Sunday afternoon- 24 Jun - Rain and the Eiffel Tower

We realized that to continue our adventure we wanted the book that Margie brought about Paris, so after riding the Batobus once all the way around we got off the boat at the Quay de Montabello at Notre Dame and walked back to our very nice apartment via the cheese shop where Margie and I picked up 4 different kinds of cheeses and Maureen bought walnut bread which it turns out she is allergic to. (?) During and after lunch, of Chicken breast, roast veggies and salad and cheeses  (just the veggies for me), it started to really rain, buckets of water dumping down out of the sky. We chatted, warm and cozy inside, about what to do and where to go.
The Batobus has eight stops around Paris. Closest to us was the (1) Hotel de Ville stop by the Pont D'Arcole, (2) The Louvre stop between the Pont Royal and the Pont du Carousel, (3) the Champs-Elyesee stop close to Pont Alexandre III, (4) the Eiffel Tower at the Port de la Bourdonnais, (5) the Museum Dorsay at the Quai de Solferino,

(6) St-Germaine-de-Pres at the Quais Malaquais, (7) Notre Dame at the Quay de Montebello and (8) the Jardin des Plantes close to Pont d'Austerlitz. We wanted to use the Batobus pass as much as we could for the time that we had it, 4 days. We had reservations that evening at the Eiffel Tower for dinner so knew we had to be there for 8. that left us with some time to fill.

At around three the rain had let up and I thought to myself 'I am in paris and I want to see more than the inside of this lovely apartment.' So announced that I was going out to the park by the Eiffel Tower to see and wander around this world famous place and I would meet them at the Eiffel tower. Margie said that she would come too but Maureen was more hesitant. It was still raining out a little. (Interesting reaction coming form the one who loves the coast)

We all headed off at 4:30 to the Batobus stop at the Hotel-de-Ville. On the way there it started to rain again and by the time we were in line to get on, there was a sizable line. The next boat came and it was full and no one got off and so no one got on. The attendant said 'what with the rain, no one wanted to get off the boat at this stop so it might be a good idea to walk down to the Louvre stop as more people might get off and give us a better chance of getting on. It did not just rain-it was a downpour! A really soaking rain!

We considered for a moment and headed off, up the ramp to the street by the Hotel de ville? and it started to pour. I laughed out loud like a mad woman at the craziness of it all. We thought maybe we could go inside the Hotel-de-Ville but we could not find a way in. We did find a largish church, St Germaine, on a quiet square which we took succor in, looking like drowned rats.

The Church, which I found out later  from Wikipedia, was founded in the 7th century and was rebuilt many times during the centuries following, which was why there were several styles to seen in the church itself. Roman, Gothic and Renaissance. The Most striking feature is supposed to be the porch but I do not know if we saw this as we were blinded by the rain. It was coming down in sheets and buckets and and whole houses full.
We entered the church as quietly as three drowned rats could, taking off our rain coats and ponchos and umbrellas and leaving them by the door.

It had beautiful stained glass windows of a very different style and several very nice statues of considerable age. A  wooden statue of Saint Germain and a stone statue of Saint Vincent which we saw but at the time did not know how old they were.  I found out later they were done in the 15th century. there were no pews in this church, only little wooden stools. how cute. This was a really beautiful church and we never would have even gone into it if we weren't looking for shelter from the rain.

It seems that during the Wars of Religion, the church bell which is called "Marie" sounded on the night of 23 August 1572, which marked the beginning of the St Bartholomew's Day Massacre. Thousands of Huguenots, who were visiting the city for a royal wedding, were killed by the paris mobs. Those Mobs what can you do?

 The church was a very cool old church tucked into a little street somewhere around the hotel-de-Ville?  the 'Place du Louvre' I found out later, and we stayed there for a while until the downpour subsided.  We all then wandered up to Rivoli so I could find a bank machine. On the way we saw a small square with lots of people and entertainment, some kind of fundraiser or celebration of something.

We went up to find out what was going on. At this point Maureen decided not to go on but would meet us at the tower for dinner.  Margie and I stayed to watch the dancing  for a bit and then moved on. I did not find a bank machine on Rivoli that I could use so Margie and I wandered back down to the river past some very pretty little parks one with a with large tower in the middle and one with a sphinx fountain.

We went past an entrance to the louvre but did not go in as our paris pass for the louvre did not start until tuesday. It was raining off and on but only a little sprinkle comparatively speaking. We went into a restaurant to have a cup of tea and get our bearings again. Lots of the streets in paris are the same to us tourists. Three or four story buildings with narrow streets and no sign of any identifiable landmark.

We went down to the river walk to get to the batobus stop by the Louvre. but the river walk was blocked by a barrier  right by a tunnel. There are lots of tunnels along the river so we thought that we would go through the tunnel out of the rain  and wind up at the batobus stop by the louvre in no time as  it was not that far. it was a one way tunnel with the traffic coming toward us as we walked on the narrow sidewalk inside.and seemed to go on for quite awhile. Seemed like a mile!

We knew something was wrong when the tunnel did not end. We Saw an emergency exit and I thought I would just pop up to see where we were, but when I opened the door there was first of all a most horricfic smell emanating from the space and then I saw an old mattress and some clothes laying around in the small space at the bottom of the stairway going up. Yes, very scary! I was afraid we were going to meet the homeless french person that lived there. Not sure how he could have stood the smell though.

