Getting to a Paris hotel was not easy

I have a new city on my favorites list. This weekend two friends and I got a ride on the Mitfahrgelgenheit with two Germans, living in Aachen, who only spoke French and German. They picked us up in a nice little VW car, which became increasingly more...cozy as we drove the four hours to Paris. It was a fun drive, amplified by the fact that the couple was sitting up front singing along to practically every song that came on, which included rock, hip-hop, and my personal favorite, Britney Spears. (Think, "hit me baby one more time" said with a thick accent.) Anyway, it took pretty much exactly 4 hours to get there and at first I was actually not at all impressed. The outskirts of the city were very industrial and unremarkable and we passed by factories and apartments that were exactly opposite of the "city of love" image. They were really nice and offered to take us to our hostel, so they put in in their GPS and started driving. I don't know if it was because the navigation system was shifty or the place was just impossible to find, but finally another 4 hours after getting into the city, getting stuck in stop and go traffic, and looping around a few times we offered to just jump out and take the metro.

Luckily, McDonald's is ubiquitous and cheap, so we were able to ease the starvation we'd built up over the preceding 8 hours of travel. I thought the French McDonald's menu was really funny - since Europe is on the metric system all of the "quarter pounders", etc, are called things like "royals", there were various desserts such as cakes and tarts that I had never imagined seeing in a fast food restaurant, and on the drink menu were beer and wine! Definitely different than in the States.

We jumped on the metro which was impossibly confusing at first, but finally managed to figure it out and realized it was pretty efficient. Another bout of traveling and we got to our hotel, which ended up being in what I like to think of as the Brooklyn of Paris. (Google maps deceived me, but at least it was really cheap.) Our room was actually way nicer than anything we would have gotten in a hostel in the city, complete with two twin beds and a bathroom crammed into a little room that overlooked a soccer field and, in the distance, some of the Paris skyline.

It was getting to be evening, so we headed back into the city in hopes of seeing the Eiffel tower at night. After a few transfers we climbed out of the station and the first thing we saw was the top of the tower lit up behind some trees. It was so beautiful! I had always assumed it was a large structure, but I had no idea it would be as massive and elaborate as it was.

We kept walking until we got right under the base. The entire park under the tower is beautiful - there are lakes, grass, and plenty of places to lie around and hang out. When we were standing right under the base thousands of lights suddenly made the entire tower start to glitter. This went on for about five minutes and we later realized that it marks the beginning of each hour.

It was too late to buy tickets to the top, so instead we just hung out in the park below, watching people and the lights above. Finally, because of both exhaustion and the trains stopping we headed back to the hostel, where a grumpy night clerk let us in and we were able to get a bit of rest.