July 13th

The night train was quite the experience, our compartment was so tiny! There was the four of us (me, Beccah, Malory, and Jenna) and its made to sleep 6 people! We barely could fit the four of us! It was fun though, its all part of the experience right? We stayed up and talked for awhile and then we went to bed around 11 or so. Luckly I was so tired that I slept pretty soundly on my board of a bed with these really nasty pillows and blankets that we were provided for us. "Just don't think about it...", I kept telling myself. We woke up and got off the train about halfway down the length of the train Bec just realized that she left her computer on the train! So she sprinted back, and its a long way back but she was super fast in sandals too! I was very impressed, good job Bec! We left the train station and took a bus to our hotel. I like Paris so far, it is stinky but the architecture is very cool, both old and modern buildings. Definatly different from Italy. We checked into our hotel but we were early so they didn't have all of our rooms ready for us so Darrin took us out and we walked to the Eiffel Tower. Its huge! We all found a spot on the laun and Darrin had us sketch the Eiffel Tower for a while and then we put our sketch books out for everyone to look at. We have some really talented people in our group, I was so impressed by all of the different interpretations of the Eiffel Tower. After sketching we went back to the hotel and finally got into our rooms. We were given a few hours of free time to go get something to eat so a group of us went to the Hard Rock Cafe in Paris. It was so cool! I hadn't ever been to one before so i was pretty stoked, it was so good! Bec and I shared this really good burger and fries and all you can drink (soda that is!). After eating we all met up with the group and headed for the canal for a boat tour of Paris. That was really cool too, it seemed like everying was centered around the canal. It was really neat to see Paris all lit up, the city never sleeps here which is really cool, although I wounld really recomend staying out too late, its a little creepy. By the time we were done with the boat ride it was pretty late so we all headed back to the hotel. I'm rooming with Malory and Beccah, its going to be a fun week. You can see the top half of the Eiffel Tower from our room, very cool! Tomorrow is a free day because its Bastile Day! Its like their independance day, I'm excited should be fun, we are going to try and see the parade and we heard that there will be fireworks at the Eiffel Tower. I hope so, that woud be awesome!