Ben Visit Part 2: Paris, La Ville De L'amour

I honestly think I've been putting off writing this because I'm having a hard time admitting to myself that my dream of a week in Sevilla & Paris with Ben is over. But as much as it makes me sad, I've really enjoyed looking back through the pictures and reliving the week that was, without a doubt, the best week I've spent with Ben since meeting him five years ago. 

As much as I can already tell how big of a cliche I sound like writing this, I must say... Paris really, really is such a romantic city. It's an obvious statement, I know, but let me just do my best to explain myself. First of all, it was a total dream come true that we were even able to go to Paris. It is not cheap, let me tell you. Thankfully, though, and with a little help from my wonderful parents, we were able to make it work. Thus, we really made sure to appreciate every moment of our four days there.

Here's where I get super cheesy... but you know what? I don't care. The entire ambiance of the city was just so romantic. The grand boulevards lined with quintessentially Parisian buildings, adorable cafes with tiny tables for two outside, beautifully green parks with mid-April's bright tulips, well-dressed locals carrying two baguettes in their bags as they walk home from work--those are just a few of the scenes that add to the ambiance that is unparalleled by any other city in the world. That's a pretty big claim, but I stand by it. I will never love a city as much as I love Paris. 

A romantic city like Paris isn't nearly as fun unless you have someone to share it with, and I couldn't have asked for a more amazing, happy guy to spend my time there with. We decided to make it a point not to rush around too much. I tend to have a million and one things I want to do and places I want to see, but with an impending "see you in 10 weeks" around the corner, I knew it was important to slow down and enjoy every minute I had with Ben in the city of love. (Ok, I'll do my best to tone down the cheese now.)

We got to our hotel in Paris on Wednesday around 7 after a smooth but long Ryanair flying experience. For those of you not familiar with Ryanair, it is an insanely cheap budget airline in Europe that always seems to fly to airports that are very far from the city they claim to serve. Our flight to "Paris" really went to Beauvais, France, which is over an hour outside of Paris. Getting to Paris involved taking a taxi from the airport to the train station, taking an hour and 15 minute train ride, and then taking another taxi to our hotel. It was definitely worth the price difference though, and we were still smiling by the time we got to our hotel.

The view from our hotel room

After getting settled in our hotel room and using the in-room Nespresso machine to recharge, we headed to dinner at a restaurant where I ate with my friend Kathleen when I was in Paris in November. It was a very memorable meal, so Ben insisted on giving it a try. It was a relatively short walk away from our hotel, so we decided to ditch the metro to enjoy our first Parisian sunset and check out the Champs-Élysées, one of the main boulevards in Paris. 

Our meal at Chez André was amazing. I think it was still my favorite dinner all week. We split a delicious endive salad, and then I had duck with caramelized peaches, and Ben had VEAL KIDNEY. Yes, Ben actually ate veal kidney. And he liked it. (Not sure if I should be proud of him for trying new things or grossed out, but I decided to be proud.) We split the creme brulee for dessert--my favorite!

When we got back to our hotel, we discovered that we could order our breakfast to our room free of charge. We filled out a form and were able to get as much as we wanted delivered to our room at the time of our choice. Needless to say, we ended up having breakfast in bed in our hotel robes and slippers every single morning, and those were some of my favorite moments all week.

First on the itinerary on Thursday was a picnic and anniversary celebration by the Eiffel Tower. We bought a bottle of wine at the cute wine shop across the street from our hotel and took the metro over to the Eiffel Tower. We found a sunny, grassy spot in the Champs de Mars park with an awesome view. We opened up the bottle of wine and read each others' cards. We had filled out these really cute memory books that I bought from Uncommon Goods and gave to Ben before I left. It was so cool to go back and laugh about things like our first impressions of each other and who/what we thought the other person would bring to a deserted island. 

We probably stayed there for over an hour and a half, and I can confidently say that it was one of the best individual moments of my life. I feel so lucky to have met Ben five years ago on a cruise in the Caribbean and to have spent the past four years dating him and growing up with him. Even though we had to post-pone our anniversary celebrations to about a month after the actual date, it was an absolutely perfect way to celebrate. (Okay, turns out I can't promise to end the cheese.)

