Saturday, May 31, 2014

A day in Paris

Hi all - hope you had a great week!  I have been struggling a little bit.  My body doesn't seem too happy that I've been literally all over the place during the past couple of weeks, so I've been feeling not so great these days.  I've been aiming for lots of rest and lots of liquids.  Fingers crossed for a speedy recovery!

I had forgotten how gross condensed soup is.  Desperate times.

Anyway - back to my recap of my recent travels!  I took the red-eye flight from Beijing back to Singapore on a Thursday.  We landed around 6:30 am on Friday, and I went home, had a quick shower, and then went straight into the office.  The trip to China was a really productive one, but only being semi-present on emails for a few days can really put you behind!!  After a frantic day of work, I went to Stephanie's good-bye dinner, and then headed right back to the airport.  One red-eye flight later (two nights in a row of sleeping on an airplane.. ugh), I woke up in Paris!!

I had a long layover in the City of Lights, so I actually got the chance to explore the city for a day!  I took French for all four years of high school, so France, and obviously Paris, has always been very high on my list of places that I've longed to visit.  

I took the RER-B from the airport into the city, first stopping at the Notre Dame cathedral.  As soon as I climbed the stairs up from the train station out into the street - I was in love.  The sun was shining, the air was crisp and cool, and it was just all so beautiful.

The view coming out of the station

I love seeing old churches, and morning at Notre Dame was really peaceful and beautiful.  As I was leaving, I started to notice some larger groups of tourists coming in, so I was happy that I was able to spend some time here before tons of people rolled in.





I made my way from the Ile de la Cite to the Ile Saint-Louis and stopped into a cafe for a little petit dejeuner and free wi-fi.  I hadn't really had a ton of time to do a lot of research and planning before I got to Paris, so I took some time to consult Google Maps before heading back out.

Cafe au lait, chocolate croissant, and jus d'orange


I wandered through Ile de la Cite until I reached Pont Neuf.  There, I crossed the Seine and went towards the famed Louvre.

So beautiful


Oh hello!

Backside of the pyramid entrance

Lovely

Once through the Louvre, I wandered through the Tuileries Gardens, passing lots of statutes, flowers, and fountains.  I sat on a park bench for a while and just did some people-watching in the sunshine.  It was bliss.



Continuing on, I reached the Place de la Concorde.

Big ole obelisk

And in the distance, the Eiffel Tower!


I kept on walking and made it to the Champs-Elysees, where I wandered through some shops, used a luxury toilet for 2 Euros, and went to the famed Laduree for some macaroons!




I had three - chocolate, pistachio, and salted caramel!

Apparently, the Arc de Triomphe is getting some work done.  Womp.

Eventually, I made my way to the Eiffel Tower!!  I couldn't be bothered to wait in line to go up to the top (I had a plane to catch, after all), but it was still such a great sight to finally see in person!







I grabbed a ham and cheese crepe on the go, and I wandered back to find a train station back to Charles de Gaulle.  I felt pretty proud of myself that I managed to see so much stuff over just a layover, and all without really getting lost!!  Paris is such an incredibly walk-able city, and I absolutely loved it.  Of course, one day is definitely not enough time to see and eat everything there, so I definitely hope to be back again!



Wednesday, May 28, 2014

That Wall

Hey everyone!  Look at me - two posts in two days!  Just trying to catch up on everything :)

Anyway, back to my whirlwind travels in May... I got back from Ho Chi Minh just after midnight, and the next day at 4pm, I boarded a plane to Beijing.  I had to go up to China for work, and luckily, I was able to take in some of the sights as well!

We arranged to have an English speaking tour guide come and pick us up from our hotel to take us to see Tienanmen Square, the Forbidden City, and the Great Wall of China.  The Wall is one of the items on my Singapore Bucket List that I didn't think I would get a chance to cross off, so I was very excited to finally see it!!

The most immediate thing you notice when you pull up to Tienanmen is the sheer number of people.  They are absolutely everywhere!




Even some in matching outfits!

This whole complex was actually enormous.  I think it took us more than 90 minutes to simply walk from one side to the other!  Tons to look at though, so it was well worth it.







These people are all shoving into each other to take a picture of a chair.



This was carved out of one giant piece of stone.  Pretty cool huh?




After we had crossed through to the other side, we headed out of Beijing to go see the Wall!!  We were planning to come up through the Mutianyu entrance, which is a bit further outside of Beijing but supposedly less crowded.

We stopped for lunch that was obviously suited for tourists.

And then we arrived at the Mutianyu entrance!  We planned to take the cable car up and spend some time walking around before coming back down via cable car.


The Prime Minister sat in our cable car!


And then suddenly, the Wall was in sight!


We climbed up at our entrance - tower 14.

INCREDIBLE






At one of the points along the Wall (tower 19 maybe?), there were tons of celebratory drinks.  This cracked me up for some reason!

We decided that we were going to climb up to the top!

Super steep

Tower 21!  #prepareperu!


And at the bottom - there was a Subway and a Baskin Robbins haha.

I have to say that the Great Wall of China was absolutely spectacular.  I'm positive that my pictures don't do it justice.  It was really just an amazing site and incredible to see in person.  Although the Wall has undergone some restoration efforts, it is still just really crazy to think that it was all built by hand!  The sheer size of it is really just incredible.  Definitely worth the expensive Visa!!!

And of course, we couldn't leave Beijing without having some Peking duck for dinner!  I found a place using my typical trusted resources (Chowhound and Trip Advisor) and had the hotel print the name in Mandarin for us.  Even still, our taxi driver got lost and couldn't find the place!  I was actually pretty surprised at the lack of English spoken in Beijing, but I was really glad that Stephanie had told me to just call places directly and let the taxi drivers speak to the restaurant / hotel!

Quack

Condiments for Peking duck!


The next morning, we headed off to Tianjin.  In my mind, Tianjin was meant to be a bit of a smaller city with an industrial feel.  I hadn't done any proper research, but that was just what my gut told me.  Imagine my surprise when I learned that nearly 13 million people live in Tianjin!!!  Sometimes it really is hard to fathom just how massive China is.

My time in Tianjin was pretty packed with work things, but it was a lovely trip.  In general, I really liked China a lot more than I thought I would!

And then, I looked outside the airport and couldn't tell if it was raining or if it was just pollution.

Pollution.  Oh, China!