This morning we ventured to see the Arc de Triomphe. We started out our adventure by hoping on the bus which we found was much, much easier than traveling on the Metro. The stroller just pops on in the back without much problems. Also you get a much better view of the city above ground. The arch is very impressive in itself but one of the most amazing things is what surrounds it...the world's largest and scariest roundabout. With 12 avenues radiating from this circle and it being about 5 lanes wide, it is any wonder why there isn't an accident every 5 minutes on this thing. We actually saw some people walk across it to get to the arch (which is stupid because there are stairs and a tunnel that go under the street.) Then we saw little cars zipping in and out of huge busses and in this picture you can barely see the lady riding her bike between the black and silver minivans on the left. It is INSANE!!!!
Napoleon built this triumphial arch in honor of all of those who fought for France, but in particularly in the Napoleonic wars. It is the second largest arch in the world.
Underneath the arch is the Tomb of the Unknown Solider from World War I. In 1920 it had the first eternal flame in Eastern and Western Europe since the one for Vestal Virgins' was extinguished in 394. It was a visit to the arch that Jackie Kennedy remembered after JFK was assassinated and that is why she set up the eternal flame at his grave site. I tried explaining the story to Addison, but she was more interested in running around.
We then took a walk down Charles du Gaulle Avenue where all the high street stores are found. We stopped in this Peugott dealership and saw this "James Bond" car that had a custom jet ski built into the back end.
Next Kevin took the kids for a little walk while Emily and I checked out Lois Vuitton. Okay...the air in this place was took expensive for me to breathe. I thought it might be fun to get a little something though since this was the flagship store for LV, but after seeing that just a little coin purse was 160Euro I about died. The handbags started at around 400 Euro and that was a very little one. I found some sunglasses that I really, really liked but they were 180 Euro. Now maybe they would have been worth getting but I have two kids and when one of them would think it would be fun to step on them or scratch them I would have to throw up. So I decided to just wait until the next time I return to Paris without having two young children who need to have money for college before I buy myself a 600 Euro handbag. I can still dream though....
Funny thing in Paris, we seemed to eat a lot of Italian food. One of the coolest things is that we ate outdoors more than inside, but that is what you do in Paris in the summer. We stopped at a little Italian bistro for pasta and pizza to add a little variety to Addie's food intake. Kevin helped her learn how to roll up the noodles on her spoon.
Now Kevin got kind of adventureous on his pizza this time. He ordered parma ham with garganzola cheese. It was the worst thing I had ever tasted for a pizza...well maybe just the part with all the thick cheese. Now France has some really stinky cheeses and so does England and I think if something spells bad it has to taste bad as well...but that is just me. Kevin got most of the pizza down but it was really too strong for me and Emily about spit her bite back out because it wasn't her cup of tea either.
Another thing we noticed in Paris is that there are a ton of sushi restaurants and a lot of them deliver. Here was a guy who pulled out a little white bag and probably brought a sushi lunch to some guy working in the high end Toyota dealership just down the street.
Emily and I saw some young girls doing some fun poses by the Metro sign and thought we'd try it too. OKAY...I AM REALLY OLD because I felt like an complete old lady trying to get up on the stone railing and I was so scared to death of falling backwards that I just stuck my arms out while Emily wrapped herself around the post.
We took a little ice cream break in the park to cool down, but that didn't keep Emily and Addison from running around. Addison found a walnut shell and Emily broke it open to find that the shells made a heart shape. Addie and Emily must be destined to be good friends for life!
Our initial plan for the day was to walk to the Louve museum, but half way down the Charles du Gaulle Avenue Emily pointed towards some really neat building so we decided to take a detour. This is the Petit Palais which houses the City of Paris Museum of Fine Arts. Now we didn't go inside but the outside of the building was beautiful enough for us to adore. The front arched door was so ornate.
We stopped on the Pont Alexander III bridge for another wonderful view of the River Seine and Eiffel Tower.
At the end of that road is Les Invalides which houses the museum of the French military and Napoleon's tomb. We didn't have time to go in but I really wanted to see Napoleon's own horse that they have stuffed and on display. There is also an amazing display of old canons on the outside.
On that TV program that we watched it also showed the couple finding some men playing bocce ball in a dirt courtyard. Well, we happened to find them as well. Bocce ball is a very popular game in Paris, but most particularly with the older generation from what we are told. These guys were serious though. They had their own balls and most of them had small tape measures on them to get a precise measurement. You could tell some of the oldest gentlemen had played a year or two because they could make the ball fall pretty much where ever they wanted even in the uneven rocks and dust.
