The Mussels in Brussels
For anyone reading this post, we have written about 4 other ones since Naples, so make sure you scroll dozn and read about our adventures in Paris!
OK, yesterday was pretty much just a travel day. We checked out of our hotel, and thank goodness we spent four nights there, because that was ALMOST enough time for our backs to heal! We made our way to the train station, and seeing as our train didn't leave for another few hours, settled down to do some writing. Well, that is after we managed to find a way into the train station (after leaving it temporarily to pick up some post cards). In our 5 minute absence, the place went into this strange lockdown, in which you couldn't get in through the main entrance and yet could get in by going through the cafés at the station. Also, there were no announcements going on in the station, and they were not evacuating it, so we have no idea what was going on? Was it a drill or just strange French paranoia (we did see them demand the passports of a few "suspect" looking people (that is to say, not suspicious looking at all... just not caucasian) and frisk them as well.
We settled ourselves on the floor, since apparently benches are hazards in train stations. We made a pseudo fort out of our bags, since we were not going to pay upwards of 4 euro to check them in a locker while we waited. Before jumping on our train, we finally got ourselves a crêpe! Totally worth the wait, and Laura found a place that didn't charge us an arm and a leg! Yay Laura!
The train ride to Brussels was quite quick since we were on the highspeed Thalys train. The tiny child in front of us fancied herself an acrobat and whiled away the hour by running up and down the aisle and bouncing in her seat.
Once we got to Brussels, I was relieved to find that they speak French here instead of Dutch. Of course, the signs are in both languages, which is annoying, but at least we understand one of them! We easily navigated the metro here (and were also assisted by a friendly subway worker), and only hit a temporary glitch when we got off the subway and our directions and map got a little sketchy. We still haven't bought a proper map of the city, but have not found that we need one.
After dropping our bags off at the hostel (which smells funny but is probably not the worst place we have stayed so far) and headed off into the city. Thankfully Brussels really is tiny, so we soon found ourselves in the central area. But NOT before we found an English bookstore with a huge Harry Potter display in the window AND the new books in boxes by the door! Never has a life of crime been so tempting... They were just sitting there! In their embargoed boxes! Must... resist... desire... to... steal...
The tourist signs are horrible here, but even with that handicap, we found our way to Mannekin-Pis, the statue of the little peeing boy. Alas, he was not wearing a costume as they have been loaned to... another peeing statue? We don't know, and are thoroughly disappointed. However, we drowned our sorrows in a fricken huge bowl of mussels (but not before other restaurants tried to woo us with free drinks... and mistake me for a Spanish speaker... again!) and fries. It was soooo good, and we are definitely going back to night. After all, Brussels is a perfect city for eating! We could easily spend 4 days here doing nothing but that! It's great!
We then and sat around in the Grande Place, which really has to be seen to be believed. I don't think we have seen anywhere quite like it in any other city we have visited. You won't believe your eyes... we are never going to forget it! We spent a long time sitting on the curb, and then the cobblestone after a strange man tried to talk to me, waiting for the sound and light show that was supposed to begin... It never did, but we had a good time listening to Pomme and laughing away. We successfully navigated the streets in the dark without a map, outmanouevred a man selling bread that he was eating (we called him The Breadler), and Laura power walked her way away from an overly friendly Belgian.
Today we have been to the CéBéBéDé, which is probably the only museum worth seeing here. Neither of us are huge comics fans, but it was still interesting to see. We have no idea what the rest of the day holds for us EXCEPT it will definitely involve eating more mussels. Tomorrow: HARRY POTTER DAY!!! EEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Paris: Day 3
Our last full day in Paris was our "Amélie Day"... or at least the morning was! We took the metro to Anvers, where we then walked up the steps to the Sacré Coeur Cathedral. On the way, we had to fend off numerous vendors, that we dubbed 'string sellers'. They ask you to put out your hand and hold up threads, saying they want to give you a good luck charm. We don't know about you, but we don't give our hands to strange men. Again I was mistaken for Mexican! Curse my non-translucent skin and vaguely "ethnic" looks! The view from the top was quite nice (although it was rather foggy) and the cathedral was, as it always has been, very impressive. We steered clear of the catacombes, however, having learned our lesson in Vienna!
