How can a trip to Europe happen without any shopping?
And so..there we were..on a bus to La Vallee Village, one of the factory outlet shopping villages in Europe...can be found in Dublin, Milan, Paris, London etc..
We went there with no high hopes..but ended leaving there with 3-4 big bags of damages!
The price of the items we purchased were reasonable and items are of high quality.worth the money in fact..haha..well..is all about having fun isnt it..especially in a vacation..your wallets will be more susceptible to temptations!
We spent ard 5 hours at the shopping village before making our way back to Paris. Take note that this shopping village is not within the city of Paris. You can take a bus there with Cityrama Services.
Being curious at the high popularity rate of this phototour held by photographer Randy Harris, I signed up a phototour with me..and learnt tons of tips in taking good travel photos. Along the way, Randy recommended me interesting angles that I can take my pics, and shared some technical expertise with me with regards to better use my D90..to take people, culture, history, scenery of Paris..he thought me how to be observant and gave me ideas on what to look out for!
I personally think it was a very fruitful experience and it was my 1st time participating in this tour. It's a one-to-one kind of tour, so you get the whole attention from the expert..which I enjoyed talking and sharing my pics with him..Highly recommended if you are keen in photography and wanna take great pics!
Below are some of the pics which I took while learning from Randy..
Children and bubbles
Velib on Rental
Dimensions
Black and White
Nice angle Perspective
Street Art
We ended the tour after about 3 hours..and went for an icecream break at Haagen Daaz..
Loved the taste of the icecream that day..especially after taking in so many beautiful memories of Paris..
Since it's our last day in Paris, we thought might as well spend the night watching the sunset at the lourve Museum...i'm glad we did..the sky colors was spectacular!
We woke up pretty tired after ytd's nite out.we went to saint chapelle to see the arts on the stained windows of the chapelle and le concierge,a prison of the early days. We initially wanted to visit the catacombes but the queue was horrendously long tat we gave up.tat's a pity as tim recommended us to see the true history in paris.
St.Chapelle
Le Concierge
we went for a cityrama tour to giverny in the afternoon.it was the place where the famous painter monet, created his water lilies workpiece.
Us at Monet House
The period which we went there is known to be the best to visit giverny as the flowers were all in full bloom. True indeed, we went there,impressed by the garden that contained all the flowers,some of which we've nv seen before.the weather was great!whilst learning how to appreciate nature n arts @ the same time.
At Monet's garden
we went back to paris city in e evening and made our way to eiffel tower.there was a huge projector screen near eiffel to broadcast e world cup matches. We joined e crowd to watch n.korea vs ghana tat day. I didnt know there were so many koreans residing in paris,when korea won tat day,the korean crowd went cheering and dancing!wat a sight!
as we strolled en route to eiffel,there were protest groups wrt some religious issues,which i cant recall now.protests are norms in paris.in fact,there will be aother protest on that day whcih we are leaving paris.tat one is wrt retirement age issues.parisans are indeed expressive in their views and brave to voice out.
waiting for eiffel tower to light up at night was nt an easy task to accomplish due to e long summer hours. We waited till 11pm n finally saw the gold lighted eiffel tower which was breathtaking!!
feeling satisfied after seeing one of the wonders of the world and taking many pics of this landmark, we went back..happy happy!
Our 2nd day of paris was spent taking a tour with Cityrama.it seems to be the monopoly of paris travel,aside from paris vision. We took the metro to lourve stop and walked towards the office..boy,there were so many pple queuing up at the counters. We participated in this "grand lourve and seinorama" tour that day.
as we werent experts of arts and jus wanna have a quick look at the famous art works like venus de milo and mona lisa,going with a guide was the most efficient way out and im glad we did.the museum was bursting with pple.i have nv seen a museum so crowded before.everyone was crowding ard their guide,or listening to their audioguide which explains works from famous artists.
We had a feel of how to appreciate the msg tat artists wanna convey thru their paintings.from impressionalists to modern art paintists,huge genre of arts that left us awed,surprised and enlightened.this was an amazing place to be in,even for us!a 3h tour was spent moving thru from one hall to another.i had fun takin pics too!
His Fans!
we walked out of the museum to tuileries gardens.beautiful and majestic is what i thought,that's accompanied with the lovely sky.we strolled thru the garden,and along seine river,to musee d orsay.a sandwich and the choco crepes filled our stomachs for lunch.
parisans have a great way of living.their river transmits a sense of peace,harmony,with the many ancient bridges built across it, linking one part of the city to the other.pple walk slowly,appreciate the envi slowly,had their lunch by the river.lifestyle was calm.probably is the european style of life which we witness in ireland and spain as well.
