Paris in April

I already blogged about one portion of our French holiday, which was our visit to the new LDS Temple in Versailles. This is the other parts of our trip.

We drove, which meant our car got on a train and we took a 30-45mins ride under the English Channel. We were amazed by how quiet and smooth the ride was. We never felt the train start or stop moving.

Photo op before we rode in the chunnel.

I'm not sure what cathedral this is. It's not in Paris, but it was so neat to turn a corner and suddenly see.

We arrived in Paris on Friday afternoon and attended the LDS Paris Temple open house that same evening.

Maybe I should have taken more photos of our B&B we stayed at, but I didn't. It was a lovely apartment with a couple bedrooms and wonderful lighting. It also had fabulous blackout shades that proved very beneficial for the late night and early morning sunlight.

We originally planned on touring around the Eiffel Tower on Sunday, but with rain in the forecast, moved it up to Saturday, which was an absolutely beautiful day.

We weren't planning on going up the tower when our plan was to see it on Sunday so we didn't reserve tickets to up it. Tickets were already booked for Saturday so we'll have to go through that experience on another trip. We really just enjoyed walking around, taking pictures, lettings kids play, and taking it easy without any major plans. It made the day super enjoyable to simply play things by the moment and soak in the nice weather.

I quickly fell in love with the architecture all around Paris. The buildings have beautiful details. These were what I assumed to be homes very near the Eiffel Tower.

Koen was up for a classic tourist photo.

Posing on big rocks are exciting and photo worthy.  (Posing in typical photo spots for your Mom when she makes a request is not as exciting.) 

We chose a nearby pizza restaurant for lunch. Our waiter was kind and playful, which helped me feel a little more relaxed about my lack of French language skills.

We learned by the way, that ordering lemonade meant we were getting Sprite.

There is a beautiful carousel across the tower that we didn't want to pass up.

  

It took Macie a while before I could get her off my lap and feel comfortable enough to sit on a carousel bench by herself.

As a kid, and even today, the animals that move up and down are more attractive to me. But for Koen, a train beats out additional movement hands-down. He looks pretty thrilled.

So this was pretty cool. We got to see watch these ducklings following their mama around.

My photo doesn't do it justice, but these purple trees in front of the Eiffel Tower made me so happy and looked so beautiful.

This is across the street of the tower. I love the look of the building and the trees.

We took a walk along the River Seine to get a closer look at the boats along the way.

Doing this once will be more than enough. Walking underneath the bridges provided a very strong smell of bodily fluids that was heavy enough I felt I could feel it like humidity touching my skin.

Chasing/trying to touch birds is a favorite activity no matter where we are.

I did find the city of Paris to be a beautiful one. The architecture around my home spots in America simply do not look like this.

The only downside to our B&B was that we had a tenant below us who, as we were warned, is sensitive to much noise. We tried our best to keep our feet and voices quiet, but despite our efforts, did receive a visit from our downstairs neighbor.

We went to church Sunday morning in Versailles. Due to a lot of other visitors, we had to park a little ways away from the church. Thankfully, it was dry and comfy weather that morning. We walked into a very full church building where local members were doing their best to accommodate so many visitors, whose number continued to grow. We were lucky and were able to get a chair in the foyer, though many people were standing, sitting on the stairs, and even standing outside for the lack of space. I think the sacrament took a good 30-45mins to pass. I was impressed by how quiet it was during that time.  I wish I would have taken a picture of us in front of church for documentation.

We thought we would visit the Palace of Versaille's gardens after church. It took us a long time to find parking. (I later learned that most parking is free on Sundays.)

We got to walk through a little pop-up market. If I hadn't felt nervous about losing kids in the crowds or finding a toilet for a little one to use, it would have been fun to take the time for some neat photos. It was gone by the time we came back.

So when we did get to the palace, we saw some pretty long queues. Long enough that we were scared of waiting in them with the kids. (Again, after our holiday I did learn that these queues were apparently skipable for those who were only going to see the gardens.) So we took a few pictures of the palace from the outside and then moved onto lunch.

Koen asked us to pose "smart"... this is what we came up with.

I couldn't resist sharing this photo after seeing what Hadley was doing.

The trees in Versailles reminds me of Disney's Sleeping Beauty. They're trimmed to the same shape.

This is a random building/home just as we were leaving for home. You can see homes similar to this in England as well, but none the less, I love seeing the colored shutters and door on this stone building.

I thought driving through France was beautiful. I enjoyed seeing some of their villages on hills, the countryside, and old church steeples. We all had a really good time. The kids thought France was amazing and loved learning random French words with us. France was fun and remains on our list as a place to holiday again.