Adventures in Paris - Part 3

This is Part Three of my Paris adventure...you can read Part One here and Part Two here!

Our third day in Paris began with a visit to Musée d'Orsay, an art museum that is housed in an old train station. Funnily enough, we ran into another American student who goes to Marist and was studying in Paris while we were walking into the museum and we ended up spending half the day with her! The amount of Americans we have met here in the UK and while travelling has been kind of funny - we keep joking that the US seems to have followed us here when all we want to do is make European friends :)  Anyway, the museum was very cool - a lot different (more manageable) than the Louvre and had a ton of iconic artwork! We got to see lots of paintings from Van Gogh, Degas, and Monet.

The museum definitely had the feel of an old station - especially with the huge, ornate clock at the entrance 

The ceiling in one of the rooms was incredible

This huge clock reminded me of the Invention of Hugo Cabret 

Just a selection of the hundreds of amazing paintings 

A replica of Degas' dancer statue 

After the museum we walked along the River Seine to Notre Dame Cathedral. It was a beautiful day and the square was bustling with activity - there were people who would give you birdseed that the pigeons would eat out of your hands and artists offering to do charcoal caricatures of you (both of which you can see in the picture below). 

The River Seine

Stylin' part two

Notre Dame - had to show some Nova pride even though it wasn't St. Thomas Church

Andrew feeding the birds featuring Nicole in the background getting drawn by an Italian man who said her sunglasses "made her look like a movie star"

After grabbing crepes for lunch we headed to see the famous Pont de l'Archeveche, also known as one of the "Love Lock Bridges." Couples hook a lock onto the bridge and throw the key into the Seine to symbolize unbreakable love. Recently, one side of the bridge was removed because the locks became too heavy and were causing damage to it. 

Locks as far as the eye could see

It was fun to read all of the different inscriptions on the locks - all different languages and messages

Where there weren't any locks there was graffiti...

Afterwards, we met up with a friend of one of the girls on my program, whom she had stayed with during an exchange program in high school. We got to talk to her about culture and life in France which was super cool. Where we met her was right by a huge memorial for the recent violence in Paris. We asked her about what it was like to be living in the city after the theater attacks a few months ago and it was chilling to hear her talk about what happened. We weren't too far from the site of the attacks so we walked to the area to see the memorial. There were still candles lit and fresh flowers everywhere - it was all very surreal. 

Pray for Paris

Later that night we met up with Susie's friend that she met when she studied in Paris last summer. It was really fun to meet people in Paris who were our own age and hear what it was like to be a teenager in Europe. Our lives are very different but we actually had a surprising amount in common. 

On our last day in Paris we did one final bakery run (pretty sure the lady who owned the bakery was expecting us at the same time every day at this point) before packing up and heading to the airport. Traveling to another country - especially one where I didn't know the language at all - was a huge learning experience, but I'm so lucky to have been able to do so. I can't wait to see where my travels take me next...let the planning begin!