Our anniversary gift to each other was a French wine tasting class, so after our picnic, we headed over to O Chateau for our class. We learned a lot about the different wine-producing regions in France, types of wine, and wine tasting techniques. We got to try one white wine, one rosé, and one red. They were all delicious, especially paired with some amazing cheese and bread. I tricked Ben in to eating blue cheese, because he claims to not like it but he's never really given it a try. Turns out, he likes blue cheese. ;)

The wine tasting class was in a very central location, so we were able to walk around and see lots of different places for the few hours that followed.

First, we went to the Love Lock Bridge, the Pont des Arts. We bought a lock and wrote our initials and the year on it, and then locked it on the bridge. It's pretty cool to see a bridge filled with so many love locks, and it's even cooler to know that our lock will stay there forever. Okay- until the French government inevitably cuts it off because the bridge is going to collapse. But it's the metaphor of it all that's important, right? 

We then walked around the Louvre, through the Tuileries Gardens, to the Longchamp store on Rue St. Honore to get me my first Longchamp bag, and to Shakespeare and Co. Bookstore. 

The final stop on our real whirlwind but absolutely wonderful day was for dinner at Au Pied de Cochon, a historical, well known restaurant that my BFF Cara had recommended. She told us we had to get the French onion soup, and it did not disappoint. Ben got what apparently is the restaurant's specialty: pig trotter. I was proud of him for being adventurous again, but I don't think it turned out quite as great as last time. He still liked it enough to finish it though, and we ended with a delicious banana chocolate tart. 

On Friday, we woke up to have another delicious breakfast in bed, and then we were off on a day trip to Versailles! Our hotel was very close to a major train station, so we were able to take a 30 minute train out to Versailles and then walk to the Chateau. We stopped on our way to the Palace to get some picnic ingredients of course, including sandwiches, macarons, and a bottle of wine. 

We started our day picnicking in the gardens, which are MASSIVE. I could have spent an entire day just in the gardens there. Our picnic was lovely, and, to my surprise, it turns out that Ben likes macarons. He very rarely will eat sweets with me, and when he does it's usually some variation of chocolate cake, so I was really excited. 

Once we finished our bottle of wine, we walked around the gardens for about two hours. We had so much fun walking around the gardens. It was another one of my favorite moments of the week (and, therefore, of my life.) We laughed a lot and took so many pictures. We were both just so happy to be together in one of the most incredible places we'd both ever seen. 

Yeah, we really had that much fun. I would have loved to keep walking around the gardens, but we needed to get in line to make sure we had enough time to explore the palace before it closed at 6. We waited in an hour-long line to get in, and spent another 1.5-2 hours touring the palace. Each room was so grand and elaborate, but my favorite was definitely the Hall of Mirrors. 

Hall of Mirrors

We got back before 8:00 and quickly recharged with some Nespresso before heading over to the Marais area to walk around a bit and get some dinner. We ended up at a cool, modern place we had spotted the night before called Loup Brasserie. I had cod and Ben had a burger with bacon, and then we shared an Earl Grey cream for dessert that was amazing!

On Saturday I woke up with a pit in my stomach thinking about how it was our last day in Paris. The past few days had just flown by, and I really couldn't wrap my head around the fact that I had less than 24 hours left with Ben until the end of June. I did my best to try to stop thinking him leaving and just enjoy the time I did have with him that day.

We started by heading to the Eiffel Tower to go to the top. It was number one on my list, since I hadn't done it the last time I was in Paris, so we woke up early and went to get in line not long after it opened. We had read tips online that said if you wait in line to take the stairs it is a much shorter wait. Well, I can't imagine how long the wait for the elevator was, because we ended up waiting two hours to take the nearly 700 steps up! It was well worth it, though, for both the views and the memories walking up.

When we were done checking out the different levels within the Eiffel Tower, we walked around the area to find something to eat for our last picnic. We found some delicious sandwiches and a lemon tart, and we, of course, bought a bottle of wine. We found a great spot in the same park we had our picnic the first day. The weather wasn't nearly as nice, but we still had a great time soaking it all in for our last day.

