bonjour de paris

after a few language barrier problems and lack of communication devices we arrived safely in our apartment. i was expecting pretty bad weather, to be honest. friends who traveled here before have said they've ran into rain and cold weather. but I'm happy to say that the sun stayed out for our first day in paris. we got in around nine am local time and tried to stay up to acclimatize to the time zone, but everyone passed out for a few hours due to lack of sleep from the plane.  after a few hours of rest we hit the streets to explore the area around saint louise en i'isle. we're staying right on the river so there were a ton of boats to see. there were quite a few people down by the water eating lunch and hanging out as well. after wondering the streets for a while we ended up at the front doors of notre dame. it isn't as big as i had expected. i guess disney and quasimodo hyped this cathedral up just a tad, but it was still beautiful. we then just wondered around the streets watching street performers do their thing and food vendors cooking up all sorts of delicious meals. we ended up sitting down at the place called sain sev'. food there was delicious and i'm thankful that the serving weren't nearly as big as the ones in america. i started the meal with some escargot, followed by steak, and topped of with some creme brûlée! after dinner we just wondered back home. i knew that one of the love locks bridge in paris had collapsed due to the weight of the locks so i wasn't keeping my eye out for it. surprisingly enough, we stumbled across one on the way home. i can now see why a bridge could crumble under the weight of some locks. there were a ton! a few areas in the bridge were also covered with sheets of wood - where i assume the weight of the locks has caused it to fall. anyway, that was the last stop of the day before we went back home. now it's one in the morning local time and this girl is peacing out. 

xx