We kept on walking and attempted to go to the Musee Rodin so we could walk around the gardens and see the famous "Thinker" statue, but the museum is closed on Mondays...go figure. So we walked on to the Jardin du Luxembourg which we heard was a really nice place. It was but it had a few quarky things going on there. One cool thing was that it had another Statue of Liberty which is the smallest of the three that I knew about, but the first I had gotten to see. The middle one was about 3 blocks from our hotel and the largest one is in New York City.
We sat and got some more ice cream and while Addison slept, Harrison had a ball eating ice cream and getting it all over.
Now the biggest and quarkiest thing about this park was that you weren't allowed to sit on the grass. It took us a bit to figure how serious they were about it, but after Emily (the daring little Brit) got swooshed off the grass by the patrol office we understood why all these chairs were sitting on the gravel walkways. We were just flabberghasted and frustrated because all we wanted to do was stretch out on the grass and let Harrison crawl around a bit...which we did end up letting him go around a bit.
After Addison woke up we thought we would find a playground for her to have some fun in since we made her ride most of the day in the stroller. Well the one really nice play ground that they had charged you 2.60 per child and 1.50 for parents....ahhhh, yeah we decided to just let her ride on the merry-go-round which was frustrating too because they said she was too little to ride on the horses and she would have to be strapped into the basket. She wasn't too happy at first but then when another little girl sat with her she was happy.
We kept walking through the park and funny enough we found some people sitting on the grass. Here there was actually a sign that said it was permitted to sit on this 50 foot by 50 meter section of grass and it was jam packed.
These are permanent ping pong tables set up in this one park and what made them so cool was that these two old ladies (and I'm sorry they were pretty old) were playing and were pretty competitive with each other.
On our metro ride home we had a lady try to get through the handicapped gate as we were going to go through with the stroller and we held back because we thought that wasn't fair for her to do. Well, we ended up being total hypocrites because we all ended up walking through under one ticket and didn't even think about it until after we had done it. Sorry miss...
It's always fun to see all the different types of signs in different countries because often you can't read the language but you can get the jist of what they are trying to sell. Lots of signs we actually see have both the native language and some type of English on it which I think is pretty crazy. I did get a kick out of this sign promoting "Wall Street English"...I wonder what that is because I guess I speak American English and Emily spoke British English...is there really another type of English???
That evening we ordered the kids some pizza for dinner and Kevin and I went out for dinner at the French restaurant that Addie had broken the wine glasses at. It was a nice little place and we had some amazing food and a great bottle of wine.
Tonight since we went out to eat alone, we thought it would be fun to go back to the hotel and get Emily and the kids to walk with them up to the Eiffel Tower. I did have to take this opportunity to take a picture of the lift we had at the hotel. The mirrors inside were an attempt to make it feel a little bigger but you really couldn't get much more than 4 people in it and still be cramped.
On the way to the Eiffel Tower we stopped by the French Statue of Liberty which was just a few blocks from our hotel out the edge of the island in the middle of the Seine river. It is one of many replicas found throughout France and the US. It's just funny to think that I've seen two of them in one day, but I've never seen the real one in New York (someday I hope).
Here again is another picture of Kevin and I with the Eiffel tower, but this is the best night one we got because Emily has mad photography skills.
Kevin was so happy to be able to share this moment with his little girl. He told me how excited he was to tell Addison one day when she is much older that they got to sit and watch the lights flicker on the Eiffel Tower together.
This was a late night for the kiddos but I think they really enjoyed getting out. I'm sure one day they'll get totally embarrassed that I brought them out in the PJs to see the Eiffel Tower at night. It was so amazing and again one of those times that you just have to sit there and take it all in.
Last night Kevin decided to actually take the day off on Friday to spend with us all. Right away in the morning we left the kids with the boys so I could bring Kevin to his theory driving exam and to pick up the minivan we rented for the weekend. Of course he manages to pass with only missing a couple of questions and he studied only 1/3 the amount of time that I did. 
That night we treated to boys to some English pub grub and brought them to one of my favorite places to eat in Peterborough - The Cuckoo. The weather was beautiful so we thought we'd sit outside, but then as most hot English days do, it got really chilly as the sun went down so we moved inside.
Casey enjoyed his first ever duck dish and all of us enjoyed the sampler platter of fine English starters like battered mushrooms with garlic mayonnaise, marinated prawns (shrimp), chicken and chorizo skeweres, garlic ciabatta, pigs in blankets served with onion chutney and smoked paprika mayonnaise...yummy!!!
