Roam around France & Italy: Travel with Piyai & Noolek #2

Our trip to Paris has begun as we finally arrive to Charles de Gaulle International Airport (Aéroport International Charles de Gaulle - CDG), which is the main international airport of France. It's located in Roissy area in the northeastern suburbs of France. It's named after "Charles de Gaulle" (1890–1970), leader of the Free French Forces and former President of France.

Once we arrive to the airport, we can transfer directly to Paris or other cities in France by taking RER (Réseau Express Régional - Regional Express Network) or TGV (Trains à Grande Vitesse - High-Speed Train). Before taking a train to the city centre, the first thing that Noolek (myself) has to do is buying a ticket for traveling to the city centre. The ticket that we have to buy is a single ticket called " t+". After considering our trip in Paris, we decide to buy a single ticket like this because we won't travel a lot with public transport. We will mainly travel around Paris by walking.

The " t+" ticket is made from paper. It's suitable for anyone who travels in Paris in a short time. This ticket can be used for taking Metro, RER (within zone 1-2), buses, as well as some trams in many areas such as a tram to Montmartre. If you guys want to travel outside zone 1-2, you have to pay extra depending on the zone you are going to. You can travel by Metro or RER and connect to different lines within 90 minutes by using a single ticket. If you travel buy bus or tram, you can connect to another bus or another tram for 1 time but you can't connect to Metro or RER.

Moreover, in order to save people's time and money, the t+ ticket is also sold as a "carnet", which has 10 single tickets. It's likely sold in many big metro stations and cheaper than buying at the airport. Therefore, in order to prepare our trip in Paris for 2 days, Piyai and Noolek need to walk from the airport to the metro station for buying these carnets. As a result, we decide to buy 40 single tickets for 5 persons. Once we get the tickets, it's time to get to know Paris.

A connecting walkway from the airport to the train station.

Once we arrive to the train station, we have to go down to the lower floor.

The atmosphere inside the airport and the train station is quite secured. We see some security guards patrolling around the area time to time. It makes me feel secured rather than being scared. I also think that I'm still in my country because people in the green uniform make me feel comfortable.

There are many security guards around the station, so we don't have to worry about security problems here.

We enter to this office to buy a carnet (a book of 10 one-way tickets for transportation in Paris).

The next thing we have to do is taking a public transport to the city centre. Noolek and Piyai decide to take the Roissy Bus, which runs between Charles de Gaulle International Airport (CDG) and Opéra (Palais Garnier). It takes around 75 minutes and the ticket price is 11 Euro per person. The reason why we choose Roissy Bus is that we can put our luggage conveniently in provided space, also we can take this bus to the last stop and easily connect to many places by Metro. In addition, we can buy a Roissy Bus ticket using a ticket machine. The machine will give us a change in coin if we insert a large banknote.

We can easily buy a ticket of Roissy Bus from this ticket machine.

After buying our tickets, we have to wait for a bus at the platform. There is a monitor that we can see how long we have to wait for the bus...It's so convenient.

The monitor tells us how long we have to wait for the bus.

We can take a seat here while waiting for the bus.

These are the Roissy Bus ticket that we buy from a ticket machine.

Once the bus is coming in front of the building, we get into the bus and insert the Roissy Bus ticket to the machine next to the bus driver for validating the use of the ticket. After that, we put our luggage in the provided space and choose our seats wherever we like. So, we don't have to be worried about our belongings anymore.

The Roissy Bus is parking in front of the building. Let's get on the bus.

Although the bus has 2 sections, the driver can drive and sway the bus a little bit from left to right, so we will feel like we sit in a car. There is a free Wi-Fi on the bus, so we can do the check-in on Facebook that we already arrived to France and we are heading to the city centre of Paris.

After taking the RoissyBus to Opéra which is the last stop, we carry our luggage and walk down to Opéra metro station for taking a metro to our hostel that we have booked in des Gobelins area.

Our accommodation in the middle of Paris that Piyai and Noolek chose is quite small and narrow, which is suitable for small backpackers from Thailand like us. If we choose to stay in somewhere a little bit far away from the city centre, the price of the accommodation will be cheaper.

