Paris and the Finals of the World Cup

Friday 19th October (Paris)

Started the day with a thought for Pauls Mum as it would have been her birthday. Even though they are gone these days bring back so many fond memories.

Today we decided to go to Sacre Coeur Cathedral (Sacred Heart) which is a Paris landmark, being built on a hill with wonderful views over Paris in the Montmarte area. The Metro was on strike, except for limited lines and some people believed that this is so the English cannot get across to the final! We caught one metro line, but had to change to get to where we wanted to be. Unfortunately that train never came and as we did no understand the French announcements we decided to take an alternative route so we caught another line which took us near Montmaerte. This gave us a small walk up many, many steps to Sacre Coeur. The view was well worth it, as was the Cathedral, however Paul decided that he is “cathedralled out” as we have seen so many very old, very beautiful churches in the past 3 months. Walked back to our hotel (all downhill thankfully), purchased another suitcase along the way (Euro55) and made it in time to join the bus for a group cruise and dinner on the River Seine on the Bateaux-Mouches. This was one of the most amazing experiences of our trip and is a must for anyone going to Paris. The boat is equipped with spotlights which highlight the buildings all along the Seine and there are many, many beautiful and historic buildings in the area between the Eiffel Tower and just below the Notre Dame Cathedral which is the area we visited. After this wonderful cruise, the coach took us back to the hotel. Earlier in the day we had booked to see Moulin Rouge at 11pm tonight with Di and Grant, as we could not get into the 9pm show. (If you ring for tickets you will be told there are none, so we got onto the net and purchased them from there as this has a different allocation.) We then caught a metro to Montemarte (they were no longer on strike) and walked through the very seedy part of Paris to where the Moulin Rouge is situated. An amazing show. Topless ladies but very tastefully done and much better than we expected, with not only wonderful dancing but also a ventriloquist with a cute little white dog who spoke and an acrobatic couple. We had seen a documentary in Sydney prior to leaving on our trip and knew that there were quite a few Australians in the troupe, who were all highly trained in classical ballet and who had worked very hard to be part of Moulin Rouge. The costumes were beautiful for both the men and the women. A truly memorable show! After the show, with some difficulty, we managed to get a taxi back to the hotel and fell into bed at 2:30am!

Saturday 20th October (Paris)

Today we slept in and then decided to do some more “touristy” activities so off for a walk and lunch on Champs Elysee. The atmosphere here was electric with hundreds of English and South African supports all dressed up and fired up. Many people had obviously gone to a lot of trouble with their face paint and costumes. Great lunch except that a beer cost Euro12 which is around A$20!! After lunch we went to the Eiffel Tower and queued for around an hour before going up with Grant and Di. The lift driver obviously thought he had a sense of humour as he made the lift shudder and bounce up and down in the one spot. Not funny Jan!! Di was particularly frightened. We only went to the 2nd level (there are 3) which was quite high enough as there was a further 1 hour queue to get to the next level. Back to the hotel and then off to a lovely Irish pub to have dinner and watch the final between South Africa and England. A number of our group met here and all the guys thought that the final was boring, with no tries scored and too much kicking. South Africa won and have secured the World Cup until the next one in New Zealand in 2011.

Sunday 21st October (Paris)

Our last day in Paris, so an early start and off to the Louvre to visit Mona Lisa and many other art treasures. In 2 hours we had only covered less than 1/10th of the whole Louvre collection which is massive. A stunning building with an interesting history having been a palace for many years prior to the French Revolution. Back to our hotel to pack up and meet the N.Z. tour group for a final lunch before we all go our separate ways. It was a very friendly lunch as we had got to know many of the people well over the 3 weeks of the tour, and it was sad that we were going our own ways again. (I cried!). Marty and Pete, as the tour organisers were thanked as they had done a fantastic job in organising and running the tour. We had decided rather than face the rush of Paris traffic on a Monday morning after a World Cup Final , that we would stay at the Sofitel Hotel at the airport so we caught a taxi with our 5 bags, (3 large & 2 medium carry-ons)and headed there. We had left a couple of other bags at this hotel prior to joining the tour, so these were also collected and added to our luggage! A massive re-pack then took place ready for our trip to Vienna in the morning.