Day 2

Day 2 Happy St. Patrick's day from Paris. The weather started off beautifully, but ended on a cold and wet note. We did so many things today. We started off at the hotel with breakfast. Pretty typical for a French breakfast...croissants, pain au chocolat, fruit, yogurt, crepes and beverages ranging from expressly to apple juice. I think the apple juice was the hit of the morning for the kids because it is so different from what we are used to in the States. At 9am our coach hus pulled up and we hopped on board for a bus tour of Paris. We left La Defense area and headed for Paris where we would pick up our morning tour guide, Paval. These city guides are so knowledgeable about Paris. They have the best stories and amazing details about the city. Our first stop was the Arc de Triomphe, commissioned by Napoleon to commemorate all of his military victories. From there we drove down the Champs Elysee and all of the American stores that line the avenue. The latest addition is Abercrombie and Fitch. Other monuments we saw and photographed were Les Invalides, La Tour Eiffel, Luxembourg gardens, the Louvre, Tuilerie gardens, and we ended at Notre Dame which is on Ile de la Cite. From there we split up, changed and withdrew money and headed for a quick lunch. People ate everything from pizza and sandwiches to beef Burgundy and duck. We then met Giuseppe, caught the metro (the subway) and went over to the Eiffel Tower for a trek up to the 3rd level. By now the temperature dropped a bit, the sun has gone behind the clouds and the rain has started. As we finally arrived at the top, the wind was blowing so hard, but the view is amazing from up there! (I will try to post pics tomorrow). At 4pm we reconvened as a group, 47 in total, and took the metro back to Montmartre for some quick shopping and dinner. Tonight's meal was quiche, roasted chicken, green beans,nrice and apple pie for desert...the concensus was that it was a good meal. Next on the itinerary was a boat tour on the river Seine. Our metronride over was entertaining for some of us due tonthe Scottish men, kilts included, who were celebrating St. Patrick's day andnsome rugby. They entertained with a rendition of "Deep In The Heart of Texas", claps included. Despite being cold and wet, the scenery was amazing and we arrived at the base of the Eiffel Tower just in time to see the twinkle lights that sparkle every hour on the hour for 5 minutes. Beautiful! The boat tour gave us a chance to see many of the same monuments from a much different perspective. It was about an hour long and we were all more than ready to head back to the hotel for a hot shower and some sleep. We have decided that French people are so skinny due to all of the steps that they must walk, especially in Paris. :) Tomorrow will be equally busy and I hope to include some pictures for everyone to see... a remain!