Well, today I’m off to the Louvre museum for most of the day and then I’ll be heading out of Paris. Prices on the Eurostar trains for today still look high, so I think I’ll head to Sweden to meet up with Tony. It’s a quite long train ride – 26 hours, but it’s free travel with my Eurail pass, and it’ll give me some time to relax while on the train – sounds fine to me! I haven’t really had a “down” day since I started traveling yet.
Hopefully it all works out! I’ll try and update again later.
I wandered around a bunch today, and it got rather cold and snowed for quite a while (lightly) – I’ve seen the Eiffel tower now from all over, but haven’t gone up it, visibility’s really poor and it’s just cold! I think I’ll save that for when I’m back in the warmer months sometime 
Paris is definitely a fun town to walk around in, it’s all very inviting and (fairly) easy to navigate. The metro system’s great when you need to get somewhere quick, supposedly in Paris you’re never more than 500 yards from a metro stop – not bad! Managing not to walk right between all of them when you’re looking for one may be another story though!
Tomorrow I hope to go to the Louvre museum, since I got there as it closed yesterday (they still let you walk around the common areas and gift shops), and today most of the museums are closed for the holiday. I think I’ll let that be the end of my Paris experience, and then hopefully make it over to London.
I didn’t quite realize that the Eurostar train wasn’t like an extended metro train.. and it’s actually quite expensive (ouch) – rides out tonight (e.g. two hours from now) would be about $150.. and for tomorrow, well, a whole lot more than that.. I’m *hoping* that a last minute booking for tomorrow will be similar to if I were to book tonight. But it’s a bit of a gamble, although it really wouldn’t be that fun to be rushed and hop on a train in two hours (saving the cost, but adding to the stress, and loosing the cost of my hotel for tonight). There’s supposedly a discount of Eurail pass holders as well, but you can’t determine that or book it online, I’ll have to do it in person or via phone (and their phones are closed today!)
If it ends up being really expensive – I have a few options, I could get an obscure flight on Sunday for about $150 that goes though.. Denmark, or, if I can get ahold of him, visit an stay with my friend Tony in Sweden for a few days (with my Eurail pass, I could travel there for free) and from there either book a Eurostar train to London, or a flight to London or Edinburgh (since I’d have burned some of my time up)
Well, I guess we’ll see what happens, hopefully it doesn’t end up being too stressful or expensive! (Planning more would have been helpful, it turns out!)
I’m off to the Tropcadéro (or thereabouts) to watch the fireworks from the Eiffel Tower, which they normally don’t do, but this year they are for the 120th anniversary of the tower – perfect!
Happy New Years everybody!
I’m in Paris now, and indeed do have a room at Grand Hôtel Lévêque on Rue Cler – it’s excellent! I’m glad I got a room here, it’s very close to everything as far as I can tell, and it seems to be a very popular part of town (lots of restaurants and cafés open late and such.)
The train ride over was great as well, it was my first time on a TGV, and they are seriously fast. Traveling at 160+MPH is quite the thing to do. I hope we can have trains like that in the U.S. sometime in the future! Quite a step up from the Talgo I took from BCN to Montpellier, and even the Teoz’ that I’ve ridden on elsewhere.
More pictures and updates tomorrow, for now I’ve had a great dinner and I’m ready for bed so I can wake up early and continue enjoying Paris tomorrow! Au revoir!
Hotel to Eiffel Tower
I’ve been in Marseille now for two days, and I’ll be heading off to Paris this afternoon/evening – Paris should be a real blast, especially for bringing in the New Year!
I’ve put in a request for a room at Grand Hôtel Lévêque, which is located right off of the historic Rue Cler – it’s another that comes highly recommended by Rick Steves’ books and travelers all around. Hopefully I get a room there – their website indicated “limited” availability up until the 1st, so we’ll see.
Hostels have been horribly booked for all the cities I’ve been in so far, mostly 1-2 weeks in advance. But I’ve been finding inexpensive hotels that have been working out just fine (I don’t really want to spend too much on lodging, since all I do is sleep there, it’d seem silly to.)
Well, I’ve got a bit more of Marseille to see (and more to eat!) and then I’ll be off to Paris on a TGV train, at an average of 160mph – I’m looking forward to that!
Au revoir!
Marseille Coast - Look at that water!
I’ve added a link to the map for Marseille photos too – it’s at the bottom of the page under the “Links” section – I haven’t uploaded many photos yet, though – but enjoy anyways!