DAY 2 FIRST SOLO TRAVEL PARIS JOURNAL

After sleeping more or less well the night before, I think in this trip I didn't sleep so well because I was so excited but also scared of sleeping alone in an unknown place without nobody I knew near me that could help me if I happened to need it. I'm not a great sleeper anyways, but still, I got up, made my nespresso coffee, ate my boring cereal, I got my camera ready and I went out to face my first solo metro experience. Obviously, Sebastian explained to me about ten times how should I catch the metro to go where I wanted to go and it was a great success! You only have to get the logic of the Parisian metro, which is easy to use, and has signs that are easy to see and large enough for those of us that cannot see too well, it's is wonderful, it is simply wonderful how user-friendly it was for me. Besides, I bought my card to use those days, I took some small card photos of myself from Bogota, they ask you a pair of pictures for the card, and it was easy to talk in French to the senior person in the booth who made all the process for the transport card, voilà. You don't need to have this card to use the metro, I just didn't want a bunch of tickets for the metro. 

Carousel del´ Hotel de Ville, Paris

I went to the Orange store and I got the internet for my cell phone, French helped me again; I studied French for a year and for us Spanish speakers is way too much easier to learn it. On the way back I walked to the studio down Rue Rivoli and I found this gorgeous carousel on the place de l'Hôtel de Ville, oh, my God, what a wonderful place, it was an amazing sunny morning and everything looked perfect. When I was getting to the studio I entered a marché and I bought a lot of water, some soda, a President brand Camembert cheese, ham, and after that I went to a boulangerie to buy a baguette, there are two kinds of baguettes in France: classique and tradition, I don't see too much the difference. Don't be afraid of entering a boulangerie to buy something, I can assure you that with a basic French class everything is possible. I had lunch at the studio with Camembert, ham and baguette, I actually had that for lunch several days because it is the most French, simple and delicious thing ever.

Cherry Blossoms in the Eiffel Tower

Afterwards I went to the Eiffel Tower because there were some of the first blooming cherry blossoms in spring in Paris, so I was afraid I wouldn't find them afterwards. In Paris not all cherry blossoms bloom at the same time: the ones at the Eiffel Tower and the Palais Royal bloom in the middle or the end of March and I went on the beginning of April. To arrive there I had to change lines on the metro which was long but easy to do if you follow all instructions. With Google Maps it is really easy to use the Paris Metro, you just enter the destination you want to go and the app tells you how to get there by metro, which train to catch, which entrance to use and it even shows you how to walk to the station. It is amazing!

The Eiffel Tower with the cherry blossoms was a magical thing, the sun was shining, the skies were blue, the Trocadero fountains were on and there were cherry blossoms framing the Tower, people were laying under the cherry trees enjoying the day. These were not the cherry blossoms I was looking for, I was looking for the ones at Champ de Mars, but my photographer's heart was happy with the ones I found. The ones at Champ de Mars were impossible for me to find, I walked a lot along that huge place and I couldn't find them. A bit frustrated, I went to this famous Cafe I had read about, Cafe Constant, I just wanted to have a cup of coffee and rest, I didn't see anything peculiar with it, I entered and I thought it was more like a restaurant than a cafe, so I sat in one of the few outside chairs, and I didn't order coffee, just a tea and dessert, floating islands, everything was served in a fancy way, and, OMG that dessert was heavenly, the most delicious Floating Islands I have ever eaten, and the tea was exquisite as well. I stayed there for a while resting, thinking, seeing people go by, thanking all the good things received. I think the food there is pretty good, I definitely have to go back there to have some dinner.

I walked along Rue St. Dominique trying to find a view of the Eiffel Tower until finally I did but at that time the tower is backlit by the sun there so it's best to go early for better photos. I stopped at a boulangerie and bought croissants for breakfast and tartines for dinner. Getting to the metro station I found this classic Parisian bicycle. When I was back home I finally was very hungry and I couldn't even leave a single croissant for breakfast.

All picture by Caroline Mint