France 2025 - Day 8 & 9

 Day 8 was the day to hit the major tourist sites. We had hoped to get into the catacombs but you can only buy tickets one week in advance and they were sold out by the time we landed the Friday before. We also found that we needed advanced tickets for the Louvre and the Muse D'Orsay. Both of which had not been that way the last time Dad was here.

We started by heading for Notre Dame, then taking a hop-on-hop-off bus from there.

This was, like, the fourth picture we took. I have no idea why it was so hard.

We did not go into Notre Dame as the line was around the block, but we saw the outside.

Stupid sun.

I thought it would be bigger. (That's what she said!)

We bought the tickets for the bus, and a slight up-charge for a river cruise. The bus took us past most of the big landmarks and up the Champs Elysees to the Arc d'Triomph. We jumped off at the Eifel Tower, where the river boats dock.

As we were in line for the boat, about a 20 minute wait, I got some ice cream for Owyn and I. Dad didn't want any. The people in front of us waited 30 minutes, got to the front of the line, and found out they had tickets for a completely different boat. When we got up there they took pity on Dad and moved us into an area where he could sit down and we could get on first. That was great because we got a good seat.

After the cruise we were all pretty done. It was a fairly long walk to the nearest Metro station. Dad stopped half way down and we petted dogs as they walked by.

This is in the center of the Place de Republic, near where we were staying. 

We went back to the restaurant from the first night and relaxed for awhile. As we got back to the room a large Gaza protest went by and camped out in the Place. They turned their protest into a street party and made noise until 0300 in the morning. It was hell.

The next day we were supposed to go out to Belleau Wood but the trip had caught up with Dad and I. We stayed in the room. I slept all day and then slept all night. We did go out to a new place for dinner, which was also very good.

The last day was our trip home. Train, airport, airplanes, customs. We arrived about 0130 to end our trip.