Well, day nine marks the halfway point of our trip, and it's been such a blast!! I won't be ready to go back yet...
Today we went to le Palais de Versailles. I was supposed to do a presentation, but I think Carlos forgot. Oh darn. Anyway. We took the train there, that was fun. Our group joined with Morgy's today, we travelled together to Versailles. Once we got to Versailles, we stopped at a supermarket to pick up our lunch because we would be eating on the palais' grounds. Then we headed over to the impressive palais. It's pretty big. Carlos got us in with our backpacks, pretty impressive since they don't allow food in the palais. He took full responsability for us. We didn't get to see the king's chambers because the workers were on strike so that wing was closed. We did, however, walk down the cool mirror hallway, but we didn't even realise that that was the hallway we were going down because I wasn't aware that the windows travelled down the whole hallway on one side. And there were no statues. Oh well. And the rooms at either end didn't seem like the war and peace rooms. But whatever.
After viewing the inside of the Palais, we stood in line to see the grounds. None of the fountains were on, that was disapointing.
We got onto this cool train thing that took us across the grounds, and travelled to see a cool building Marie liked. It was pink, but still cool. I really wanted to see her Hamceau/Hamlet, but we didn't get to because they were closed. We ate lunch by a cool pond, and Shannon sketched. I wrote.
After touring Versailles, we headed out. Carlos made us all hide from Ms. Macphearson, because he thought it would be funny. It was. We hopped back onto the train, then the metro, and headed over to Sacre-Coeur, which is at the top of la Butte. The weather was so hot. We went up the cool funiculaire, which was great because we had just climbed about 100 stairs from the metro to get to Montmartre. We were in Montmartre! I was so happy. We went inside the Sacre Coeur, it was impressive. Very holy. After, we headed back onto the metro, and tried to race to the Opera because it was closing at 5 and so we had like, 15 mins to get there. We made it at 5:02 or so, but it was closed. Carlos worked his magic on the security guard, and got Murray in for a tour because he had wanted to see the inside of the Opera for forever. It's a cool building; Murray did his presentation, and I learned how the Phantom of the Opera rumor had started there. That was cool. After it was supper time again.
After supper we headed over to Notre Dame. It wasn't open, but we got group pictures. Then we went shopping!!!! YAYYYYY!! For the first time since we had gotten to Paris I might add. I got Carson his shirt, and I also got mine. A couple of other souvenirs, MR prints, then we headed back to the Auberge. Shannon and I got to shower first, because Meagan and Sarah weren't back yet. I attempted tonight to get on the internet and email home. Halfway point of the trip, and my first email. I did manage to email mom, after waiting for the net for forever and almost falling asleep on the stairs, and Steff as well... well I didn't actually get to send it because I ran out of time. But it was so late that I didn't want to send another and so I went to bed. It was quarter to 12 and Meagan and Sarah weren't even back yet! We left the light on, and dozed until they got back. Quarter to one. They were at the Eiffel Tower. Then we [thankfully] went to bed.
