Running in the Parc des Buttes Chaumont

On the 2nd level of the Eiffel Tower

Playing in traffic on the Champs-Elysées

View from the Pompidou Center

The Pompidou at night

Paris was lovely, as you can see from the photos above. After being there for a month this summer, it was fun to be back and see some familiar places and to see some new things as well. I'm pretty impressed with us really as we saw/did all but one thing we'd wanted to do. We ended up nixing the visit to the catacombs under the city for reasons of cold, but we did see the Tour Eiffel (and went up as high as we could... the summit was closed), the Arc de Triomphe, the Champs-Elysées, the Musée de l'Orangerie (quite possibly my favorite in Paris), the Louvre, Notre Dame, Shakespeare and Co, Berthillon's Ice Cream, Montmartre, and the Pompidou Center. We were busy little bees!

On Friday night, we went to a crazy restaurant called Nos Ancêtres les Gaulois on Ile Saint-Louis. The whole theme is to have a meal like in Gaulish times, so it was really entertaining, if not quite the "healthiest" night. Just to give you a taste, here's the "salad" they bring you:

Despite my hangover Saturday morning, I did leave Chris at the hostel and make it out for a nice 4-mile run. When I was living in Paris in the 6th arrondissement, I always wanted to go run in the Parc des Buttes Chaumont, a park in the 19th that I'd heard of and googled and fell in love with. Sadly, I never worked up sufficient motivation to take the metro out to run in a park then run back, so I ended up sticking more to the Seine and those monuments for my runs. This time, however, we actually STAYED in the 19th, so I knew this run was meant to be. If I lived in Paris, I might try to live in the 19th just to be able to run in this park all the time. It's hilly AND flat and has gorgeous scenery. There were tons of runners and, as you can see in these photos, it's no surprise as to why! I averaged at an 11:40/pace, which is good considering I kept stopping to take pictures of everything! Check it out:

I also went ahead and ran by the Quai de la Seine near our hostel at the end of the run because I didn't think I'd make it out again before leaving and I wanted to check it out:

At the end of a successful run. :)

Back to the hostel (isn't it a cool building?)

Anyway we had a great time. I got my run in and got to spend some quality time with one of my very best friends. I didn't know it until I was there, but I really needed this weekend and it was everything I needed it to be. Now, time to get back on plan... I've been too off plan for too long and though I haven't really gained, I don't want to keep going in this direction!!!

PS: As a sidenote, I ALSO found out this weekend that I got accepted (and tentatively offered a TA position at one of my top grad school choices)! Whew!