Paris 2

Our second day started really early to try and beat the queues at the Eiffel Tower. We'd had a pretty crap night's sleep as the room was really hot, and with the window open the road was so noisy, so we were a bit dazed. As it turned out that there weren't really any queues and we got our tickets pretty quickly. We could only go half way up as they were working at the top, but the views were still great, and we had the added drama of lots of security guards chasing and catching a team of pickpockets around the viewing platform. As we'd missed breakfast we went to a café for an early lunch and then walked up to the Arc de Triomphe. I'd never been right under it before, and fully appreciated how enormous it is. Ignoring our sore feet, we returned to 'our' area and went to Sainte Chappelle. I'd often seen it's spire but never thought more about the building and stumbled across it when I was doing some research. The chapel houses the most incredible stained-glad windows, which give the room a blue-hue. The windows are the biggest sheets of stained glass and date from the 13th century, which hurts my head a bit. We then went down the road to Notre Dame and had a wander round there; a choir was practicing as we looked round, which was quite moving. I'm not at all religious but find the architecture and forms of control within chapels and churches really interesting. After all that walking we were ready for a crepe and cup of tea, which was quickly followed by a wander over the padlock bridge and a Bertillion ice cream (we decided to miss a proper tea!).