Needless to say I exited rather quickly and Margie thought that we should just go back but I thought that the end of the tunnel must be coming up soon so we continued on for about another 30 meters to the next emergency exit.

I entered this one a little more gingerly than the last. It was seemingly unoccupied but when I went through the inner door there was bedding and clothing there too at the base of the stirs going up. Now we know where some of the homeless stay in paris.

We retreated back down the tunnel and out into the rain . We climbed the barrier on the river walk and made our way over some rough sidewalk where they were re-bricking the path but it was still passable. Made it to the louvre batobus stop where we caught the next  water bus to the Eiffel tower stop. It had almost stopped raining but not quite.

 The tower was shrouded in clouds and looked very mysterious when we arrived at 715. As we got closer the clouds thinned and we could see it all. The crowds were not so bad due to the rain. We went looking for the booth to get our passes for dinner. One place sent us to another. It took us over twenty minutes to find the place right out in the open. A small booth with two young girls inside. I met my first rude person here too-asking where to get the tickets at a little kiosk the guy did not even answer me just pointed at a sign with prices.

 The two young girls working the booth were I believe my first rude Pariesiennes. Well, if not rude then just only barely helpful in a not very nice way. They seemed more interested in talking to each other than in helping us. We finally did come to understand that we had to come back at 8, the appointed time, and not to be late and we would be escorted to the elevator to go up to the restaurant.  They crossed our names off of the list.

By this time there wasn't time to go to the gardens and we both had to use the washrooms which we found without too much difficulty (good thing) and the lines were not too bad (good thing). Went and looked at a few souvenir places around the base of the ET and then got in line and waited for Maureen. We had already gotten our passes and were in line moving up to be escorted to the elevator when Maureen showed up. We went right to the front of the line and with only a very short wait to get onto the elevator we were on our way up. 

Even the first level where the restaurant is, is very high. We followed a few others around to find the restaurant and we finally did. We had a moment so we went into the gift shop and picked up a few things. At the Restaurant we were escorted to a table that did not have a view but that is because we had not booked our meal previously on line when we initially booked our reservation? Could be but I am not quite sure. I had tried to book the meal and after quite a few tries just made a reservation. Maybe it had to do with not letting the credit card company know I was booking a trip.

How does one know these things unless one is told? It did not say anything on the website about that  and the vegetarian menu was one item, boiled vegetables in butter, roasted slightly with cheese.  Seriously? Really? Paris, the world famous Eiffel Tower and they gave me boiled vegetables with cheese  and no view for 90 Euros. Not even a single mushroom.  C'est la vie! Yes, next time we will go up for the view and eat at another place.

I was glad that Maureen and Margie enjoyed their chicken dinners. The wine was good and was my consolation prize. That and the fact that Uncle Ron had given me money for a night out for all of us and so he had actually paid for the Eiffel Tower experience.  After dinner Margie and I went up to the next level. Maureen stayed on the restaurant level as that was high enough for her. 

We thought the elevator was only going down so we started to walk up the 10 flights of stairs and about half way up realized that they elevator was working and that we could have rode up. Oh well.  It had stopped raining and was just nice out not too cool and not to warm.

On the hour the Eiffel Tower lights up for about 10 minutes with a million sparkly lights. We were already being blinded by the very bright spotlights and then the sparkly lights came on. It was really quite surreal and fun.

While going up the stairs the elevator happened to come down and on the bottom was a person sitting below the elevator?  No this can't be true! It wasn't, it was a dummy that they have set up to look like he was operating the elevator. Very funny I chuckled at my naivete for at least three floors.

I have to admit that I am not in as good of shape as I should be and so had to slow down quite a bit and occasionally stop to take pictures on the way up. We got a lot of pictures and did reach the next level and went to the top of that level! Exhilarating! The next time we come to Paris we are going to the Tower early to see it in the daytime and we are going to take the elevator all the way to the top. No more stairs for us. It nearly killed me-had to stop quite often. but it was with a feeling of great accomplishment that I made it> I was ready to quit a few times and Dennie encouraged me.

The city spread out below us was very cool. There were boats on the river with very bright spotlights lighting up the river. There were fireworks off in the distance past the Notre Dame Cathedral. The Ferris wheel by the Louvre was all lit up. It was all so Cool! the little carousel at the base of the ET was very bright too. We could see little lights flashing in the park and I said smile as those are people taking pictures of us from the park. It had stopped raining while we were having dinner and so was quite nice out with a fairly good view of the city.

We went back down and met Maureen and went into the gift shop again and picked up a few more things. Taking the elevator down it was crowded. There were actually lots of people around at the bottom. There was a soccer game just over and there were some very happy young men carousing around the base of the ET in celebration of their teams victory.
We took lots of photos of the tower from the ground with its lights on. It looked great  from the outside at night having something to compare it to as we had seen it from the inside. We caught a cab back to our apartment and chatted and laughed about the days events. A long day but a great one with lots of adventures both fun and a few a little scary.
We have to be up early for Mont st michele so set our alarms and went to sleep.