Ahhh, Paris!

For the President's Day weekend we headed to Paris.  It is only a 4 hour drive, but we have put it off for a year and a half.  It was time to see the city and enjoy Paris.  Just so nobody gets the impression that it was all chic and Parisian all the time let me state that we 1)Found a "cheap"(cheap and Paris cheap are two different things) place to stay that was kind of like a camping trailer, but with bathroom, kitchen, and heat.  2)We brought our own food and ate in the trailer so as to avoid having to force the kids to eat snails and the such. 3)We also packed a picnic lunch each day to enjoy on the walk.  4)Last of all, we invited our friends.  With the 4 adults and 11 children we guarenteed that the trip would closely resemble a 3 ring circus sure to draw the attention of anyone in the area.  It was an awesome trip! 

 

We were lucky enough to find sun in Paris.  It wasn't really warm, but seeing the sun was a real treat on this trip.  I hear that the sun found Germany too, but really I think that is just a folktale.  Germany isn't really acquainted with the sun. 

 

I have a ton of pictures, for like everywhere we travel I really want to be able to look back and while sitting in Kansas or somewhere remember that there was a time when I saw and experienced Europe.  I didn't include many of the pics, but rather just a few from each of the places we went.

 

 

 

Arc de Triomphe

Sun!  We aren't really used to it.

 

See?  Circus!  10 of the 11 kids.

Why the warriors can't wear clothes I'll never know.

Eiffel Tower, our first glimpse

Davis

 

Eating lunch at a park at the base of the tower.  Pretty great location.  Anya is sleeping on my back.
We had wanted to go to the top, or at least the first or second platform, but the lines were crazy long and there weren't tickets to be reserved. No way we'd be able to keep the kids waiting in line for that long.   Also it would cost about $100 for our family to go to the top, but the lines were really what stopped us. 
 



This was on my bucket list..Kiss my love in front of the Eiffel Tower. 

 

Catacombes de Paris

Creepy!  Underground dumping spot of the bodies when the city cemetaries got too full.  Over 6 million bodies are now located here.  Someone went through and organized the bones.  It was dark and with all the underground tunnels lined with bones, it was a total HIT with the kids.

Jag always on the hunt for the skull with teeth or a lower jaw.

The skulls were often arranged in patterns and crosses.

Sacre-Coeur

A white church on top of a large hill that overlooks the entire city of Paris. 

 

Bagettes while waiting for the metro.

 

Eiffel at Night

They light the Eiffel tower up at night time and each hour on the hour for 5 minutes it sparkes white like a sparkler.

The Barney Family

Church in the Paris Ward

The ward was mostly Asian.  We wore headphones.  Talked to a missionary who was called to the Paris mission, Chinese speaking.  Talk about tough, here live in a foreign country, but you aren't even going to be taught the lanuage of the country so that you can get around.

 

Lots of metro/train riding.  Much better than walking everywhere with the kids.

Noah and Christian
France's transportation was very expensive compared to other places we've been.  They even require children to have a ticket which is unusual and expensive.

 

Notre-Dame

Another great location for lunch.

 

 

Inside Notre-Dame.  Notice the large bells down the center.  It was a packed house for Sunday Mass.

 

Back side of Notre-Dame

 Sainte Chapelle

The chapel was built inside the palace to house the relics collected by St. Louis on his many Crusades.

This is the part for the Palace workers to worship.

The Kings chapel.  EVERY wall was covered in stained glass depicting the creation through the resurrection.  With the stained glass and all the gold that was around it would have been quite a thing to see in the day.  It would have been necessary to wear sunglasses.

 

Louvre

For Brooke.  This is the Code of Hammurabi!  First set of written laws.  It is hard to see the small words carved on it.  I was surprised at how big it was.



Venus de Milo

Mona Lisa

The Louve is massive.  It is a museum inside of a museum.  The building itself is full of amazingly painted ceilings and sculptures. It was impossible to see even a fraction of the exhibits, especially with kids parading around.  Noah pointed out that there were a lot of people that couldn't wear clothes.  It was true.  We decided to hit the "big" attractions and then to go through Egypt because that had the cool mummies and kid pleasing items.

 

Suresues American Cemetary

WWI cemetary in which President Hinkley's brother, Stanford Hinkley, is buried.

We heard great stories about President Hinkley from the little lady that has worked at the cemetary for almost 30 years.  It was a neat experience.  This cemetary is about 5 miles outside of Paris on a hill and has an amazing view of the city.



10/11 kids.  It is fun to hang out with the Barney's.  All of our kids match up with a best buddy in their family.  They also have a 15 year old son.

Just a few more notes from our trip:
*Tolls!  France, grr.  60 euros for us to drive to and from Paris.
*Bathrooms!  Free!  With 15 we tried to make up our toll money in this department.  Especially with 2 newly potty trained toddlers.
*Bakeries.  Not as easy to find as they should be.  Not as numerous as in many other European countries.  Getting an eclair in Paris was also on my bucket list, but we weren't able to find one.  (I'm going to be making up for this in the near future.)  We stopped on our way home at a French grocery and grabbed some, but it wasn't in Paris.
*Weather.  For February we couldn't have asked for better weather.  It was cold, but it was sunny and we didn't have any rain!
*Troubles.  None really.  With every big city you hear of the pick pockets and gypsies etc, but although we saw them (gypsies not pick pocketers) we weren't bothered.  Nobody got their head stuck anywhere.  Where is the excitement in that?  Darin did make a wrong turn on our drive into town and we found a street LINED with the "Ladies" of the night.  Cars were pulling over and they were jumping in.  I was afraid to slow down enough to turn around for fear that a lady would come running over to our van.  What a shocker that would have been for her.