At the Tuileries
Along the Seine
Flying in Paris
we went back cityrama in afternoon for the Seinorama portion.there was a city tour ard the major landmarks in paris, followed by a cruise along seine river.i will think the cruise is very worthwhile.there's also a type of hop on hop off boat,batobus,that makes the river a great way of transport.
we alighted from the cruise and queued in the long line for our turn to go up to 2nd storey of the magnificient wonder, Eiffel Tower!!
I can then understand why the tower is so fascinating after being there. Be it looking bottomup or from the top down, the views of eiffel was spectacular,there were so many interesting angles to take pics from and i was simply enthralled!
2nd floor of the tower was filled to brim with tourists.but is unavoidable as the view was simply mesmerizing.seeing the montmatre,the only elevated place in paris amidst the low level of the other landmarks which include the arc de triomphe,the trocadero,the lourve,the seine,all of these just formed a wonderful postcard,deeply etched in my mind.
we took the cityrama bus back to lourve and went shopping.well,a bottle of mineral water costs 7bucks.sandwich cost at least 10bucks.not so cheap to survive in paris.prices in paris are much higher than in spain.we passed by the famous LV store,that always have a long queue to enter the shop.shops close at 8pm when the sun is still so bright.it's really tiring to wait for sunset to come by in summer time.
that day was the festival of music in paris, once a year. We went to centre pompidou,which was creatively built. As night fell, everyone was getting hyperactive.
Bands, groups of pple performed various genre of music.the feeling was amazing.everyone danced to the music,at one corner was korean drums, at the other end was hard rock music,and at that corner was the sentimental type of music.a great way to see parisans in this festival!
Beautiful Song
the music continued even till wee hrs.tat night was sorta crazy as we walked till 1am to champs elysee.sumwhat scary as we walked thru the dark streets,along the seine river.and we witnessed sorta a car fight at the roads in champs elysee.tat day portugal won a match in e world cup.so fans came out,wrapped themselves with portugal flag,stopped the traffic,honking everywhere,and just refuse to budge which annoyed some pple.police were no where to be see n we wondered why.
the area ard champs elysee was so lively even at night.restaurants were open,pple were chilling out..we walked to the metro and saw many police there.nt sure if they were guarding the metro against any fights or too afraid to confront the soccer enthusiasts wrecking havoc up above.i think i didnt mention this yet..paris metro always reeks of urine smell...there weren't toilets near the metro,explaining the smell..very disgusting..well..lesson of the day..
Took an early vueling flight from barcelona,we landed in paris around noon time.the coastline of bcn as we took off was mesmerizing,with the long beach line.in 2h,we reached paris.
1st thing we saw from the airplane is the eiffel tower.from the airport,we lugged the heavy bag on our shoulders and took the train to gare du nord,station near to hotel londres.
gare du nord was huge!with all the metro,local train,eurostar in one hub.we took some time to find the exit and that's when e real treasure hunt began. we walked up and down and right,finding the hotel name which was yet to be seen.pple gave us directions tat were..hmm..somewhat wrong.possibly becuz of miscomm.finally,after 40mins,we found Hotel londres and anvers.
checkin in was fine,but we were given a room jus below the rooftop.no aircon to my dismay as the weather was quite hot.we left our stuff quickly and rushed off to blanche for our walking tour to the Montmatre.
we saw this guy named tim,holding on to the classic walks shirt.this walk programme was one of the popular ones as said in tripadvisor.we're glad we came for this as he was humourous while telling us so much on montmatre and the neighbourhood. We passed by tombs of a famous singer in paris, residence of picasso,saw one of the spectacular day views of paris,get amazed by the passion of the parisans..
Famous Singer, Dalinda
Picasso
Man through the walls
From Montmatre
Montmatre
The talents
Fat Cat
after the 2h walk, we wandered off to the redlight district at pigalle.there were many live shows theatre along the streets,which each boasts of topnotch entertainment, with a drink n chips n unlimited time in these theatres.price was at least 20euro per pax.we also saw moulin rouge, which sells tix at 90euro.we didnt watch both. Why? One is too ex, another one?? Hmm..probably will be too eye-opening :) but we did enter a museum on erotism.interesting statues,artpieces,chinese,western,japanese,indian history,films which depict all abt sex..yup..
and so we went off and ate a sandwich n crepes.realised many of such stores along the way and mainly indians selling these.we saw many immigrants in paris in fact.
we stopped by Notre Dame Cathedral and joined in their session..a very beautiful church..i guess it is the most beautiful church among all I have visited in this trip..
wandered off to seine river and landed ourselves at a restaurant in st.germain pres for dinner.well, english was spoken so ordering was not a problem unlike in spain.the food was great for dear but not mine...i probably will only prefer german sausages next time..
trip back to our hotel with a heavy stomach n tired but happy feet!
