Traveling for a Month Part One- Dublin and Paris

So I started my month of traveling off with a bus ride to Dublin at 7am.  The goal of this trip to Dublin was to visit places I had not been to before, and I was successful!  We spent some time wandering around the city the first day, and visited Trinity College to see the Book of Kells.  After seeing the St. John's Bible (another illuminated Bible which was commissioned by St. John's University) on multiple occasions, some of the glory was lost on me, but it was still interesting to know that it was from the 15th century.  When visiting the Book of Kells, you are also able to go up into the old college library and they still have shelves and shelves of old books up there.  We decided to call it an early night and relax to get an early start the next morning.

The next morning, we decided to do the "Hop on, Hop off" bus tour which has a set route that you can get on and off at any of their 21 odd stops.  The first stop of the day was Kilmainham Gaol, which is an old jail you can tour.  It was very interesting and I had a great tour guide!

I got put in a cell, luckily they didn't lock it

After that, we went to the Dublin Zoo, which was interesting because we got to see some familiar animals they have at the Minnesota Zoo, as well as some that I don't get the chance to see often.  The Minnesota Zoo is obviously better, but they do have a permanent Africa exhibit at the Dublin Zoo and the giraffe came right up and tried to lick us.

We were going to visit some crypts under an old church, but when we got there, we realized that the church was in fact closed.  To make the situation better, we walked a few blocks to the oldest pub in Ireland, The Brazen Head.  After our mid afternoon snack,  we walked to St. Patrick's Cathedral.  Inside, we got to look at all of the stained glass windows as well as the artwork.  There was a rehearsal for an orchestra concert going on as well which was grand to hear.

We took a 6am flight the next day to Paris.  The flight brought us about an hour and a half outside the city.  They had buses running from the airport to city center.  Once we got to city center, we attempted our first trip on the metro and passed with flying colors (thanks Ms. Jurewicz for imparting your knowledge 4 years ago, some of it stuck at least!).

I got to meet up with two of my good friends from high school who are studying abroad in Paris for lunch and they took us a great restaurant.  I was so happy to see them and get some inside knowledge about Paris.  We took our second trip on the metro to get to Sacré Coeur, a cathedral on a hill overlooking the city.  After we walked around the church, we wandered into the neighborhood behind it and found the artist quarter, which I had remembered visiting on my previous trip to Paris.  It was fun to be able to walk around and look at the art which had not been out the last time I was there.

On our way home, we stopped by the Arc de Triomphe and had dinner on Champs-Elysses, with a stop at the famous Ladurée for macaroons.

The next day we got up and went to the Eiffel Tower.  We decided to climb up to the viewing platform on the second level and then took an elevator all the way to the top.  This gave us some amazing views of the city.  After this we got some ice cream and walked around the adjacent park.  Then we made our way to Les Invalides which houses monuments and museums and Napoleon's grave.  It is all centered around the military, which got a little repetitive towards the end, but was still very interesting.  That night, we took a night cruise by boat on the River Seine and got to see the Eiffel Tower lit up at night.

The next day, we went to Versailles and walked around the Palace.  I was glad to be back even though I had been there once before.  We met up with one of my friends later that night for ice cream and just sat on a Pedestrian Bridge and people watched for a few hours with her.

The next day we headed off on our next adventure...more to come...