Apologies for the Delays

So I fell behind on the blogging, the past few days in France have been very fun though.

11/1
So I arrived in Paris on the 31st late in the evening so the 1st was my first day in Paris for real. Me and my sister decided that we would hit the Louvre out first day in Paris and get it out of the way. We first ran quickly through a part of the Museum to get the Mona Lisa ( not as impressive as you wold think it is) which seems to be obligatory. After the Mona Lisa we moved on to several other sections of the Museum including one section which was full of furniture and full rooms things like the old rooms of the royal palace and how they looked. We also looked at several collections of paintings around the Louvre. After the Louvre we wandered around the nearby shopping district where my sister suggested that we get me a coat for the colder temperatures that were hitting Paris, it was around 10 C (about 50) with some heavy wind chill so it felt a lot colder. I posted some photos of me in the coat on my Flickr account so you can check it out and see how I look. After the coat we went back and hung at the Hostel for the afternoon before popping out for groceries later in the evening and then eating in at the Hostel.

11/2
We decided for the day we would go to churches for the day and so we headed out to start at Saint Chapelle which is a small church that is almost entirely stained glass. The walls have large windows of stained glass and I have some photos on the Flickr account so you can get an idea of the place. Unfortunately the front of the church was having work done and so it was covered and thus one of the best views of the church was hidden. It was very impressive but not quite worth even the discounted price of 5 Euros. After Saint Chapelle we continued on to Notre Dame which was pretty empty since it was still in the morning. We went straight into the Cathedral and looked around, you get to walk around the base level and explore the Cathedral. After the exploration we went back outside to go onto the upper level tour of Notre Dame only to find that there was a very large, slow moving line now. We had made plans to meet one of Dev's friends for lunch and we decided that we would join the line and see if we could make it to the front before we had to go to lunch. Well we did not make it to the front of the line, we didn't even quite make it to the halfway point before it was time for lunch, we decided that we would come back another day earlier in the morning so there would not be as much of a wait. We met with Devs friend and went to lunch at a small nearby cafe that we had found in our guide book. The food at the cafe was good and the location was decorated with lots of books to be like a cozy little library. The food tasted good but the service was somewhat lacking and our server was somewhat rude to us. So after our quick lunch we went back to the Hostel to recuperate before we met another one of Devs friends and after meeting up we went back to her boyfriends apartment and cooked a nice dinner with them. We had chicken, zucchini, and an apple crumble for dessert. We ended up leaving at around 11:15 so we would not be caught by the closing Metro. We hopped two trains back to the Hostel and made it back around 12 and fell into bed.

11/3
The majority of the day was spent at the Rodin Museum which is housed inside of an old train station and houses Monet's Water Lilies which are some of his most famous painting. We met with Devs friend again outside the museum and we spent the rest of the day together. we looked at a good portion of the paintings in the main exhibit and then we visited the Art Nouveau exhibit that was also in the same location. The paintings were cool and the building was very impressive, we spent several hours here before heading to our planned lunch. We decided to have out lunch at Angelina which is a restaurant if Paris that we had been recommended as it serves the best hot chocolate in the city. We ordered a double serving of the chocolate to spit between the three of us and we all ordered a dessert. I chose to get a Mont Blanc which had no description but from what I could tell it was a meringue topped with a whipped cream like topping with the whole thing covered in a sugary smooth hazelnut paste. It was great but a little to rich to go with the chocolate. The chocolate itself was very rich and thick, I would say it was about the thickness of heavy whipping cream, maybe a bit thicker. The whole meal was great and very filling but on the expensive side (what do you expect I Paris though). After the chocolate I went back to the Hostel to take a nap while Dev and her friend went off to shop.

11/4
Our planned movement took place on the 4th, we went from Paris to Decaze where Devs friend works and has a apartment she shares with several other people. The town is rather small but is in a great location near some of the nicest towns in France. The trip was pretty easy, we hopped up earlier and grabbed our bags, we had a quick breakfast at the Hostel before getting onto the Metro to get to one of the larger stations to get out train. We made it the large station with plenty of time and found our train easy enough. The first train ride was around 3 hours long and from there we transferred to another train for around 2 hours. When we arrived at the station we were picked up and driven back to the apartment. We went shopping and cooked a nice meal for dinner, chicken, carrots, rice, and a mango salsa with cake for dessert. We are planning on staying here and leaving on Sunday to go to Tullues then leaving Tullues on Wednesday and going back to Paris to finish up there and be ready for our flights.

11/5
Devs friend had work today so she was up early in the morning to be ready for her early class and she was back very soon after I got up at around 9 or so. Me and Dev had a nice breakfast of some Nutella toast and yogurt, I also had a piece of cake. The breakfast was good and we decided we would go down to a town nearby where the guy who translated the Rosetta stone was born. There was a small museum there with artifacts about both ancient Egypt and how the stone was finally figured out. After he Museum we returned to the apartment and had a nice cal afternoon lounging before cooking up a nice dinner of Mac and Cheese