Its great to see how much you have been following me while we journeyed around Europe. Its really nice to hear from all of you almost every day. Sorry that my posts aren't up to date but I will try to correct that with this post.
Sorry for the confusion Alexander, but what I meant was while you were in England last year, did you go to London, and if so what did you see there?
In Paris the day after Versailles we climbed the Eiffel tower, though we weren't allowed onto the top level. We all loved the view of Paris from the second floor of the Eiffel tower. It was amazing that, while up on the tower on the second floor you felt so high, but viewing it from the ground you could see that the second floor is only around halfway up.
We then walked to the beginning of the Champs de Elysees and then across to the Louvre. We only had about one and a half hours at the Louvre, which wasn't nearly enough, but we used that time to see enough to get a taste. We saw some renaissance paintings as well as medieval paintings and classical Greek sculptures. We also managed to get a peek at the Mona Lisa and were more surprised at the queue, or lack of it, than the paintings size.
After the Louvre we didn't do anything in Paris for the rest of the day.
The next day we traveled to Gare Nord, the main station where the Eurostar leaves from. We dumped our luggage there and caught the 42 bus, on the recommendation of someone in the Tourist info booth. The bus took us on a route through the centre of Paris, along the Champs de Elysees, though not to the Arc de Triumph and out of the centre again. We were able to see alot of the city, especially the centre.
In all, I felt that we had seen a massive amount of Paris for how long we had there. We managed to see a lot of the main attractions, or at least get in the vicinity of them.
Posted at 11:34
Monday, January 10, 2011
Friday, January 7, 2011
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Great to hear that NCYC and the theme parks were fun. Hope everyone from St Matts is good. It is hard to post things because don't have much time where we are staying, except for at night when we have a couple of hours. I'm trying to keep up to date, but there is just so much stuff. Will post about the rest of Paris and also London tomorrow (hopefully). By the way, how long did you spend in London and what did you see?
Posted at 8:51pm London time.
Posted at 8:51pm London time.
Thursday, January 6, 2011
Versailles
We had a slightly lazy morning before heading off to the Palace of Versailles, to take advantage of it being free on the first Sunday of the Month. The walk up to Versailles was amazing, with the gold-leaf gates and the view of the palace. We were all amazed by the inside as well, though Jonathan complained about the amount of Paintings.
The thing I found most amazing about Versailles was how much everything inside it must have cost. There were so many different paintings and things with gold lea on them! While only about halfway through the palace we all started commenting on how we all had massive sensory overloads. I was also really amazed by the ceiling paintings in each of the rooms and got a sore neck from looking at them all.
After going through Versailles the general consensus was that it was very show-offy and arrogant and ‘look at what we’ve got’. Not to say that we didn’t like it at all, it was just very big and expensive-looking.
We then wandered through the gardens for a bit and looked at how grand they were. Dad said that he could easily see why the French Revolution occurred, looking at the palace and the gardens and how expensive they would be, and we all agreed with him. We saw some swans waking along a frozen pond/fountain and looked at the leafless trees wondering how amazing this would be in Summer time.
Posted at 8:17pm London Time
The thing I found most amazing about Versailles was how much everything inside it must have cost. There were so many different paintings and things with gold lea on them! While only about halfway through the palace we all started commenting on how we all had massive sensory overloads. I was also really amazed by the ceiling paintings in each of the rooms and got a sore neck from looking at them all.
After going through Versailles the general consensus was that it was very show-offy and arrogant and ‘look at what we’ve got’. Not to say that we didn’t like it at all, it was just very big and expensive-looking.
We then wandered through the gardens for a bit and looked at how grand they were. Dad said that he could easily see why the French Revolution occurred, looking at the palace and the gardens and how expensive they would be, and we all agreed with him. We saw some swans waking along a frozen pond/fountain and looked at the leafless trees wondering how amazing this would be in Summer time.
Posted at 8:17pm London Time
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
Paris Day 1 (after coming from Brussels)
When we arrived in Paris we dumped our bags in the luggage storage at Gare de Lyon, one of Paris’s big railway stations. We then left Gare de Lyon to do some wandering around Paris for 3-or-so hours. We ended up just walking up the Seine and going to Notre Dame. After reaching Notre Dame we walked around it and then stood outside the entrance for a bit. Gemma soon began complaining that she was tired so we walked to the nearest metro station and went back to Gare de Lyon before catching the RER to the apartment we were staying in.
A very Belgian New Year
We spent New Year’s Eve with an old friend of Mum’s who is living with her husband and children in Brussels. We left for the celebrations at around 9:00 and went to a Greek restaurant for dinner. It was amazing walking around Brussels because it is still legal to purchase fireworks there. There were heaps of people letting off ‘bungas’, which are plastic tubes filled with gunpowder.
