Paris!

two weeks ago we went to Paris! I won't lie... I didn't completely love the city itself. I did, however, LOVE spending four days exploring the city with a few of my favorite girls, eating my body weight in French pastries, laughing to the point of tears {several times}, and visiting some of the most astounding sites I could imagine.

We woke up Monday morning, hopped on the Chunnel, and got to Paris about noon. Then we found ourselves some crepes {actually the worst meal of the trip... there was a serious language barrier going on.}, then spent the entire afternoon at the Musee du Louvre!

how many stairs are in the Louvre? I don't know the exact number, but I do know we climbed all of them. and there sure are a lot.

"the awkward hand" will forever be the greatest moment of Paris

While at the Louvre we... 

1. took a thousand selfies with various artistic objects

2. ate oreos like the rebels we are- while listening to "Paris in the Rain"

3. practiced saying "sorry, I don't speak french" a lot

We also got to see paintings I've seen in textbooks for years and years! It was definitely a long afternoon but so worth it.

{forewarning: my picture taking on this trip was not the best. so apologies in advance... sorry mom!}

We had dinner at an Italian restaurant around the corner from our hotel. BEST ITALIAN FOOD I'VE EVER HAD {although I'm sure I'll have some decent Italian food when I GO TO ITALY NEXT WEEK. yay}. After dinner we decided we wanted a treat, because we were in France after all, so we wandered around looking for something. Unfortunately our hotel was in what you may call a ghetto so it took a lot of wandering and we ended with decent, but not superb, eclairs. {eclairs that would be good if they were American but not good for France. ya know?} And don't worry, we are still alive to tell the tale, it wasn't that ghetto, just ghetto in the "no cute little cafes" way, not the "6 american study abroad women are kidnapped" kind of way. We got back to the hotel, watched Beauty and the Beast, and called it a night.

so... in case you haven't noticed by now, Paris revolved around eating delicious food and singing Disney songs. and that was perfectly ok with us. and I've also gone running almost every single day since we got home, butttt that's beside the point

Tuesday- going to Versailles was the only thing we did as a whole study abroad group. and boy was it AMAZING. I keep saying this but I absolutely adore reading about things in a textbook then getting to see them in real life. I've known about good ol Louis XIV for years but then I got to actually go to Versailles {and see the Hall of Mirrors. so breathtaking.} and it was great.

fun fact about Erica: I've had a weird obsession/love for the Apollo Fountain ever since I saw a picture of it in humanities my junior year of high school. and, my friends, we searched the gardens of Versailles for a solid hour to try to find it.
then when we finally stumbled upon it they were draining the pool for winter. so it didn't look cool at all because you could see all of the pipes.
and that is the story of how the Apollo Fountain was the biggest disappointment of the trip.

And at this point, the rest of the trip was a blur of laughter, food, and walking. so I'm pretty sure the rest of this post isn't in order, sooo yeah.

Arc de Triomphe stairs. so many stairs.

We watched the Eiffel Tower sparkle from the top of the Arc de Triomphe!

So Wednesday {I think} we completed all of our Humanities assignments:

Notre Dome! What an amazing cathedral. 

Sainte Chapelle: as you know, I love stained glass windows, so obviously I loved a church that was basically all windows.

We also went to the Musee d'Orsay. GUYS. the d'Orsay was actually the best museum I've ever been in. ever. and I feel like this study abroad has taken me into a whole lot of museums. There were so many Renoir, Monet, and Van Gogh paintings. so many. it was like the heaven for impressionism and modernism.

Then we went to Sacre Coeur plus a little market. The Sacre Coeur cathedral was one of my favorites! And since I got bored the other day, I counted that we've been to about 26 cathedrals in the last 3 months. So yes, Sacre Coeur was great. And also... mosaics. so many mosaics.

view from the stairs of the church

everything {besides the cream stone, obviously} in this picture was a mosaic. including that ceiling. It was the most incredible thing I've ever seen.

and since we were in france, why not try Escargot?! yes. it was not that great. but no it wasn't awful. and now we can say we tried it, so it's a win-win situation, right?

And we found a wall that says "I love you" in every language...

we decided to take the advice of our SA program director. so we found, what he considered to be, the best savory crepes in Paris. the above picture are our "Erica is good at directions" faces (;

BEST CREPE EVER

and while we were in our crepe restaurant Hannah's wallet got stolen. and we had just gone to the ATM. and she held it together until she said "guys, my london temple recommend was in that wallet!" and it was awful. However, she was a champ. and we laughed the whole way back to the hotel. and at that point we really were the loud, annoying Americans. but I really don't think I've laughed that hard in my entire life. poor, poor lisa. we love ya, girl.
you probably should have been there...

we went to the top of the Eiffel Tower! You could see so much of Paris!

following this picture a bunch of the people in the tour group around us started taking jumping picture like us. it was actually completely hilarious.

I'm sure by now you're asking, "wow Erica, there really weren't that many pictures of food in this post! Did you really eat that much in Paris??" And the answer is yes, yes we really did eat an insane amount of food. but in order to shorten up this blog post, I've made some nice little collages of some of our food. 

SO, PARIS IN A NUTSHELL:

>>>The d'Orsay is a lot better than the Musee du Louvre in my opinion.

>>>The Musee de l'Orangerie is another little gem of a museum. it's almost entirely dedicated to Monet's Lilies. and maybe I'm just out of touch, but I had no clue they were so large???

>>>if you are ever in Paris I am begging you to go get eclairs at Maison Galland. it's about a five minute walk from the d'Orsay on a road called Ru De Bac by the intersection of Boulevard St German. We went there THREE TIMES. they were honestly the best eclairs//dessert I've ever had in my entire life. All other eclairs cannot compare. and cheap. it was just a tiny, random bakery we happened upon in our exploring. please, please go buy a chocolate eclair. please. have a picture:

>>>one of the nights we ate dinner at this adorable little french restaurant. our waiter was young and dashing, you could say. and we asked him how he would pronounce our names. it went something like this:

me: how would you pronounce Erica?

him: in french?

me: no, in english...

him: oh, in english with my french accent?

me: yeah!

him: hair-eh-cut!

me: oh...

and that, my friends, is the reason why I am now called 'haircut' by some of these lovely ladies here in London

>>>hey. I really like study abroad.