Honeymoon: France

No more apologies. Let's face it, I'm the worst blogger ever. Ever since I got back from Europe my lazy factor basically tripled. It's come to the point where each blog feels like a chore.

This doesn't mean that I'm going to stop blogging! It just means I'm gonna stop apologizing every time it takes me an entire month to write a new post. That said, I'm gonna wrap things up with the final section of my honeymoon.

Let me start this one off by explaining that I'm a control freak. I don't necessarily need to be in control, but I need to know that I at least could be if I had to.

In addition to that, I've also never travelled before. I thought I had, but once I ACTUALLY travelled I realized that flying/driving somewhere where you have a home to stay in, and will be in that spot the whole time isn't really travelling. It's more so moving.

So, now that you know that… here we go

I'm ashamed to admit that I booked this hotel. It claimed to be in Paris. It was not. It claimed to be comfortable. It was not.

To start with, when we got off the train from Scotland to Paris we found out that the trains to our hotel were no longer running. We also discovered that we were in an area where nobody spoke English. While this is uncommon in France, it was still expected. So, we planned to rely on Ken being bilingual in these situations. Turned out the area we were in didn't even understand Ken's Canadian French. Sheesh!

Thankfully we were able to flag down a taxi that took us to our hotel.

When we got there, they claimed to not have received our deposit or booking. (My credit card says otherwise).
Our room reeked of cigarettes. There were cigarette burns all over our bed sheets. The shower was missing a door. And the worst part….. It was near the airport. So close to the airport that our room rumbled when planes flew by. And they flew by A LOT. I was already jet lagged and was kept awake by planes flying by every 30 seconds.

Ya, needless to say, we immediately booked ourselves a new hotel. This time IN PARIS!

Cathedral of Notre Dame

We passed by this on the walk from our hotel to the train station. The one we were told was 5 minutes… And was 45 minutes.

Is it racist? Yup. Really really racist.

Arc de Triomphe

Louis Vutton is kinda really huge.

Is it bad that I got more excited about ducklings than I did about seeing the Mona Lisa an hour later? Yup. Kicked outta Art School.

There were big fish that would even knock the little ducklings over. It was way too cute!

This is about 1/4 of the line to get into the Louvre.

The Louvre!! Excited! (Back into Art School!)

How ya hanging? PAH HAHAHAHA …. I'm 23 years old and it's still funny.

Nike (Victory) of Samothrace

This is my view of the Mona Lisa. Awesome.

Leonardo da Vinci - Mona Lisa

There were so many people there! It was freaking hot!! I definitely got a little overwhelmed. Heat. A huge amount of people. Sore feet. So much to see. I don't understand a thing people are saying.

Ya. Panic was starting to set in.

Titian - Pastoral Concert

Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres - Large Odalisque

…more people and paintings…

Jacques-Louis David - Oath of the Horatii

Theodore Gericault - The Raft of the "Medusa"

So powerful in person!

Eugene Delacroix - Liberty Leading the People: July 28, 1830

I'm always so shocked by the sheer size of paintings in comparison to what I had previously seen in my Art History books.

Even the ceilings were awesome!

This was Ken's favourite!

The Scribe

Anselm Kiefer - Athanor

Aphrodite of Melos (Venus de Milo)

So pretty…

Unfinished paintings in the Louvre? Cool!!

Gabrielle d'Estrees and one of her sisters in the bath

After a days rest and a new hotel I was a much happier camper, and was ready for the Eiffel Tower!

He drives the elevators.

A view of Paris. Are you in love?

Ken was sick of me taking pictures of us.

Ken was pointing toward Winnipeg. But I was catsick and said "Here's looking at you Virtute!"

Teen girls take dumb photos, and 20-some year old girls taken even dumber photos of them.

I think it would be hilarious to spell things out with bodies on the ground below the tower! HA!

We opted to walk the whole way down and I was able to get a shot of the "small" line up.

Awwww……..

Thank you strangers that didn't understand English but took our photo anyway!

Catacombes!!!

There's over 300kms of these tunnels…. we only went through 2km of it.

More than 6 million bodies surrounded us!!!

We were that far bellow the earths surface! Check out the lines of sediment!

Oh snap! We got our portraits done!!

At the time, people were surrounding us and in awe of how amazing ours was. I now have it framed on our wall and Ken and I giggle every so often about how awful it is. We're planning on telling our future children that that's what happens to your face when you go on your honeymoon.