Now nicely ensconced in Montmartre, we made our way through the winding streets looking at the vintage French ads. I was determined to find ads for Absinth to complement the spoon I had picked up in Prague, but while we could find prints for chocolate and perrier, the absinth ones were strangely absent. Was it because all the tourists had bought them, or are they banned? No bother, we eventually hit the jackpot, and found a place where they had not 1 ad, but 4 different ones! Magnifique! I snatched those up, and we also go some ads for the Moulin Rouge (hee! Paris qui danse!), the Paris Casino, and a potentially dirty French paper called "Frou Frou" with a vaguely sinister smoking woman in a can-can skirt on it (it was very chic). We then made our way down the mountain (sacre bleu! cobblestone again!) and found the real life Moulin Rouge to snap some photos. Being that it was broad daylight, there was no topless can-can for us.
We then hitched a ride on the metro to the Place de la Concorde, where we had hoped to stroll along the Champs Elysées. Unfortunately, as Bastille Day is upcoming, much of the city is blocked off and so we had to wander for quite some time through the gardens instead. We did eventually make our way to the main strip, and even browsed in some of the stores... we are of course talking about Zara's and The Gap (calm yourself, Taryn), as the haute coutour shops are now surrounded by these far more commercial establishments. They even have this nasty French burger chain called Quick Burger there, and 2 McDonalds! You know that if the stores are letting us in, they can't be that upscale!
After a few pictures in front of the Arc de Triomphe, we began to look for a grocery store. Although that quest was not successful, we did manage to get ourselves to the Eiffel Tower where the line to go up was crazy long. No bother to us since we wanted to go up at sunset as my Book of Lies recommended that as a "moment". We asked the info booth where the nearest grocery store was, and made our way there to pick up the fixings for a pic-nic (as they like to call it here in Europe). We got a real baguette, some cheese again, tomatoes, baby radishes, and instead of paté, something called "rillette" which I knew was made of pork and vaguely recalled eating it the last time I was in France... funny how I remembered that little red container 7 years later! Thankfully my memory was accurate, because the rillette was incredibly yummy and certainly not anything you could ever get in Canada (we don't think you can buy something with that high a fat content in North America... take that United States and your pork rinds!).
We ignored the Book of Lies and made our own moment by pic-nicking right in front of the Eiffel Tower in the Champs de Mars. It was our best meal yet, and the most incredible experience. We decided not to go up the tower since what is the Paris skyline if you can't see the Eiffel Tower? Instead, we lounged about on the grass and took 'arty' photos of us in front of the tower and enjoyed these 2 troubadors who played such hits as Wonderwall and George Micheal's "Faith". It was great!
Laura picked herself up her coveted eiffel tower in a snow globe, and we made our way back to the hotel. It was so nice out that we walked for quite a while talking about 80s movies and tv shows (we seem to have had identical childhoods), before we realized we had a metro ticket burning its way out of our pockets and we didn't really want to walk all the way home. Deciding to make the most of our private bathroom, we did a whole lot of washing in the sink, hung it up to dry, and got ready to depart Paris the next day.
Paris: Day 2
We promised to be kinder to our feet today, and promptly broke this promise by walking over and through the Cemetary of Père Lachaise. True it was close to our hotel, but if we ever thought cobblestone was quaint, we now feel otherwise. It is absolute death on your feet and legs, and makes walking an extreme sport rather than a scenic jaunt. Stupid cobblestone. We got ourselves a map and began to make our way through the cemetary, finding the more famous graves. We soon learned that although the map was handy for getting you to the general area where the grave was, the sure bet to actually finding the precise location was to look for the other tourists AND look for the well-kept grave sites. We saw the graves of Chopin, Oscar Wilde, Sarah Bernhardt, Molière, Balzac, and quite a few others, but the obvious highlight was Jim Morrison's grave. The grave itself is not all that impressive but the freaks who go to worship and mourn there are! There were 2 girls there who could not have been any older than 15, who were sobbing with grief while listening to The Doors on their ipods. The hell? Jim Morrison has always been dead for as long as they have been alive! And yes, we did take pictures!
Realizing that our breakneck pace might actually break our necks what with all the cobblestone, we took advantage of the European Sale month and did some shopping. Hey! Shopping in Paris is like, a cultural escapade on par with visiting a museum! It was like an interactive museum where you can also do some souvenir shopping at the same time! Yes... that's it! Anyway, because the fashion craze seems to be ugly shoes and weird peasant-wear (why do Europeans want to look like Laura Ingalls Wilder?), we didn't really spend any money... well, I bought one top that was on sale for 7 euro... from Zara's. I know! But the chic little boutiques near Lenny Kravitz's fallafel place were way too expensive! Even with 50% off, the items were rarely less than 40 euro. Too rich for our blood, so Zara's it was.
