The Rest of the Paris Story

So I wrote about day one which can be summarized as lots of walking- day two can be summed up as stairs, stairs and more stairs. The first thing we did on day two was head to Sacre Cure (which is the white church on a huge hill. It gives you an amazing view of the city. However you must climb nearly 400 stairs to get to the top of the church - plus the stairs the many stairs that you must first must climb to get out of the metro - then add the stairs required to climb to get up the hill to the church. So if you do that math - even with the metric conversion it is a lot of stairs. (pictures below.)One of the coolest parts was when we got out of the metro we ran into a great little jazz band. They were a mixed of French, German and American musicians. It was a great little band - it was a lot of fun to listen to.Then we had dinner. And headed down to the Eiffel Tower. It was night so it was lite up - but this year it was lit up with blue lights - which sparkle at the beginning of every hour for 10 minutes. I know it's super touristy - however it is an amazing. We walked up the 680+ stairs as far up as you could walk. Then we came down to sit at the park, bought a bottle of wine and watched the Tower sparkle. It's funny because when it starts you can hear a collective - ahhhhhh from the crowd. We headed back to the hotel and enjoyed each others company - catching up on the last year until 2 am.The next day was our museum tour. We did sleep in a little (well half the group did, Tony and Karyn were up bright and early to go to the Louvre.) The rest of us weighed our options and decided that sleep would be better than trying to make it through the entire day. Karyn and Tony had an intense tour - the rest of us did the highlights - which of course include the Mona Lisa. I know that I could be stoned for saying this but I am not a huge fan on the Louvre - it's beautiful and a great experience, but my favorite part is Napoleon's apartments. We tried to hit the Musee d'Orsay - but it was closed. Then we headed to the Centre Pompidou, which I did love (I didn't love the walk - my feet were tired) but I did love the modern art. That is more my style - there were tons of Picasso's and people I had never heard off - but the art was very interesting. By the time we got home it was 9:30 am and since I needed to run in the morning - we weren't going to have another late night.

After our run this morning we headed to the Musee d'Orsay. It was also in my opinion better than the Louvre. It is filled with Monet's, Van Gogh's, Whistler's Mother and more. I know it's all the famous painting - but admit it most of us would rather read the tabloids about the stars not ordinary people - well the same goes with me and museums.

Then we headed back to the hotel - to get our luggage to head for the train station. We sat for a short while at the train station. Then we headed back to Geneva on the TGV (the fast train that bolts through the Paris country side at about oh 200 mph.) We arrived in Geneva at about 6:30 pm. And now we are in the computer lab at the John Knox Center (Robert just arrived - so the 7:11 club is complete.) Tomorrow we start class - so technically the work must begin - but first we meet at 7:11 for a run (or as in my case tomorrow a short walk - I must have at least one rest day after today's long run.)