The Grand Tour Closes

Sketchy apartments aren't always bad. Sure, there may be a leak in the water pipe that could fill a gallon container in an hour. The floor may look like it's never been cleaned, and there might be a very creepy looking entry way with a lock on the door that requires a true lock whisperer plus a lot of luck to get open. However, through the windows that offer no privacy from the building across the narrow alley, I woke up to a beautiful free jazz piano concert courtesy of our neighbors. It was truly a wonderful way to wake up.

That place where the concert was last night, now in daylight

Relaxed, and munching on a tasty Paris breakfast pastry, I made my way to Notre Dame for their international church service. as it was clearly labeled 'international' I was hopeful that it would have at least some English. It did have some. After welcoming us all to the service in about 10 languages, the priest then continued the rest of the service in Latin (with maybe a bit of French thrown in for variety, but their efforts to spice it up where unfortunately lost on me).

You have to be sure to leave a lot of space for God

So, I ended up not really understanding what was going on, again. At least in this service I was easily distracted by the beautiful building and incredible acoustics. There was also the odd pigeon that had gotten confused by all the open space and believed it still was outside. Seriously. That place is HUGE.

Like basically everything in Paris, the windows were pretty too

Full of high spirits (:P) we meandered slowly back through the city, window shopping for souvenirs to remind us of such a wonderful trip. The day, though, was far from over. Possibly the most anticipated part of the visit (for me at least) was yet to come: watching the final stage of the 100th Tour de France.

I'm not the only one who's crazy about the Tour de France

It really couldn't get any better. I'm a liiitle bit of a fan of the Tour de France. It started back when my sister and I used to get up too early in the summer and had nothing to do, so my dad (or grandad, when we were with him) would put on the Tour de France. We would watch as the breakaways as they were ceaselessly hunted own. How the top riders would watch and wait, and then at the last moment break out from the dwindling pack on a steep mountain stage to claim the glory of the yellow jersey.

Breakaway!

The chasers

Everybody else ;)

So er... yea. I enjoy following the Tour de France. Which meant I was NOT going to miss seeing this stage. Even if it meant standing in the sun for hours just to see the group from a position three rows back from the fence. It was so worth it. :D

--There's a video, but it's being problematic--

With the tour over, my own journey through Paris also ended. Which is good- my feet are killing me.

Bigger Must Clearly be Better

From one palace to another. Obviously, I was unimpressed with the king's old palace (the Louvre) yesterday, so I set out to be fully impressed with actual examples of ridiculous over spending by touring Versailles. A message to the past King Louis(s). You have succeeded. Even accounting that you're kings, I can't quite imagine ever having that much disposable income. The whole palace and grounds are truly ridiculous. (In a good way, though I guess- I mean it sure is a huge tourist draw. If only you told all of the revolutionary peasants you were only thinking of the future...

This is how far away you need to stand to almost get it all in the picture

As much of the grounds I could fit in one shot. It's all part of the palace.

To keep people out, you'd need a big fancy gate too.

But seriously, after a while of walking through the giant gardens and seeing the many lavishly decorated rooms it all started to simply not feel so real. It was just so.. I don't know.. over the top? Hard to imagine anyone would really want to live there.

Villagers too ornery? Just build your own village in your backyard...

There's a lot of garden

Only fitting that the inside matches

Got to have art made to scale too

Back in Paris proper, the only thing left on the schedule for the day was the trip to the iconic Eiffel Tower. The view from the platform was amazing? Somehow even though it looks "tall" from the bottom, you really only feel how high it is once you get up.

Wonder what this structure could be...

Yes, that is it's own shadow on the left

While we were too tired to go up the stairs, (what? walking around King Louis's crazy big garden is really exhausting) we did walk down them just as the sun was setting.

This is looking straight down. There are stairs in upper left

This is just pretty. :)

It was really pretty. I may have taken a few photos. (Some people also got impatient) To end our 'highlights of Paris' tour, we took a boat ride back down towards the apartment. (If it's even possible, the city looked even prettier at night).

Last one, I promise :P

Along the banks of the river we were able to view a bit of the culture of Paris. Since the weather was so hot, people wanted to be by the river, however, they wouldn't go in it (too much traffic, too gross (probably)). To make up for it, all along the river there were artificial beaches set up, offering residents (or tourists) the opportunity to relax by the water without having to travel to the coast, or a lake. (or another river, I guess) They also had a bunch of gathering areas that were actually being used by people to get together and dance! In a  row of arenas we passed break dancing, club dancing, swing dancing and some sort of way fancy dancing that I suspect is ballroom (though being an uncultured American, I don't actually know)

I feel like I just keep repeating myself.. but isn't it nice?

Notre Dame nicely framed by the river and some lock laden bridges

Besides passing the Notre Dame Cathedral, we also passed an excellent example of Paris night life. A huge free concert featuring electronic and popular music artists on a stage with all the newest technology, but in front of a huge old building. It was one of those things that really could never happen in the US. (there aren't old enough buildings, and if there were, people wouldn't be allowed to have crazy live concerts in front of them.)