Speaking of Lenny Kravitz's favourite fallafel joint, they do indeed have good fallafel there. We got the "special fallafel" to go, and enjoyed it in a nearby park. Then we headed off to the Centre Pompidou, where we decided after perusing the gift shop (Laura was sorely tempted by some magnetic salt and pepper shakers shaped like little pod men), we decided that we didn't feel like doling out 10 euro or something to actually go into the museum. Besides, the outside is supposed to be the best part. As we left the museum, I was hassled by a street artist, who initially thought I was Mexican. When I told him I was from Canada and that I spoke French, he then assumed I was Québecoise. The nerve! Any hopes he had of drawing me were dashed with that insult, and so I told him I wasn't from Québec, and more importantly, I was not interested.
We popped into a supermarket and picked up some prickle water, and strolled down to Pont Neuf and took many photos of the Eiffel Tower in various stages of illumination. We got ourselves tickets for the Vedettes of Pont Neuf boat cruise (ha! to all the suckers who did not get the 2 euro discount coupon off the web in advance... take that, all you people who mocked our research!)and got ourselves prime seats for our little tour along the Seine. We were a bit disturbed when the two people in front of us began kissing in earnest as we thought they were siblings, but the boat ride itself was really fantastic. We got some great shots of the Eiffel Tower all lit up, and I was finally avenged for those many years ago when Jacques told me that I would never be able to say the word 'gargoyle' in French like an actual French person would. I was avenged because if I can't say it properly in French, our guide could not say it (or many other words) properly in English. Still, Sylvain was awesome, and yes, we have pictures of him too!
Treating ourselves, we bought 10 metro tickets, and used 2 of them to get home. We planned to use 6 the next day to get us around the city, and then 2 on the our last morning in Paris to get us to Gare du Nord to catch our train. All in all, a great day, for both us and our feet!
Paris: Day 1
We awoke to a traditional French breakfast: bread, croissant, and your choice of chocolat (for me), coffee (for Laura) or tea (for the British). After a quick meal, we began what would be a long day of walking and set out for the Picasso museum. Although we had talked in Toronto about how Paris was huge and that we should perhaps use the public transportation system when there, we decided that the museum was close enough to the hotel that we could easily walk it. And at first, it was easy! The streets were not paved with garbage, and it was not 5 billion degrees out. It was actually quite chilly!
When we got to the museum, we were pleased to find that the admission was reduced because it was Sunday, but we totally would have paid much more for this museum! It was so cool! Forget the Lovre, Picasso is where it is at! Every room was filled with really interesting paintings that filled us with glee. Little amoebas (ok, they were supposed to be the female form), children skipping rope, 2 amoebas dancing... it was 2 hours extremely well spent. I would say that it was the best museum I have ever been to; who knew art could be so much fun? I am also glad that I took pictures while in the museum, because when we got to the gift shop, they did not feature any of the paintings we had most enjoyed. I guess Laura and I have a more refined taste in art than the general public.
We then began our long walk to the Notre Dame Cathedral, walking through a very artsy district. We found Lenny Kravitz's favourite fallafel joint, and browsed through some of the shops. Most of them did not open until 2 pm, so we decided that we would come back after the days events so that Laura could buy a "happy purse" (it is a little straw bag with a smiling face on it). When we got to the cathedral, Laura continued her tradition of not going inside because of the extremely long line to get in. You know that when people are lining up to get into a church, and this line is longer than the one to climb up to the tower and try and find Quasimodo that it has to be a pretty long line!
After taking some pictures, we made our way to the Quartier Latin, where we checked out The Pantheon (the one in Rome is cooler), La Sorbonne, and the Law School. Then we strolled through the Jardins des Tuilleries and kept an eye out for France's version of Rome's Fountain Police: the Lawn Police. If you even think about sticking your foot onto the grass, a police officer will be after you with the whistle. We then went to the Rodin museum (passing down a street with many armed guards). I guess you need to see Rodin BEFORE you see Michelangelo's David, because we didn't see what the big hoopla was. Sure we took the requisite photos of The Thinker, but we were both glad that we had only paid the 1 euro to visit the gardens (which were admittedly very pretty). Still, with the Picasso museum and The David in the backs of our minds, we weren't really impressed. Thanks again for the recommendation, Taryn.
