Pompidou Centre and Galeries Lafayette

We woke up to our last full day in Paris. With packing, shopping, the Pompidou Centre and dinner on the river, it was going to be a big day. As with the previous days, breakfast was first on the agenda. After that, we swiftly took the Metro all the way to the Galeries Lafayette. Everything was very expensive, backpacks costing 600 Euros, bracelets costing 400 and wallets costing 150 Euros. Needless to say, not much was bought but the size of the complex was fascinating,

Then we travelled to the Pompidou Centre, an art gallery consisting of contemporary art. We thought it was very intriguing and the artwork was truly engaging.  It was much different to anything we had seen before. Some artworks stand out, such as the film of the religious practices in India, the white tile chamber and a painting of a penguin shopping were all works that stood out to us.

Soon after that we headed straight to the river to enjoy a delicious meal on a floating restaurant. An entrée of egg with mushroom and leak, a main of potato and duck followed by a succulent pear and ice-cream to finalise the meal was more than enough to keep us content.

The end of the day finally came and with it, mixed feelings. We packed our bags to get ready to leave the beautiful city of Paris and for the 20 hour travels ahead of us.

Jack and Ben

The Palace of Versailles and the Louve.

We started our day with an early breakfast at so we could leave by 8.00am. When we boarded our coach our tour guide, Delphine, outlined our exciting day ahead at Versailles. During the ride, which took around an hour and half, our guide shared some interesting facts about the areas we passed through.

Upon our arrival at Versailles, we were greeted with the tall golden gates and a beautiful fountain. We were given some time to explore the garden full of hedges, cultivated gardens and some interesting forests which seemed to stretch out for miles. We weaved our way through a maze and strolled around the massive ponds and fountains.

 

We re-grouped at eleven to eat our lunches at a small café just outside of the palace. The food was classically French, with baguettes and croissants. We then returned to the palace for the tour within.

Splitting into two groups, another tour guide joined us going by the name of Sophie. We were given earphones that we could listen to their telling of the history behind the château. The history was very informative and interesting, and we got a lot out of it. We asked the students what they thought of the palace.

“I really like the outside”

“It was pretty awesome”

“There was a lot of gold. It was quite pretty”

“The garden was massive”

“I loved the Hall of Mirrors”

We were astonished as soon as we stepped foot in the palace by the extravagant designs and the art on the ceilings and walls. We explored through king and queen apartments and saw the classiness of the dining rooms. Background information of what it was like when the palace was occupied was supplied by our tour guides through our earphones.

After we saw the palace we got on our coach and headed back to Paris. Although we were exhausted, the tour guide consoled us by telling us that most Parisians, because they don’t have a car, walk seven kilometres a day. We were dropped off at an Italian restaurant near the Louvre where we had a hilarious waiter that everyone enjoyed the company of.

When we headed to the Louvre, it was still daylight and men selling key chains, little Eiffel Towers and other souvenirs greeted us. We lined up, buzzing to see the famous ‘Mona Lisa’. We wondered around the gallery for a moment before heading off in one big group to find the famous portrait. The room that held the painting was huge and we pushed through the crowd surrounding to see the small, framed picture. Although many enjoyed the experience, few said it was underwhelming and the painting was smaller than they expected. All together, the gallery was amazing, especially at night, and was an experience we will clearly remember.  

Jamie and Morgan

Tuesday - Eiffel Tower and Montmartre

Today was our biggest and most tiring day yet. After waking up and eating our awaiting croissant, we set off for Montmartre at around 9am. We took multiple Metro lines to get there, once we arrived we walked up, what seemed like an endless array of hills and slopes, to get to our destination, Sacre Caure . We were given multiple tasks including poetry, writing, visual art and photography based tasks. The atmosphere of Montmartre was captivating, in limited time we we were able to eat, complete the tasks we were given and experience French culture that it emphasised. 

We met back up at 12pm, via the Metro and walking (on our soon to be exhausted legs) we started making our way to the famous Eiffel Tower. The walk was long but rewarding. We crossed the padlock bridge on the way, which was a fantastic display of the love for which this city is famous. Tens of thousands of locks covered the rails with names and love hearts written all over them. We all took the opportunity to take many photographs. We then continued towards the tower, with each step our excitement grew. We were all buzzing with anticipation, this huge, intimidating landmark that we had only ever seen in pictures, was upon us. 

