A Sleepy Stroll through Paris
After a wonderful breakfast of pain au chocolate and croissants, I was ready to take on the day, or so I thought. After the sugar rush of breakfast ran off, I found myself slowly becoming more and more tired. Luckily, I had packed a Nutella packet to snack on, in my trusty money belt, and I was back to my normal self after I ate it. We took the Metro to the Il de la Cite and walked down cobblestone streets, past patisseries and old churches, until we wound up a Notre Dame. I don't know how the tour guides can navigate their way through all of the cities so well. I know my memory would fail me if I tried to get through Paris without a map. I soon found myself inside of the world renowned church staring in awe at the massive stained glass windows. After just the right amount of time inside of charming Notre Dame, our group found ourselves again being whisked away down the streets of Paris to play a game know as petanque.
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"Today we got up and had delicious pastries for breakfast! I loved the pain au chocolate! Then, we walked to the Metro and rode it. We ended up near the Il de la Cite. There, we stopped and saw an old church with some cool gargoyles and we passed by a delicious looking pastry shop. We continued until we reached a very, very old tree."
-An excerpt from my travel journal |
A New Game with New Friends
We ended up near a garden where we would learn how to play petanque. Two petanque experts came to help us learn how to play. Basically, petanque is a French version of bocce ball. After the experts explained how to play the game, we were split into teams and began a friendly competition. Although I was not very good, my team managed to pull through and win the game. After our game, our amazing tour guides surprised the whole group by bringing us fresh pastries. Sarah, our tour guide, always knew the perfect way to keep the group happy! When the pastries were gone and the group was full of energy, we went our separate ways to go and explore Paris.
A Beginner's Guide to Petanque
- Divide into teams and choose your boules. Boules are the balls that you use to play petanque, and they should have some type of groove pattern engraved around themselves.
- The first team throws the jack. The jack is a little wooden ball. A circle is then drawn for the players to stand in to throw the jack and boules.
- A player from the first team tries to land a boule as close to the jack as possible. A player from team two then tries to throw their boules closer to the jack than their opponent. This continues until they run out of boules or take the lead. If they take the lead, the other team throws their boules to try and get closer to the jack once again.
- After a team uses all of its boules, the other team has the chance to throw the rest of theirs. The team with the closest boule to the jack wins, and each boule that is closer to the jack then their opponent's closest boule gets an additional point. Only one team gets points each round.
- A new round is set up and the first team to reach thirteen points is declared the winner.
Musee d'Orsay |
We decided to take a walk to the Musee d'Orsay and look at some art. We first stopped to have a quick lunch, and it was incredible! I ordered a ham sandwich, expecting a light meal, and I ended up with a massive baguette with a generous helping of ham stacked in the middle. If you order a sandwich in France, don't expect pre-sliced, white bread. After lunch, we walked the rest of the way to the museum. I suddenly realized that my earlier sleepiness was coming back and my full stomach begged me to sit down for a moment. As soon as we got to the museum, I found a comfy lounge chair and accidentally fell asleep on it. While Aunt Molly and Madeline explored the museum, I took a quick nap to rejuvenate myself for our next adventure. Before leaving, we stopped at the Van Gogh exhibit, which took my breath away! It is magical to see all of the pictures you had learned about in art class lined up on a wall in front of you.
Van Gogh's Masterpieces
Sacre-Coeur
After using the Metro, and stopping at the vending machines along the way, we finally arrived at Montmartre. We took a funicular up the hill, and when we reached the top, we were astonished. From the top of the hill, you could see all of Paris. We hiked the rest of the way up to Sacre-Coeur, and explored the beautiful church. The inside was just as amazing as the outside. After taking a few pictures on the top of the hill, we went back down and found a nice Italian restaurant to eat at. I don't know why we decided to go to an Italian restaurant, but the food was incredible! We took the Metro to the Eiffel Tower to have one last look before we returned to the hotel. It was easy to fall asleep that night after walking eight and a half miles through the bustling city of Paris.