Paris! So much to say but my head still hurts from the lack of sleep. I’ve only been getting about 4 hours sleep/night since I’ve been back. I have no idea what is wrong with me. I’d like some valium. Please?
I’ll post pics up in any case. Text to come.
YARLY!
I spotted this magazine at the newsagent leaving Barcelona. Years ago I got together with a few mates to pitch a new magazine to be titled “BIONIC” to a few publishers, we almost signed a deal. Here’s the mock cover I did for our Bionic Magazine.
The street we were staying on leads directly to the Moulin Roughe/Red Light District.
Paris also offers a bike sharing system called Vélib’ with more than 20,000 public bicycles distributed at 1,450 parking stations
First thing we did was hit a local Patisserie.
Then we hit the booze! Bordeux oooh yeah!
The apartment was aesthetically the best of the 3, it even had a grand piano (!) but it was rather hot and noisy.
Jamie and Richie get some chillax time in.
City plans for more car free roads.
Ah quiet streets, a breath of fresh air after the insanity that was Barcelona.
The Moulin Rouge. The red light district in Paris was so tame coming from Barcelona. We got to see a show, with dinner and it was mad fun, so cheesey, but so fun.
Mum went wild shopping in Galeries Lafayette.
Trains are so so so easy to catch in Paris, we were on the trains every day.
The Arc de Triomphe circuit was still fresh in my head from this years Tour de France Paris stage. Suga and I did the huge walk down the Champs-Élysées from the Arc to the Louvre.
Mum going ape at Chanel on the Champs-Élysées.
Toyota had a showroom on the Champs-Élysées. This is the solar panel roof on the new Prius.
A concept car.
And another.
Renault also had a showroom, this thing was super tasty.
So was this!
New Clio had really nice race seats but they were mounted so damn high, such a shame they can’t get it right.
One of many bridges over the Seine river.
Another one! This one was at the Place de la Concorde.
Place de la Concorde.
Fountain detail.
Fountain detail.
Almost at the Louvre.
The Louvre. The modern pyramid stands out like dogs balls in real life.
Peugeots. Motorized and not.
This one night we gave in to Sushi as it’s all over Paris, in fact it was nearly impossible to find French food!
Wasted on many rounds of Sake I spotted this poster, the date was the day after and it was in our suburb! Fuck me I was psyched to watch some UCI DH action!!!
In the morning we headed up to the Sacré-Cœur Basilica which is pictured in the background of the Mountain Bike poster.
Yes I had found the bikes, right at the base of the church too but hey, these aren’t DH bikes?!
We took a great position at a cafe and yup, it wasn’t DH, instead it was XC and the DH is to be held next year (talk about false advertising!!!).
The XC was run like a time triel with a rider setting off every minute, this made for damn boring viewing. Shame as the location was so amazing.
Yawn. Where the downhill at?!
We walked around and found the tricky start which was down a set of stairs.
There was a Dali exhibit here too, but it was nowhere near as good as the one in Barcelona.
Art Nouveau style train station entrances were great.
Awesome huh?
On the boat!
The river cruise was well worth it, so beautiful. If you ever go to Paris, do it and do it at sunset.
The tower.
For a minute every hour at night the tower goes into a crazy razzle dazzle light show.
The next day we entered the Louvre. This is the massive crowd around the Mona Lisa.
In true mosh pit style Suga and I got to the front and even then we weren’t close enough to it.
We had lucn at Phillipe Starck’s bar, it wasn’t that impressive by day.
The Sainte Chapelle was mighty impressive.
But the Notre-Dame was the most impressive in my opinion. Despite having a museum card, which lets you avoid the queue we still had to line up for 1.5hours to get in. And once you get in you understand why. It’s 387 steps to the top and the steps spiral up in a very very tight stairway which even for me felt a little claustrophobic. Coming down the steps was somehow even worse.
Gargoyle on the 1st level.
Little door into the bell tower.
The wooden bell tower was awesome. You just imagined the hunchback swinging around in here.
Massive bell.
The stairway up.
387 steps. You can see how small the steps are and how tight it is in there.
Up the top, people in the queues below look like ants.
Ah Paris.
Mum treated us all to dinner at the Eiffel Tower which we booked months ago (it’s booked out for 3 months in advance). We all got pimped up, was strange to do so as we’d been wearing thongs and T’s for the whole trip so far.
I thought it was going to be a dark green for some reason.
We jumped the queue and headed straight for a special lift which only goes to the restaurant.
Super pimp carbon fibre chairs designed by Pininfarina (the company behind many beautiful cars such as Ferrari, Maserati, Rolls-Royce, Cadillac, Jaguar, Volvo, Alfa Romeo, and Lancia)!
I’ll take one, please?
I had the frogs legs for entree, so pretty and tasted great!
Jamie and Richie got the steaks, which were awesome.
Check the chips that came with the steaks.
My veal was yum.
Christina’s pigeon was the best pigeon I’ve tasted.
Dessert.
$847 EUROS! Heart attack material! The meal was damn awesome though, so much more than we had expected (especially considering that our very own Centrepoint Tower restaurant serves up shit on a plate and rapes you wallet too).
When we got down to the bottom it was night and the tower was lit up.
The next day we took a long train trip out of the city to the Palace of Versailles. It was super hot that day and the crowd got the better of me, killer wasps trying to get up my shorts were annoying too. I had a crap time and wished I was back spending more time at the Louvre instead. Still, it was an impressive palace with an even more impressive garden.
Spotted.
We also went to the Paris Erotic Museum which was a lot better than the tiny one in Barcelona. These are photos of Jean-Pierre Ceytaire’s great work.
Pnau stole more than Miles Davis’ riffs, they also stole this album cover art.
Pocket bikes race off the lights outside our apartment.
The Centre Pompidou was super impressive. Designed by Richard Rogers and Renzo Piano it hangs everything on the outside. A massive structural expressionist cast exoskeleton, exterior escalators too.
The modern art inside was awesome too, much more my kinda thing.
Matisse.
The original Bauhaus chairs, so different to how they look these days.
Marcel Duchamp’s “readymade” bicycle wheel.
And his “readymade” fountain.
This Dali piece just exploded off the wall. It’s hard not to love his work, especially in real life.
Not a fan of Picasso’s work but I really liked it all in real life.
70’s furniture. Damn I’m a bike geek!
On our way out we took the opportunity to do the Pulp Fiction Royal with Cheese and Fries with Mayo. The fries + mayo worked well! The burger was crap.
Christina and I headed out to the aquarium as our museum pass got us in there for free too, it wasn’t great but I’m a fish fan so I love all aquariums. Here’s a south american tank, a big arrowana and some big gars.
Piranhas!
Bicycle bits used to display clothing.
A cabinet full of old skool kool brought back lots of memories.
This dodgey Australian themed bar had a frames NZ all blacks poster outside, wtf?!
We failed to find good French food on the street on our last night so we settled for this tiny but packed out Chinese joint which had a guy making fresh noodles in the front window (always a good sign). Turns out it was damn great food!
We’d definitely lost track of all the different beers we had consumed.
In the morning Richie and I all of a sudden had a hell of a lot more bags to carry down the stairs. Mum went wild it seems with the shopping.
From here we hit Singapore for one more night, did some more shopping (Suga finally caed in and bought herself an LV handbag) and after a long and bumpy flight we were back in Sydney.
This is what greeted us as we got off the plane in Sydney. Turns out the woman on the left was a uni lecturer of mine and the girl on the right is her daughter. So so strange.
Hope you’ve enjoyed these blog entries! :)