Standing beneath the Eiffel Tower everybody’s jaws dropped while staring up at the breath taking architecture. We were rounded up and squeezed into a very tight elevator to start making our way to the different levels of the tower. Standing on top of the city was an amazing experience and being able to see all of Paris from all angles was fascinating and beautiful. 

After an hour of taking photos and seeing everything from a new perspective, we headed down to the ground to get dinner. We arrived at Le Terminus Nord for our best dinner yet. We really got to experience fancy French food and service. 

After enjoying an amazing meal, we all waddled with ‘stuffed bellies’ to Theatre Des Bouffes Du Nord, an old, near-derelict theatre, to see our first fully French play ‘La Revolte'. The play was a beautiful two person performance (by a female and male actor) and even through we still aren't sure what it was about, we know it was passionate, intense and was done well. 

Leaving the theatre, dragging our tired bodies, we made our way home.

Niamh and Griffin

Monet’s Garden and Introduction to Central Paris

Today (Monday) we took a two hour bus ride to Monet’s Garden. There was a large variety of flowers and colours in the garden, which made the atmosphere of the gardens fresh, lively and beautiful. The history and hidden stories contained within the gardens were amazing and the preservation and restoration of the property did the original justice. We wondered through both the water garden and the flower garden until we arrived at Monet’s house. Inside we saw replicas of his paintings and original paintings from Japan that Monet bought to hang around his house. After some lunch and ice cream, we went to the art museum, with works from Degas, and with an exhibition using pastels and a time line of evolution through art. Once we had seen all we could see, we departed to Paris and back to our Hostel. 

A quick freshen up, we headed to the local park and wandered exploring for about half an hour, before we set off for dinner. Our first course was salad and quiche, followed by chicken and spaghetti, and cream caramels for dessert. Extremely full at this point we went on an ‘expedition’ to experience the Paris Metro.

Exiting the Metro, we walked down the streets arriving at Notre Dame. Our ears were soon drawn to a French/English busker set up in the main square of Notre Dame, and we soon flocked there. We talked with the busker and explained where we came from, as well as listening and enjoying his songs for about 20 minutes. There, after taking many photos of this historical church and the surroundings, we became excited when we saw the Eiffel tower for the first time. We wandered a bit more around the Seine River before we made our way back to the Metro and home to our awaiting beds.

Madison and Isabelle

London to Paris on the Eurostar.

The day started with a frantic rush. With alarms going off too late, breakfast at 7 am, people hogging the bathroom, objects going missing and doing the final packing of our luggage, we sure had something to talk about on the Eurostar train to Paris. We arrived at the St Pancras Station, collected our tickets and went through French immigration while still firmly in the middle of London. Soon after we left London and 2.5 hours later we were in the heart of the French capital. To fill in our time many of us purchased food and drinks such as tea, hot chocolates, croissants, sandwiches, and LOADS of chocolate and chips or should we say ‘crisps’! 

So then we arrived in Paris! The city of love, or in this case - love of art! Although no-one could understand the signs or posters, we found our guide who walked to us to our transfer bus.  With luggage in tow, mouth open and heads turning we began to take in this different city.

We arrived at the hostel, half asleep but excited. When you walk into the hostel, our eyes were drawn to the most gorgeous outside area, a courtyard in the centre of the hostel. While some of us got our room keys straight away and settled into our new home, others had to wait an hour for their rooms to be clean and ready. We’re sure the other hostel customers didn't mind hearing a bunch of us singing and playing guitar in the courtyard as we waited.

The bedrooms where huge - at least certainly compared to our rooms in London - and hold either 2, 4 or 6 people. There are different themes to each room, some consist of very bright and bold colours and patterns such a Baroque style red and grey room.

In the evening we walked around for an hour getting feel for Paris and then had dinner at an Italian restaurant (Yes! An Italian meal in the French capital.) where we got pasta or pizza and chocolate mousse. 

We are all excited to see Paris over the next four days. It should be ‘chockerblock’ full of interesting things and fun!