By the time we reached the square where the main firework display was going to happen it was around 11:30 so there were already heaps of people. We reached a position which we thought we would get a good view of the fireworks. In the end about half of the fireworks that were let off we couldn’t see because of a building, but it was still pretty amazing.
Posted at 7:59pm London time
By the time we reached the square where the main firework display was going to happen it was around 11:30 so there were already heaps of people. We reached a position which we thought we would get a good view of the fireworks. In the end about half of the fireworks that were let off we couldn’t see because of a building, but it was still pretty amazing.
Posted at 7:59pm London time
Amsterdam
Sorry for the confusion, but this post slots in between Boxing Day and us seeing Harry Potter.
On the 27th of December we headed into Amsterdam for the day. We arrived in at about 11:00 and wanted to find something to eat before exploring Amsterdam. In the end we settled for some Kebabs so we could eat while walking.
We decided to head off to the Anne Frank house first. When we reached the house, there was a massive queue outside it. We stopped and looked at the queue and then decided to change our plans and go to the Van Gough museum/art gallery. We reached the museum and, luckily, the line wasn’t too long.
The Van Gough museum was really interesting, because it had information on Van Gough’s life and also artworks by other painters that inspired him, as well as a very large collection of Van Gough’s artwork (though with noticeable absences like ‘A Starry Night’ and ‘The Cafe’, as well as only having one of his paintings of sunflowers.
We spent quite a while in the art gallery, so it was about 5:00 when we came out. We decided to see if we could get to the Anne Frank house before it closed, thinking the last people were let through at 5:30 with the house closing at 6:00. Because of this we quickly hurried to the house to try to get there on time. In the end we reached it at 5:45-ish and found out that we were an hour off, the last people were actually let through at 6:30.
The Anne Frank house was very interesting. You could go into the rooms that Anne Frank and the 7 other Jewish people were hiding in. They also had some information about the concentration camps and the Nazis during the war. The other big part of the museum was a room exhibiting the original diary of Anne Frank.
By the time we had finished going through the Anne Frank house it was around 6:30 and so we headed off to the station to catch the train back to Rotterdam. On the way we grabbed some more kebabs for dinner, and so ending our kebab tour of Amsterdam.
Posted at 7:58 London time.
On the 27th of December we headed into Amsterdam for the day. We arrived in at about 11:00 and wanted to find something to eat before exploring Amsterdam. In the end we settled for some Kebabs so we could eat while walking.
We decided to head off to the Anne Frank house first. When we reached the house, there was a massive queue outside it. We stopped and looked at the queue and then decided to change our plans and go to the Van Gough museum/art gallery. We reached the museum and, luckily, the line wasn’t too long.
The Van Gough museum was really interesting, because it had information on Van Gough’s life and also artworks by other painters that inspired him, as well as a very large collection of Van Gough’s artwork (though with noticeable absences like ‘A Starry Night’ and ‘The Cafe’, as well as only having one of his paintings of sunflowers.
We spent quite a while in the art gallery, so it was about 5:00 when we came out. We decided to see if we could get to the Anne Frank house before it closed, thinking the last people were let through at 5:30 with the house closing at 6:00. Because of this we quickly hurried to the house to try to get there on time. In the end we reached it at 5:45-ish and found out that we were an hour off, the last people were actually let through at 6:30.
The Anne Frank house was very interesting. You could go into the rooms that Anne Frank and the 7 other Jewish people were hiding in. They also had some information about the concentration camps and the Nazis during the war. The other big part of the museum was a room exhibiting the original diary of Anne Frank.
By the time we had finished going through the Anne Frank house it was around 6:30 and so we headed off to the station to catch the train back to Rotterdam. On the way we grabbed some more kebabs for dinner, and so ending our kebab tour of Amsterdam.
Posted at 7:58 London time.
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
Apology for Lack of Posts
I'm sorry for my lack of posts over the last few days, but we couldn't get Wi-Fi in Paris. We are now in London and somewhat glad to be back in an English speaking country. We saw a lot of things in our 2 and 2 half days in Paris. We went to Notre-Dame, the Eiffel Tower. the Louvre, Versailles, walked on both sides of the Seine and visited the Champs Elysees, but not as far up as the Arc de Triumph.
How are all you holidays? What have you been doing? Hope to hear from you and I will post about Paris and other things soon.
Posted at 9:20 London time.
How are all you holidays? What have you been doing? Hope to hear from you and I will post about Paris and other things soon.
Posted at 9:20 London time.
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