notre Dame, both inside and out. By then, we had to hurry up (Allie's flight was at 7) and head straight to L'as du Fallafel, where we expected and were met with a loooong line. Allie got to wander a little around the Marais while I held our spot on line. We then took our food over to Place des Vosges where we ate the remains of what we didn't gobble up on our walk to the spot. We then had a little time to kill before getting Allie back to my place to grab her stuff, so we walked back through the Marais and on to see the crazy tubular primary-colored building that is Centre Pompidou. Then it was time to go home. The tour of Paris was over and Allie was thoroughly satisfied with her short visit to this wonderful city.
If you prefer a visual guide of this tour, check out what Allie did on MARISA'S-SUPER-SPEEDY-TOUR-OF-PARIS-:
1. Allie eating pain au chocolat and baguette for breakfast at the Eiffel Tower
2. Allie at the Arc du Triomphe
3. Allie bought treats at Ladurée
4. Allie in Place de la Concorde
5. Allie drinking Angelina's famous hot chocolate
6. Allie at the Louvre
7. Allie awaiting free macarons from Pierre Hermé
8. Allie and the view of Paris from Sacre Coeur
9. Allie enjoying a real French dinner
10. Allie at the Moulin Rouge
11. Allie lounging in the Jardin du Luxembourg
12. Allie in front of Notre Dame
13. Allie trying world famous L'as du Fallafel
14. Allie loves Paris
To really know and experience Paris, you have to spend a lifetime. To get a significant taste for it and a sufficient understanding, you have to spend a semester. But if you can only do two days, I'd follow this guide.
A post about my job interning for Women's Wear Daily to come. Missing you all more than you could imagine and am so thankful to be sharing my experiences with you on my blog if I can't do it in real life!
Paix, AMOUR, AMOUR ET PLUS D'AMOUR et Néon,
Marisa
No comments:
Post a Comment