Lauren 

The Tate Modern

We woke up to a noisy alarm and had to rush to get some washing done, it being the final day in London, which was quite a rush. We later enjoyed a continental and hot food breakfast, which like every morning, is absolutely delicious with fresh/hot bacon, eggs and sausages.

We departed at around nine o’clock to arrive at the London underground station closest to us, Canada Water. We hopped off the train at Southwark and walked in the light rain on our way to the entrance of the Tate Modern Gallery, one of the biggest art galleries in the world.We started at ‘The Tate’ with paintings and pictures from Marlene Dumas. There were other exhibits at the art museum too, but we had booked in for this exhibition. The exhibition was located on level 3 in the gallery, with a near by café with the best hot chocolate.

The exhibit housed around a hundred art pieces, several of which were near pornographic, as quoted by the artist. There were fourteen rooms in the exhibit, each housing between five and twenty pieces of art. Although her art was very unique, it was enjoyable and understandable. Strangely enough, some paintings / pictures were obscure, one being quite a lot of scribbles on a canvas. Others were beautifully expressed, for example an oil on canvas painting of a flower pot.


Later the group parted and one half went across the Millennium Bridge and the other half stayed and continued in the gallery. The view from the bridge was outstanding! From the middle of the bridge you could see a whole host of London landmarks - The Shard, Tower Bridge, the ‘Walkie-Talkie’, the ‘Cheese-Grater’ and St. Paul’s Cathedral. Below you could see the River Thames rough and quite shallow because of a low tide.

Before we got home, we went to the nearest “supermarket square” (like Galleria, Innaloo, Karrinyup, etc.). Most people went to the ‘99p store’ (the $2 shop) and bought many nibbles for the night and the train ride for the following day. Some people bought little,  others bought as big. When we got home to the YHA hostel, we had to immediately get packed, finish washing and be sure that nothing was missing. Tomorrow we leave our home of 9 days YHA Thameside and head to Paris.

Matthew & Komninos

The 'V&A' Museum and Grimms Tales

The day begun as usual - with a bunch of bacon, hash browns, eggs, toast, jam, or cereal being crammed into your appreciative stomach. Setting off around 9:00 we are lucky to have a later start than usual. We scoot through the maze of the tube station promptly, seeming as we are getting the hang of its busy ways. Victoria and Albert Museum was not what you expect. Rather than observing the average museums - preserved butterflies, brontosaurus fossils, etc -  we were given an amazing opportunity to visit Alexander McQueen’s ‘Savage Beauty’ display.

Before that day we must admit  that many or us had no clue whatsoever who this “Alexander McQueen” was. He was not a fashion designer. He was an artist. With beautiful gowns of sea shells and glistening wire, he expressed history and turned it into majestic art in which you can wear. Though some of his work could be taken as rather confronting, many of us were able to push past this and realise truly how breathtaking his work was. He had it all- every detail, within the detail, even more detail. His clothing was like a optical illusion. His quotes inspired. His work was truly fitted to the title “savage beauty”.


“I wanted to have everything, to touch everything. And I don't just want to use crystal - I want to invent something new”  
-Alexander McQueen 1998

We returned home for dinner after having explored the V&A and then rushed over to the Oxo tower wharf (near the Globe Theatre) to attend an immersive theatre performance of Grimm tales, most of which we have never heard of before.

Now imagine a room of flickering dull globes - and sounds of unknown origin bouncing off the walls. Portraits cut apart and altered slightly perhaps to add a realistic eye to an octopus or a doll to a child's photograph. Now picture a mirror. This mirror watches you back. You become part of the action - this is immersive theatre, you are included. With short tales and dark rooms the actors both narrate the story and be the story. They tell the original story with all the “distasteful” parts in which fairy tale books remove. The king cut off his twins heads to save his faithful servant. The princesses’ father chose to marry her. The jealous step mother pushed her step daughter into the river to drown.

Caught up in the thrill of chasing the actors the smiles on the audiences faces showed it all. We were truly immersed. We were truly in love.

We walked around the theatre for a solid two hours and by the time we arrived back “home” we were EXHAUSTED and fell sound asleep.

Alison