Europe Trip (4): Paris City Centre: Louvre and Opera Garnier

Date: Tuesday, 2 June 2009
Location: Paris, France

- Palais du Louvre
- Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel
- Jardin du Carrousel
- Rue de Rivoli
- Palais Royal and Jardin du Palais Royal
- Opera National de Paris Garnier

We bought some ice creams at the end of the Pont des Arts bridge before entering the Louvre via its Sully wing. Since it was a Tuesday, the Louvre museum was closed for the day, so there’s not much people traffic there, allowing us to enjoy taking the photographs near the Louvre pyramid and the Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel.

We then met mbak Enik near Louvre, and we proceeded to have lunch at McDonald's which is located along Rue de Rivoli, one of the most famous roads in Paris, not far from Louvre. After lunch, my wife, my mother and mbak Enik then visited a duty free shop around the area, while I took Irza and Inka for sightseeing around the area. We walked past Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel monument towards the Jardin du Carrousel garden behind it. After taking pictures in front of the Joan of Arc statue at Places des Pyramides, we then walked north towards Avenue de l'Opera.

Our next walking destination was the Palais Royal and the garden, Jardin du Palais Royal. Passing through the garden until the end, we exited Palais Royal complex through its back entrance and walked along Rue de Petit Champs, located around Paris' 1st arrondissement to go towards Avenue de l'Opera again. Our next destination was the famous Opera National de Paris Garnier building. By that time, we have walked several kilometers and myself and the kids were also very tired, so we decided to take the public bus back to Rue de Rivoli to meet my wife and my mother.

That was the first time we took public bus in Paris. :) Since we haven't purchased our carnet of t+ tickets yet (will share about the advantage of buying the carnet of t+ tickets later), we purchased the tickets on board of the bus from the bus driver, and pay in cash. The ticket purchased from the bus driver can only be used on the bus itself and doesn't allow transfer to other mode of transportation (e.g. the metro train).

Europe Trip (3): Paris City Centre: Île de la Cité and Around

Date: Tuesday, 2 June 2009
Location: Paris, France

- a Kide's residence at Châtenay-Malabry
- Robinson RER station
- Notre Dame de Paris cathedral
- Pont d'Arcole: Hotel de Ville
- Pont Notre Dame: Hotel Dieu, Tribunal de Commerce
- Conciergerie, Palais de Justice, Sainte-Chapelle
- Saint Michel junction
- Pont Neuf
- Institute de France and Pont des Arts

On Tuesday morning, 2 June 2009, a Kide dropped us off at the nearest RER station around Châtenay-Malabry, Robinson (pronounced: ro-bang-song). Our first destination for the day is the centre of the Paris: the Île de la Cité island and its most famous attraction: Notre-Dame cathedral. Since we enter the Robinson station from the side entrance, we had to use the automated machine to buy the tickets for the RER train, using Euro coins since the machine doesn’t accept notes. Luckily, we had enough coins. Only couple of later then we found out that at the main entrance, there’s a ticket counter where we can buy tickets using notes. :P

RER trains charge by zones, so we had to check on which zones the starting and destination station are located, to ensure that we purchase the correct tickets according to the number of zones travelled. We can either buy single-trip (one-way) tickets, return tickets or a carnet of 10 tickets (with discounted price) which can be shared by different passengers. If you’re not sure, you can just go to the ticket counter and inform the staff your destination station, and the staff will advise you on the price.

The Robinson station is on a branch’s end of RER line B, so we took the train towards the city and we alighted at St. Michel – Notre Dame station, the RER station closest to the Île de la Cité island. It was the first time we used public transportation in Paris, and we enjoyed it very much. The RER trains are similar to Kuala Lumpur's KTM Komuter trains, slightly bigger than Singapore’s MRT trains and it’s quite convenient, provided it’s not too crowded.

From St. Michel – Notre Dame station, we crossed the bridge across Seine river to Île de la Cité and walked towards Notre Dame cathedral. We took our time taking pictures in front of the cathedral, near the statue of Charlemagne and at Point Zero, the “real” centre of Paris where distances to other locations in Paris (and perhaps France?) is measured. From there, we proceeded with our walking tour around the island, covering Pont d’Arcole and Hotel de Ville across the Seine river, Hotel Dieu, Pont Notre Dame overlooking the Tribunal de Commerce building, Place du Chatelet and the gloomy Conciergerie building, before reaching the Palais de Justice and Sainte Chapelle buildings.

After taking some rest in front of Palais de Justice building, we then left the island by crossing the Pont St Michel bridge, and walked along the Seine river towards Pont Neuf. After taking some pictures and having another rest in front of Institut de France building, we then crossed the Pont des Arts bridge and walked towards Louvre.

Europe Trip (2): Châtenay-Malabry, Eiffel Tower, Seine River Tour

On Monday, 1 June 2009, which was our first full-day in Paris, still recovering from jet-lag, we took our time in the morning to walk through A Kide's residence at Châtenay-Malabry.

