Montmartre and Nuit Blanche

After walking around the Jardin des Tuileries, Chloe and I hopped on the metro and headed up to Montmarte, a famous part of Paris up on the hill full of tourist attractions like Moulin Rouge...

, x-rated shops, and cafes that were once brimming with intellectuals and artists like Picasso at the beginning of the twentieth century.

The cafe where much of Amelie (you know the one French movie that so many of us have seen - Catherine, I remember watching it with you in our basement in like eighth or ninth grade?) was filmed, where we were going to eat until we discovered it was outrageously expensive.

Hungry, we continued up the hill until we found a little cafe with reasonable prices and sat down to split a croque madame with frites and some wine. We didn't end up going to any of the other tourist attractions in the area because we happened to sit down by a couple of very nice French and French Canadian people who we made friends with and spent the whole rest of the day and evening with them! They took us to all the little local bars they go to which served amaaaazing cheese and charcuterie platters.

It was a special night in Paris - Nuit Blanche. All of the museums, churches, libraries and theatres where open all night and were free! Since we were in Monmarte, we lined up to go into a little Montmarte church. Chloe and I were actually the only ones of the group that chose to go in but I was so awed by the exhibit - everything was dark as night as you were ushered in and in the center church were there the pews normally are, there were these amazing lamps made from crystallized Dead Sea salt providing a gentle but slightly eery glow. Chlosephine and I sat and talked about religion in the dim light before we very tiredly went home to sleep.