After some funny post-bottle of wine Eiffel Tower pics, we went back to the hotel to warm up a bit and figure out what we were doing next. We ended up walking from the hotel to Galeries Lafayette, a big, fancy Parisian department store. 

While in Galeries Lafayette, we stopped and bought some macarons for later at the famous Pierre Herme. We got two salted caramel chocolate macarons and one lemon macaron. We ate them later at the hotel and they were all they're built up to be! We walked around on various floors of Galeries Lafayette and bought some cool postcards. 

We then walked around a bit in the area looking for the perfect dinner spot for our last meal together. We ended up at Triadou Haussmann, and it was a very great steak meal for both of us! 

Well, this has been quite a long blog post, but it is well-deserved after a trip full of amazing memories. Leaving Ben in the morning was extremely hard, and I still don't quite feel like myself four days later. I am so thankful that he has been insanely supportive of my crazy dreams throughout the past year, though. 

If you made it to the end of this post, THANK YOU! Next up on my blog, Ben is going to do a GUEST POST! I can't wait--he is a pretty great writer. 

Au revoir for now! I am off to Madrid in seven hours--eek!

A

Ben Visit Part 1: Semana Santa en Sevilla

Well, everyone, my incredible week in Europe with my boyfriend has come and gone. I'm still feeling pretty sad after his departure on Sunday, but I know I will always have amazing memories of our time in Sevilla and Paris together. So many amazing memories, in fact, that I decided to split up Ben's visit into two separate posts: one about our time in Sevilla and another about our time in Paris. 

Ben came to visit me in the Fall in Sevilla (when we also traveled to Rome), so he had already spent about five days here in my home city. He loved it so much, though, that he really wanted to come back here instead of just traveling somewhere else. I'm so happy that he likes Sevilla that much, and bringing him around to all of my favorite places means so much to me after spending the majority of our time apart for the past few months.

It was a long ten weeks of waiting for his arrival after I left at the end of January, but the day we had been waiting for finally arrived on Saturday, April 12th. After a loooong layover in Paris (because it ended up making being much cheaper for Ben to book a round trip flight to Paris and then a round trip flight to Sevilla and back to Paris that Wednesday with me), Ben finally arrived at the Sevilla airport at 9:00pm, where I was there waiting for him with the biggest smile on my face and tears in my eyes.

Since I had checked in to the hotel earlier in the day, I had a bottle of some of our favorite Spanish red wine waiting for him in the room, which we proceeded to drink a bit of before heading to our first tapas feast of the week. Luckily, Ben is a huge fan of Spanish food--specifically jamón ibérico (Spanish ham). He really can't get enough Spanish ham--it cracks me up. We had our first dinner at a tapas bar called El Pasaje, which included ham, cheese, salmorejo (a thick, cold tomato soup typical of Andalucía, Spain), and more. We ended the night with a short walk to see the beautifully lit cathedral.

The following day was Palm Sunday, which began the week-long Semana Santa (Holy Week) celebrations in Sevilla. Sevilla is famous for its Semana Santa processions, when a ton of different churches from in and around Sevilla parade through the city dressed as "nazarenos" (See the people in the pointy hats below--no connection to the KKK) and carry their church's "pasos," which are big, beautiful religious "floats" displaying scenes of Jesus and the Virgin Mary.

All of the locals warned me that it would be a bit of a cultural shock. To be honest, the bigger shock was just how crowded the city was. I was warned about how crowded it would get, as well, but it was beyond what I had imagined. At a few points Ben and I found ourselves in "sardines in a can" crowds, which was not so fun. We quickly learned we needed to buy a little Semana Santa booklet that had all of the procession route times and maps, and that helped us enjoy the processions when we wanted to, but also avoid the crowds when we wanted to. 

On Sunday, after breakfast at our favorite place from last time right by our hotel, we joined my Spanish friends to go around the city and see some processions. Dressed in our Sunday best, we got drinks, tried the typical Semana Santa dessert called "torrijas," and saw a few different processions. It was very interesting and beautiful, but I understand why many locals have had enough after a few days and use the week off from school/work to hit up the nearby playas (beaches). Overall though, Ben and I really enjoyed getting to experience the traditions first-hand with Spaniards, rather than getting lost as Semana Santa newbies among the crowds. 