Late morning, we had A Kide's driver, om Join, to take us to the most popular tourist attraction in Paris: the Eiffel tower. We needed to queue for about 1.5 hours to buy the tickets before we can climb the tower. We bought the tickets which can bring us up to the top floor. The price is €13 for adult, and €7.50 for child.

Note that they only sell tickets to walk-in customers, and the tickets can only be used on the same day they are purchased. I checked their website that found out that they are planning to provide online reservation services for all visitors, but that would only be available end of this year.

We took the lift directly to the second floor, skipping the first floor. We immediately circling the area and take pictures to all the different directions. One of our favourite directions for viewing from the Eiffel tower is the north-west view, towards Pont d'Iena bridge and Palais de Chaillot at Trocadero, with the tall buildings of Paris' business district, La Defense (pronounced "la difong") in the background.

Another of our favourite direction is the south-east, which will give the view towards the Champ-de-Mars park and Ecole Militaire building, with the ugly Montparnasse Tower in the background. South-west direction will give the view towards the Seine river, with RER train tracks crossing across the river, while north-east direction will give the view towards the north area of Paris, with the Taj-Mahal-alike building of Basilica Sacre-Couer visible on top of the Montmartre hill.

We then took the lift up to the top (third) floor, and the view is even more amazing from higher level. It's also a bit windy up there, so we decided not to spend too much time there and went back to second floor. After had some snacks on the second floor, we descended back to the ground floor, in time to see some kind of procession parade passing through the road just in front of the tower.

We then further descended to the riverside under the Pont d'Iena bridge, for us to take the Bateaux Parisiens boat cruise tour along the Seine river. This includes automated commentary through headsets which are available on each seat. The price is quite cheap, €11 for adult and €5 for child.

We purchased the tickets and boarded the boat from pier number 3 along the number of piers just in front of Eiffel tower. The boat took us to the east direction from Eiffel tower all the way to the islands of Ile de la Cite and Ile Saint-Louis and back, passing under many bridges along the way: Pont de l'Alma, Pont Alexandre III and Pont Neuf, among others.

Unfortunately, the boat is not air-conditioned and with most of the boat's structure made of glass, it was becoming so hot in the afternoon. When we disembarked from the boat, we felt very tired, and with the jet-lag still taking effect (it was already night time in Singapore at that time even though it was still evening local Paris time), we decided to end our adventure for the day, and went back home to a Kide's residence.

Europe Trip (1): From Singapore to Paris via Dubai

Inka and Irza have came back from their mid-year holiday in Paris and surrounding regions, together with their father (that’s me), their mother and their grandmother (that’s my mother).

We initially wanted to take the Singapore Airlines’ direct flight to Paris, especially since the return flight would be using the new Airbus A380 plane and the price was also quite cheap at that time. Unfortunately, it took quite some time for our Schengen visa to be approved, so by the time the visa is approved, the price has went up considerably and we had to find another option. We didn’t want to buy/issue the tickets first before our visa was approved. Luckily Emirates started to launch their promotions, and they offered the Singapore-Paris ticket (return trip, via Dubai) for only S$785 (adult) and S$618 (child), inclusive of all the surcharges and taxes. We immediately bought the tickets without hesitation.

We left Singapore on Sunday, 31 May 2009, in the morning. At Changi airport, we met Han Yu, Irza’s school-mate who happened to be our neighbour on the same block, and his family, who were going for holiday in Hong Kong. Emirates services are great, almost comparable to Singapore Airlines’ services. There’s TV set on every seat, with on-demand movies, TV, radio, and most importantly, games to keep the kids occupied.

We arrived at Dubai International Airport in the afternoon, and we disembarked into Terminal 3, a new terminal built and used exclusively for Emirates. Since we needed to change planes, we had to go through security checks before going to the departure/transit area. The queue during the security checks was quite long. Our boarding pass for the Dubai-Paris leg had been issued while checking-in in Singapore, so we didn’t have to go through the transit check-in counters and proceeded directly to the departure gate.

We arrived at Charles de Gaulle (CDG) airport in Paris, France, at around 8pm local time. We expected that it would already be dark while we reached Paris, but to our surprise, the sun was still shining at 8pm in Paris during summer. That day was the longest day we’ve experienced, since Paris is 6 hours behind Singapore time at that time. We enjoyed sunshine for about 20.5 hours, from 7am Singapore time until around 9:30pm Paris time (or 4:30am Singapore time, the next day).

The Emirates flight arrived at Terminal 2C of the airport. The terminal itself is quite small, but it’s actually part of a larger Terminal 2, which consists of Terminal 2A, 2B, 2C, 2D, 2E, 2F and a separated 2G. Going through immigration is a breeze, we didn’t have to fill in any immigration forms. The immigration officer just checked our Schengen visa, and stamp the passports. No questions asked. :) After passing through customs, we were greeted by my cousin, a Kide, who was our host in Paris during the 2-week holiday. He drove us to his residence in Châtenay-Malabry, a nice and quiet neighbourhood south of Paris. At his residence, a Kide and mbak Enik hosted a very nice dinner for us.