In order to get back to the shopping district, we had to backtrack quite a bit, so we decided to change things up and stroll across the river and walk along the bank of the Seine. In so doing, we caught impressive eyefuls of the Eiffel Tower, but tried to steer clear of it (it wasn't on the schedule for that day!). We crossed at Place de la Concorde, passed by the Louvre, and strolled along Rue de Rivoli looking at all the shops. How can Paris be the fashion capital of the world? The shoes are so ugly... the best place we saw shoes was in Amsterdam! As we made our way to the shops, we stopped at a bakery and picked ourselves up a baguette so that we could finish off the rest of our cheese and paté for dinner. Laura's bag successfully purchased ( for 3 euro!), we hobbled back to the hotel. It felt much longer walking back than it did in the morning, and we cursed ourselves for constantly doing this to ourselves. 3 weeks in and we still have not learned that sometimes it is worth hopping on the metro and saving your feet. Still, it is true that the best way to get a feel for any city is to walk through it. Sure both the metro and alleys in Paris smell like urine, but the streets are much nicer to walk on than they are to walk under! If you have a map of Paris handy, locate the Cemetery of Père Lachaise, and then find the Eiffel Tower. Draw zig-zaggy lines between the 2 forming a circle, and you will get a sense of just how far we walked. No wonder our feet were sore!
Easy Jet is evil
OK, we know we have a lot of updating to do, because the internet was very expensive in Paris: Please excuse any huge mistypes because the keyboard here is the craziest one yet. Who ever thought that you would have to use the shift key in order to place a period?
So, we have never been so happy to leave a place as we were with Naples. When we last left off? we were getting ready to go to the airport. It was not all that hard to get to (we just took a bus straight there), but once we were there, our problems started. There was nothing to do in the airport, and like the Italian train system, they do not tell you where to check in until 20 minutes after you were supposed to have checked in. We found a post office that was open, but not for business, so we decided that we would just try to find a shop where we could buy stamps after we had gone through security. What a joke! By the time we found the counter where we were supposed to check in, there was already a huge line. For whatever reason, the line did not move, even when they opened up a second counter, so we were forced to stand there with our back packs on for over an hour. During that time, we watched a stereotypical Italian fight between older people (someone was trying to cut in line!): it was very loud and the hands were flying! We have no idea why Easy Jet took so long to check in about 40 people, because by the time we got to the counter, the plane was supposed to take off in about 15 minutes and it only took us about 2 minutes to get our tickets. Now we know why that show on TV always shows people screaming at people from Easy Jet!
The insanity continued, as despite the fact that the Underground had been bombed just 2 days previous and Europe was "stepping up its security", not once was our passport checked at any point during our trip. Also, in order to make things even slower, we were not allowed to walk the 20 ft to the plane, but had to cram onto a bus and have it drive us there. Never have we seen such pushing and shoving by adults; the result of Easy Jet not issuing seats (you just sit wherever is free when you get on the plane).
The flight itself was rather benign, although Laura's sweatshirt had to be stowed in the overhead compartment because it was somehow a safety infraction while resting in her lap. Whatever! We were just so relieved when we got off the plane in Paris. It took us about 2 hours to make it from Orly to our hotel, but we braved buses and the Metro successfully to do so. And yes, it was a hotel. For the only time on the trip, we had a private room, with only 2 beds, and a bathroom! Youppi!
We had not eaten anything since our meager and somewhat terrifying breakfast in Naples, so after trying to realign our spines, we went in search of a grocery store. Thankfully there was one not too far from our hostel, and we stocked up on cheese, tomatoes, paté, and bread.... ooooh, and 2 euro wine! Alas, the bread was not the best it could be in France, but that's the price you pay when you do your grocery shopping at 8 pm. I am telling you, nothing ever tastes as good as it does in France! The cheese is sooooo good, and the produce always tastes so fresh. Our days of hours in the sun and eating very little took their toll, for even loading up on food, the wine made us giggly very fast and we went to bed with everything pleasantly fuzzy. We slept well that night, knowing we had big days ahead of us in Gay Paris.
