Paris, France

This weekend was a busy and exciting one for us. We got on the bus Friday night to head to Paris on an Express trip, meaning no hotels you just sleep on the bus. It took about eleven hours for us to get to Paris. Our bus parked right in front of the Eiffel Tower and we were free to do what we wanted for the day.

Getting off the bus was hectic. As soon as our bus parked people trying to sell stuff came running over to the doors trying to get us to buy stuff before our feet even hit the ground. In the end we did end up buying from them because the product they were selling was also sold at all the tourist shops but theirs was cheaper.

We spent probably a good 45 minutes just walking around the Eiffel Tower taking pictures. We have decided that it's pretty much impossible to take a bad picture of the Eiffel Tower, it's just so photogenic!

 

 

After we got what we thought was enough pictures (we actually ended up taking MANY more before leaving) we started looking for the pick up stop for the hop on, hop off bus.

About a week before we left for Paris I started looking online for the best way for us to get around Paris. Since we were only there for a day we needed something easy to navigate, not to pricey, and quick to get us to all the places we wanted to see. We opted for the Big Bus Paris.

The Big Bus Paris is a hop on, hop off tourist bus. It cost us 29 euros a piece and was a double decker bus with an open top. For those of you who don't know a hop on, hop off bus is basically where the bus goes to all of the main attractions and you can get off to see whichever attractions you're interested in. Then you can hop on the next bus that comes by. This company had a lot of buses. A new one was coming by each attraction about every 10-15 minutes!

 

 

The first place we decided to hop off the bus at was the Louvre. I have been wanting to see the Louvre since I was little. Unfortunately, we were unable to go inside because the line was already crazy long! But no worries there is another Paris trip in April and we are considering going on it. The architecture was amazing to look at and the glass pyramids were just WOW!

 

 

After we finished admiring the Louvre we walked across the way to the love lock bridge. Recently Paris has asked people to stop putting the locks on the bridges because the weight of the locks are causing the sides of the bridge to collapse. It was still really cool to go look at though.

 

 

Once we were done looking at the bridge we hopped back on the Big Bus Paris and headed to our next destination. Can you guess where that was? I'll give you a hint, there is a Disney movie about it.

Notre Dame was hands down the most beautiful cathedral I have ever seen. It was packed full of people trying to get inside to go up top. We opted not to go up top. There are well over 300 stairs going up to the top and absolutely no elevators. Yikes! However, we were able to see the gargoyles from the ground and the bells went off during our stop there. I never knew bells could sound so awesome.

 

 

Our next and last stop that we made on the hop on, hop off bus was the Arc de Triomphe. Beautifully built and crazy busy with people it stood on the Champs Elysees avenue, which is known as the most beautiful avenue in the world.

 

 

After we got done at the Arc de Triomphe we headed to the Eiffel and grabbed lunch across the street at one of the many carts that were set up. I had a hot dog, but not just any hot dog. This hot dog had a homemade bun, two hot dogs crammed into the bun, and the guy put ketchup and mayonnaise on it! My husband had a banana and nutella crepe, plus some of my hot dog.

After lunch (which we didn't end up eating till almost 2:30) we did a little souvenir shopping. We picked up our usual shot glass, bell, and postcards. Plus this time we also got a miniature Eiffel Tower, a Paris purse, and a snow globe.

Once we were done with all of our shopping we decided to get back on the hop on, hop off bus and ride it all the way through. The cool thing about the Big Bus Paris is that they provide you with headphones so you can get interesting facts and information. We didn't use the headphones earlier in the day because we got off and on so much that we were missing too much of the information. It took about 2.5 hours to ride the bus all the way through but it was definitely worth it.

The weather in Paris this weekend was in the low 60's. Jackets were needed the whole time, especially considering we were riding on the open top of the Big Bus. Towards the end of our ride on the bus it even started raining a little bit!

After the Big Bus dropped us off at the Eiffel Tower we made our way back to our bus as it was about time to head home. We left Paris at almost 7pm and finally arrived back home at 5am Sunday morning.