Europe Trip: day 5-7

I have been in Europe for a week. This is my own life and I can hardly believe it. The trip continues to be incredible and I feel so grateful for everything I have had a chance to see.

Day 5 (Thursday, for those of you who are as lost in the days of the week as I am) began with a trip to Versailles. This location has always held a special place in my heart. As a child, the first address I can remember was on the street Rue de Versailles, which was a mess to try and spell as a 6 year old, but sounded really cool. (On an unrelated side note - I saw the Rue de Nicolas Flamel yesterday and had a brief Harry Potter freak out).  Of course, the primary reason to visit Versailles is to see the palace. Despite all the stories and pictures, nothing prepared me to expect how truly extravagant the palace is. There are rooms in that 'house' which took me five minutes to walk from one end to another.

After touring the palace, we had lunch and returned to Paris. I went back to the Arc de Triomphe, this time to climb to the top! This was a view worth paying for. I'm sure other look-out points were pretty cool, but at the top of the Arc, I could see the whole city spread out around me, with the Eiffel Tower close enough to get some really cool pictures.

Afterwards, we wandered into a random restaurant for dinner and ended up in an Indian restaurant. Not exactly what I intended to eat while in France, but the salad I ordered was great.

Friday was a continuation of tourist spots with Sacré-Cœur, which translates to Sacred Heart, and Notre Dame (apparently, it was a day to visit catholic churches, didn't notice this until just now). Sacré-Cœur is this incredible white building which stands on a hill looking out over the city. Unfortunately, the morning was foggy, so we couldn't see most of the city, but after visiting the church, we wandered the streets at the bottom of the hill and conducted some very successful souvenir shopping.

After lunch, we headed to the top of Notre Dame, another activity definitely worth paying for. Admittedly, the view at the top wasn't drastically different from the Arc de Triomphe. The Arc, however, is pretty solidly in the city, while Notre Dame stands on a small island in the river Seine, so it was cool to see the river down on either side of the building. The most exciting part of the climb (which was probably more than 270 steps, but I forgot to count) was getting to see the bells and the gargoyles at the top of Notre Dame.

The vast majority of today consisted of photo shoots with different models. We took the models into the little courtyard outside of the place we are staying and around the Louvre and the (of course) back toward the Eiffel Tower for more pictures there. While at the Eiffel Tower - we saw a guy proposing to his girlfriend and it was the cutest thing ever. Of course, since we are a group of photographers, anyone with their camera out snapped a few pictures and one brave soul even went and offered to take pictures for them (after he was done proposing and the girl had obviously said yes).