Oops Hostel is a hostel that located near des Gobelins and Place d'Italie metro stations. It depends on how we like to walk up to the hill or walk down from the hill. Our room has a private bathroom, which is quite common for an accommodation in a big city. This hostel has small guest rooms and hostel facilities. The price of breakfast is included with the room price. This area is quite safe...Nothing is scary... In addition, we use a keycard to enter to the hostel.

There is free Wi-Fi with strong signal. And if we want to cook something, we can cook in a kitchen downstairs but we have to ask for a key from the reception. The overall atmosphere of the hostel is quite good even though it's quite small. Anyway, as we spend most of the time outside the hostel, a large or comfortable room doesn't mean anything for us.

This is our accommodation in Paris.

There are some travel brochures placing on a desk.

This is our small room inside the hostel.

There is also a private bathroom here.

Once we finish having a meal and taking a rest after our long journey (more than 10 hours), we gain a lot of energy to take a tour around Paris at night. The advantage of visiting Europe in summer is that the daytime is quite long. The sun goes down after 9.00 p.m... We can take a walk as much as we can. Sometimes, many shops are closed but the sky is still bright. And our destination for tonight can't be anywhere except the Eiffel Tower. Many people say that if we come to Paris and we don't visit the Eiffel Tower, we haven't arrived to Paris yet. Therefore, we have to visit the Eiffel Tower as soon as possible since we heard that it's also beautiful at night.

We walk from our accommodation to a metro station called Place d'Italie because we want take a metro line 6 to the destination, which is Trocadéro station. The reason why we have to go to this station because we will see the best view of the Eiffel Tower once we get out from the metro station. There is a large area without any obstacles.

Inside the metro.

Moreover, during travelling with Metro Line 6, the Metro runs on a bridge across the Seine between Passy and Berhakeim stations. This point is very popular for photographers because of the beautiful view of the Eiffel Tower behind the Seine. However, a beginner like Noolek can only take 3 shots of this, which are quite blur. Noolek selects the best one as you guys can see below.

A view of Seine River and the Eiffel tower between Passy and Berhakeim stations. This picture is quite blurring because the bridge is shaking.

We arrive at Trocadéro station. Let's go outside the underground.

We can see a direction sign to the Eiffel Tower from here.

After getting out of the metro station, we see a wrought iron lattice tower that everybody knows as " The Eiffel Tower". The Eiffel Tower is called La Tour Eiffel in French, which is one of the landmarks in France. It was built from wrought iron and it's 300 metre tall. It's located on Champ de Mars street near the Seine River in the city centre of Paris. It's named after "Gustave Eiffel", a French engineer and architect. It was designed and constructed for being the entrance to the World Fair in 1889, which France is the host country. Moreover, it was constructed for celebrating the 100-year anniversary of the French Revolution in order to show the greatness, wealth, and success in the industrial age of the country.

We are unlucky that the sky is not beautiful today. The sky is partly cloudy and it's not quite clear.

As you can see in the picture, the Eiffel Tower has a dark background even though I set up my camera to be in a night mode. I think I have such a bad skill in photography. Anyway, I realised that the beauty and the uniqueness of the Eiffel Tower in front of us makes everyone wants to visit here once in a life time.

Every night at 10.00 p.m., the Eiffel Tower's flashing light displays in a short time...It's so exciting...Noolek takes a video but it's blurred while other tourists takes many pictures of this show as much as they can....Noolek is so regret..However, tonight is such a lively night indeed.

The flashing light amazes all tourists around the Eiffel Tower.

The Eiffel Tower with flashing light...It's so beautiful.

After finished watching the Eiffel Tower from this spot, we have to watch the Eiffel Tower in a closer area because it will give such a great atmosphere. Let's get closer to the tower...It's not so scary in the night because there are many people here.

It's so crowded with tourists.

We have a look at this nude sculpture located along the way from the Eiffel Tower.

A view of the Eiffel Tower with the Seine River in front.

A view of the Seine River in the evening.

We have been watching the Eiffel Tower closely from this side.

A view from the bottom side of the Eiffel Tower.

After having enough with watching the Eiffel Tower and the flashing light, we are heading back to our accommodation to take a rest. Visiting the Eiffel Tower gives us such happiness in Paris because we could visit the landmark of Paris on the first day. Our mission has been accomplished and I think we would have a nice dream tonight.