I still can't get over how weird this juxtaposition is

Now You're Speaking French

Note-- Regarding the Time Warp here: Internet and photos and videos had a falling out during my time in Germany and then life got real busy, so I wrote down a bunch of posts on paper intending to upload them later. Well, now it's later and the posts are (finally) going up. Enjoy! --

I went to Paris! Despite the credit card company being confused as to whether if Paris was "in Italy, right?" (no lie, direct quote), I made my way unerringly to France.

First Impression: There are a lot of people. Like a lot of people. It shouldn't be possible or something. But nonetheless, I was super excited. I mean it's Paris! Everyone grows up hearing about the magical city of yummy food, light music, full moons and fancy art. And snobbery. Believing you're "all that" is an incredibly important aspect of all Paris veterans.

Approaching that famous place with all the art

So maybe not the snobbery part, but we did immediately get out to the Louvre (how do you pronounce that anyways?) to get our fill of feeling sophisticated & cultured.

This was the only photo I ended up taking 'inside' ... I was a bit distracted. ;)

That place is huge! Like way to huge to ever imagine seeing all of it in a year. And we only had one evening! While I know I missed quite a bit, I was still fairly pleased with what I did manage to see. Besides the ever important Mona Lisa, I spent a large portion of time in the portrait gallery enjoying envisioning all the varied lives of the people painted. I wasn't expecting to recognize any of the works (I'm a bit of an anti art snob) but I stumbled across the painting depicting Hamlet with Yorick's skull. I think it may have been on the cover of the paperback copies of Hamlet we received in High School, since it was instantly recognizable. (And here I thought I'd never be using what I learned in AP English)

Some places are just too pretty. It's inherently unfair to everywhere else.

After wandering amongst the endless rooms of art, I walked back to the only slightly sketchy apartment. My favorite part was the rather unique bathroom window that went through to the kitchen. There wasn't much time to ponder that bit of weirdness though, as we were all beat and planned to wake up nice and early the next day.

One of Those Days

It's the middle of summer. My project is doing it's best impersonation of a inanimate object. Did I mention it was summer? So I went in search of cheerier things. Like good books. And froyo. (For the English slang challenged: froyo --> frozen yogurt) One of the two was easy to find. The other, was not.

Guesses? Probably to no surprise, I found books easily. The whole liking reading things, means I would be basically happy with any book I laid a hand on. Which is a bit troublesome, because I end up trying to figure out which book I like the most out of the many good selections possible.

Conveniently the book stores in Germany have set traps for people like me. They have all this comfortable, inviting seating in their bookstores making it "ok" to take rather extensive.. previews.. of the books. Which of course just makes you want to buy them more- cause you'd feel really guilty if you just sat there and read the entire book in the store, right? Well that's how it worked for me. (I escaped, for those worried, without becoming too much of a sucker- though now I am quite a bit more on guard. At least I hope I am.)

Finding froyo was much more difficult. Like any American, I went to the grocery store, since you don't have to pay nearly as much. And the selection is supposedly better. From my brief encounter with the frozen desert section of German grocery stores, I would say this is sadly not the case. I was hard pressed to find ANY sort of ice cream/gelato/sorbet not to mention froyo. All I did find was one tiny pack of popsicles. Which is completely bonkers since people here must eat ice cream sometime.. right? Maybe not. And in the long run, it was probably better that I was unsuccessful. But I have this really bad craving for lemon sorbet right now... Hopefully my new book will be distracting enough to make me forget all about it. :)

One Fish, Two Fish...

The Hamburg fish market has come to Stuttgart. It is absolutely nothing like I was expecting it to be.

While it did have the same contents: stands selling fish products (cooked into meals or raw) as well as other vendors (like drinks and ice cream) it was presented in a completely unique way. I'm really glad I took some pictures, since there isn't really anyway to describe this and give it justice. Let's just say, they take their fish really seriously. (but not themselves) And it shows. Dinner tonight was delicious.

Super fancy, fish themed stands lined the square

The goal: Out decorate all your neighbors

I cleverly ordered by pointing at something that looked tasty

How Fresh is Your Fruit?

I had always thought 'fresh fruit' was sort of standard. I mean, how different could fruit that was just grown really be? I have to say though, I have never before had a package of strawberries start juicing themselves simply by being against the side of my shopping bag.

Although the pink stain does kind of stand out on a blue bag, at least my whole room now smells like strawberries. I don't think that's a bad trade off at all. (They taste really good too, in case you're wondering)

Appreciating Life

Not all water is created equal. For example, water in London was really, really terrible. I actually think I may have ended up thirstier after drinking their tap water. A rather impressive feat. Needless to say, I was relieved to be back in Germany where the tap water was actually drinkable.

My body also seemed to finally let go, as I sat down to write some posts and woke up 6 hours later. I guess I was maaaaybe a little tired.

I definitely was appreciating my early morning flight