After a long day with lots of walking, we were ready for a big meal. We headed to one of my favorite restaurants in the world called San Marco. Even though it serves Italian food, it is a must-go place when in Sevilla. The restaurant is in an old arab bath house, so the architecture is just amazing. However, the best part is that this restaurant manages to be very high end and delicious while keeping prices unexpectedly low. Ben was a huge fan of this price to quality ratio. He enjoyed some delicious salmon, and I had risotto with foie gras.

Monday started with another awesome breakfast at our favorite place called La Tapateria. Then, we took a nice walk along the river and ended at Sevilla's biggest food market, el Mercado de Triana. We bought some ingredients for an early afternoon picnic--jamón y queso, of course. Before our picnic, however, we bought some ceramic gifts for a couple of our favorite people. The Triana neighborhood of Sevilla is known for it's great ceramic artisan shops, so we walked though and checked it all out. (Fun fact: It's very common in Sevilla to hang ceramic plates on the walls as art!)

After our picnic, we did a little sight seeing. We went to the top of the Torre de Oro, which I was originally told is where Christopher Columbus stored gold from the New World, but I've since learned that isn't true. The tower did serve as a prison and a military watch tower throughout the middle ages, and now it is a Spanish naval museum. I'm not going to lie, though, we mostly just went for the awesome views.

We then took a walk around Sevilla's bullring, Plaza de Toros. We wanted to go inside, but the line was pretty long, so we just decided to walk around the beautiful outside. 

We then headed over to La Alameda, a huge plaza with a ton of restaurants and bars around, and one of my favorite places to relax with a mojito as big as my face on a sunny afternoon. I just had to let Ben in on one of my favorite Sevilla pass-times. 

After going back to the hotel for a little siesta, we got a beer by our hotel and then went to another one of my favorite bars so that Ben could try some orange wine. Although he didn't agree with me that it tastes like alcoholic Tropical Capri Sun, he did like it a lot. 

Then we got dinner at the restaurant next to the "orange wine place" as I like to call it, where we had a couple tapas, including one of the best tapas I've ever had- a small piece of hard toasted bread topped with a small piece of a ham filet and a caramelized apple slice.

Tuesday was our last full day in Sevilla. We slept in a bit and then went to my house to see my host mom, Eva, and pack up the big extra suitcase Ben had brought me to bring all of my winter clothes home for me. Turns out, we timed our trip home pretty well, because we got there just before a procession was going to pass right below my balcony. We enjoyed come cerveza with Eva and watched the procession. It took me a while to pack everything, so it was a pretty relaxed morning. 

Once I was done shedding my closet of all signs of cold (cold in Sevilla meaning between 55-65 degrees...), we went back to a restaurant right by our hotel for a tapas lunch and more cerveza.

 

Then we walked to a bar along the river to get even more cerveza (notice a theme here?). After a long walk back to the hotel, we took another siesta and relaxed before heading to our last dinner in Sevilla. It made me pretty sad that our time in Sevilla was already coming to an end, but I was more excited to go to Paris than I've been for any trip this whole year. Understandably, of course--the city of love with my love? Lucky, lucky girl.

Our last dinner at the Restaurante Hostería del Laurel was probably the best tapas meal we had all week, and it was the perfect end to a wonderfully Spanish "staycation" in Sevilla. The highlight was the adobo fried fish tapa--an Andalusian specialty. I will be going back to this place, for sure! 

We woke up on Wednesday with some serious excitement in preparation of our travel day to Paris. We had our last breakfast at our favorite breakfast place and then headed to the airport to catch our 2:00 pm flight.

Our time in Sevilla was everything the two of us had hoped for and more--cultural, fun, and with lots of tapas and cerveza. It was the perfect first few days of our time together. I sure missed this guy (and I am back to missing him now), and Sevilla was the perfect place to just enjoy being with him and not have to worry about cramming in different sights and plans.

What followed, though, were the best few days of my life, and I can't wait to share with you all our trip to Paris! Stay tuned! :)

A