Europe Day 05: From London to Paris

Our Contiki tour begins!
Major early start today at 5:30am! I seemed to have lost little tour cards package that we were given to have on us, but after giving the initial card to our tour manager yesterday, apparently it didn’t matter that they were lost. We dragged our stuff to the other Contiki hotel, as that’s where we were being picked up by the bus, and met up with the people on our tour group, including two new friends we talked with yesterday, Belinda and Natasha from Cayman Islands. We had our suitcases weighed and they fell well below the limit allowed per person for the bus, which just means – WooHoo – more shopping!

On our way
After that we all got on the bus and took off. The bus was fairly packed, with 45 people, and ended up being a mix of two tours – Road to Athens as well as Road to Rome. There weren’t too many free seats, but everyone seemed comfortable. The group was pretty quiet – not much rah-rah – but I think that’s because everyone had a pretty late night and an extremely early morning. We have a lot of couples and a lot of girls – I’m sure the single guys are quite happy. We were introduced again to our tour manager – Leona – who gave us a rundown of general Contiki rules and whatnot – and we were also introduced to our driver Joop who we could tell would be a “jolly old soul”. This first drive was on our way to Paris. It was going to take a few hours to get to Dover so we just settled in.

White Cliffs of Dover
During the drive, you could tell that once upon a time, castles were the home du jour though Europe as we passed quite a few examples along the way. When we finally arrived in Dover, where we were to catch a ferry to Calais, France, we were definitely impressed with Dover castle and the famed white cliffs that stretch for miles.

Ferry Riding
The ferry we caught was fairly huge and had two major shops and lots of comfortable seating. It took about two hours to get to Calais, which was a bit long since we actually got waylaid when we arrived since the ports were all full.

Driving through France
From Calais, we had another few hours driving to a rest stop, and then another few hours driving after that before getting to Paris. While on our way, we passed Vimy Ridge – though only in sight – as the highway is quite far from the area. It seems either the monument was placed in a natural opening that could be viewed from the highway, or someone made it viewable. Anyhow, unless you’re warned it’s there, you’ll miss it, because when you’re driving by at 100km an hour, you are basically afforded a five second glimpse.

Paris Driving
Finally – after hours and hours on the bus – which we are realizing is going to be an on-going saga on this trip (I have no idea how we’re going to survive) we made our way into Paris. It truly was amazing driving into the city – the sights, the sounds, the people – there just seemed to be a fullness of life to it all that I don’t think I’ve witnessed too much back home. Before we went to our hotel, Leona gave us a quick tour of the city and some of the major landmarks. We jumped out to see and take pictures of Napoleon’s final resting place, as well as the Eiffel Tower, a little later, from the Tracadero area. However – about five seconds after leaving the bus – the sky decided to downpour on us, so we all ran back. The pictures we all got though are a bit neat, as it looks like doomsday is approaching with the Eiffel Tower in the background – ha!

After that, there was not point stopping anywhere else so we drove to the hotel which was in the southern region of Paris – just on the rim of the city proper.

Creating our own adventure
We had actually arrived in Paris quite late and there were no plans made for the evening except for a quick meal. With the weather it seemed fruitless to do anything, and someone had said that the Eiffel Tower might not even be open (which we couldn’t believe). Regardless of all the doom and gloom however, H-Rabbit and I decided to take off with our new friends Chris and Liz (awesome couple from Sydney) and check out the Eiffel Tower anyway. We knew from our schedule that we probably wouldn’t get another chance to see the Tower at night and we just didn’t want to miss that experience. After gearing up for the rain, we made our way through the Metro system and didn’t get lost, though it was a bit tricky figuring out just where we were with everything in French and the multiple lines all crisscrossing over and under each other.

Graffiti Note for Da Boyz: Every single inch of the Paris Metro/train tunnels are covered in graffiti – even the parts that you think haven’t seen the light of day and/or artificial light – ever. My only comment – it was all BAD graffiti – like black and white tagging only, and nothing artistic at all I must admit I found that very disappointing and strange for such a city renowned for its artistic talents.

Happy in the Rain
When we emerged from the Metro, it was beginning to rain again. At first – we were a bit lost because the station for the tower is not exactly that close to it – however venturing a few steps, we realized that it was just hiding behind some trees and the view was spectacular – even from far away. When we got to the base of the tower, it started to rain harder – however it opened up an awesome opportunity – the liens to go up the tower were getting shorter and shorter because people were leaving due to the rain. We didn’t know for sure if we wanted to go up at first – we were worried we’d pay for nothing if the sky was simply full of rain clouds – but seeing as we made it all the way – we figured we might as well – and it wouldn’t be too much of a burden to do it all again tomorrow if the views were bad. As we waited in line – we realized we might HAVE to do it again tomorrow anyway – as the message popped up saying “Third Floor Closed” – which is the highest point of the tower you can get to and of course exactly where we wanted to be. However – luck on our side – it opened up again just before we went to buy our tickets – so we were relieved. Apparently whenever the third floor gets too crowded – they close sales to it – which is quite aggravating – especially for people standing in line in the pouring rain!



One of the best experiences ever
It was about 11pm (yes – to that person who told us it would be closed at 10pm – it WAS open – and would be STILL open until Midnight!) when we hopped (though really, more like squished) on the tower elevator. As we ascended, the most awesome thing happened - the 11pm light show went off. It was absolutely breathtaking to have all these millions of lights just blinking and flashing and dancing all around you. H-Rabbit caught tons of video of it because the pictures just didn’t do the experience or effect justice. When we were let off at the second stage – we went immediately into the line to go to the top. We figured we’d do our picture taking and hanging around at each stage as we came down – to ensure we didn’t miss the third floor experience since time was of the essence.

Paris at your feet
The view from the top of the tower is absolutely mesmerizing – and I believe even more so at night. The city of lights just blazes beneath you and the beauty of it all just whisks you away. We took a ton of pictures of the city from every angle we could think of. It truly was a breathtaking view and experience. The adrenalin pumping through us even made us forget all about the rain. I can say for certain now that we wouldn’t have passed up tonight for anything. As we were approaching midnight, we figured we’d try and make a dash to get down to the bottom of the tower again to try and see the light show from the ground rather than on the elevator again. We didn’t quite make it for the very beginning – but we did manage to hit the ground before the show finished and got some great shots out front of the tower. I believe that the Tour de France “additions” most definitely only looked good at night, as their bright yellow “tackiness” definitely didn’t fair well earlier in the day when we were taking shots at Tracadero.

On our way home by taxi – as the Metro closes down at midnight – the four of us agreed that we shouldn’t ruin the experience of tonight by trying to go up during the day tomorrow. Our taxi ride through the streets of the city was quite beautiful as well as we needed to go right across Paris to get back to our hotel. Upon getting “home” we have now collapsed into bed to get ready for the HUGE day ahead of us tomorrow – as we need to try and see as much of Paris as we can in all of just one day, all on our own!