My 2024 France Trip: Non-Stop Olympic Events!

Thursday, August 1st

One of my Olympics must dos was going to see handball. I don’t know why I have always been intrigued by it, especially since it’s only something I watch every four years at the Olympics, but it always seems so exciting! I purchased our handball tickets as soon as possible, but I accidentally purchased for the wrong day! I ended up giving the wrong day tickets to my friend we met for lunch and promptly purchased the correct ones for our marathon day of Olympics at the South Paris Arena.

The neat decorations as we were walking up to the venue that is normally just a convention center complex, where many events were taking place in various buildings

Our session involved two matches, The Netherlands vs Brazil and South Korea vs Sweden, with passionate fans supporting each team. The experience was all I had hoped it would be with the acrobatic throws, the amazing saves, and the cheers of the crowd as the players moved the ball down the court energizing the arena.

Sadly this is my only good “picture” of the handball, as the rest of the time I was taking exciting video!

The early morning session allowed us to schedule a volleyball match in the same South Paris Arena complex just 30 minutes after our handball session ended.

We made it from South Paris Arena 6 to Arena 4 in record time, as we were able to use a shortcut without having to go through security again, just in time to either use the restroom or buy food. We went for the restroom to make it to our seats JUST in time to see the beginning of the Brazil vs Japan match.

It was an exciting match and we put to use the chants we learned at beach volleyball! “Monster Block! Monster Block! Monster! Monster! Monster Block!”

The expert and famous players on the Brazilian team were too much for the Japanese ladies to handle, but it was a fun and exciting match which ended in three sets, meaning we were done early and able to head to Paul to eat more sandwich mixtes!

I finally managed to try some DELICIOUS Bertillon ice cream! They close during the month of August (and they closed even earlier due to the hassle of the frozen zone before the Olympics started) and the only way to get their ice cream is to visit one of the restaurants they sell to around the island

With some wandering around to find souvenirs and especially a box to ship my Tour de France umbrella home in, we made it back to the apartment to prepare for another one of our fancier meals, at the opulent le Train Bleu located in Gare du Lyon.

It was SO Beautiful I couldn’t stop taking pictures!

The painted ceilings and gilded fixtures harken back to the glamourous days of train travel at the turn of the century. As you enter the revolving door, it seems like you are stepping into another time. We agonized over what to order, but Casey ended up with the three-course prix fixe menu and I went with their specialty, the leg of lamb that is hand carved tableside for you and the lemon souffle. Both were PERFECTION.

SO Delicious! My lamb, potato gratin and my drink, most likely the “Train Bleu”

I would have gone with one of the tasting menus, but I HAD to get the lemon soufflé

Friday, August 2nd

Today was our “big ticket day” with multiple doubles tennis matches in the afternoon as well as swimming finals at night! We made our way to the impressive Roland Garros complex with the biggest venue shop we had seen with many interesting things to purchase!

An impressive complex where the French Open is held, I was ready for the USA players with my stars and stripes sunglasses!

So fancy, on the outside of the main court stadium

We were in the smaller court, Suzanne Lenglen, but we discovered that these were the comfiest chairs we had the pleasure of sitting in (Must be for those fancy French Open spectators)! We learned a LOT about doubles tennis, saw MULTIPLE matches, and even got to cheer on the US men’s doubles team of Tommy Paul and Taylor Fritz!

Taylor and Tommy from the USA! We didn’t do well, but at least they came back the next day and won bronze!

They were playing the Australians, and the cheers for the Aussies were becoming non-stop with their “Aussie, Aussie, Aussie, Oi, Oi, Oi”, so some enterprising USA fan started echoing “USA!” during their “Oi, Oi, Oi” part, and the hilarity of it had the fanbases competing on who could be the more obnoxious. We sat through two full matches and by 6pm we realized that there were two more which we did not consider when planning our 8pm swimming session.

We unfortunately had to leave to get across town to make it to La Defense Arena which we knew would be MOBBED for one of Frenchman Leon Marchand’s most anticipated races, the 200m IM. We tried our hardest to get there early, but with almost a whole line of Metro stations closed, a 15-minute walk to find an open one, and an RER not running according to schedule, we made it past security with only about 30-40 minutes before the session start time.

Finally entering the famous arena from where amazing stories had been coming out of ALL WEEK

After a SLOW line in concessions, we BARELY made it to our seats and then the “Allez les Bleus!” chant that haunted us anywhere a French Olympian was competing started to surround us in full force. If I never have to hear that again, I will be one happy person. The French fans were spirited, but they also cared nothing about anyone else beside Leon Marchand. I know he is like the Michael Phelps of France (even coached by Michael’s longtime coach Bob Bowman at Arizona State University), but MAN was it disrespectful to the rest of the competitors. That put a little damper on my experience, even though he was AMAZING in his race. It is interesting that the French National Anthem has a lyric “Marchons! Oui Marchons!” and it interestingly changes to “Marchand! Oui Marchand!” when he wins. We did get to watch Ragan Smith from the US win the silver medal in the 200m backstroke, which was exciting!

Men lining up for the “splash and dash”, the 50m freestyle!

Ready for another race! Probably Marchand’s, but I can’t remember 🙂

Us leaving the venue, after a LONG day of Olympic events!

Such a cool building lit up at night, the ACTUAL Grande Arche de La Defense building

Saturday, August 3rd

Our last full day in Paris! We spent a bit of time finding packing materials for my umbrella and mailing it, but in our frenzy of getting everything together, we finally were able to understand the men’s cycling road race route and missed it by like 10 minutes! Saddened, I packed up my umbrella and took it to be mailed, then we headed to Parc des Princes for the women’s soccer quarterfinal match featuring USA vs Japan.

On the walk from the metro to the stadium, it was a long walk! Like 20 minutes! These big places aren’t close to much public transportation! Maybe they make them “far” from a handful of metro lines so everyone is spaced out and going in different directions?

This guy was serving “biere” from his backpack outside the stadium! HA!

Pretty delicious lunch of a hamburger, frites, and a Coke zero in our souvenir cup!

A few things about Parc des Princes. The ability to move about the stadium is limited, there aren’t many restrooms, and the seats are HORRENDOUS. Not only are they not terribly comfortable, but they are SO CLOSE TOGETHER that if I was sitting normally in my seat, my knees would be touching the back of the person sitting in the row in front of me. During halftime, most of the stadium went to the concourse while half of them stayed standing at their seats just because they needed to unfold themselves.

Weird picture, but I had to apologize MANY times for kneeing this lady in the back

Snoop Dogg showed up to cheer on the ladies as well!

The US was NOT playing well. The time of possession was probably the same as Japan, but we kept the ball in our own backfield (is that the correct term? I know nothing) just passing it back and forth. Japan made WAY more shots on goal than we did as their defense was KILLER and we couldn’t get past it. In European soccer, the fans make their displeasure known when players aren’t advancing the ball and start to boo and jeer at the team, and there was PLENTY of that. We didn’t blame them, it was awful. Japan’s uniforms had blue in them, and I even started to hear the French national chant, “Alles les Bleus!” because of the displeasure of the French fans. I found it interesting that in hearing from friends at home, they perceived a great game taking place which leads me to ponder how commentators can influence our perception of a game, because EVERYONE in the stadium was unimpressed, even us USA fans. I was certain that we would lose in penalty kicks until overtime when Trinity Rodman made a shot that was so good that we knew it would go in even before she kicked the ball. Our Olympic events were over, and we only had one last night to say goodbye to Paris.

The saddest picture, leaving our last Olympic event 😦

We had walked across the bridge from our Ile de St. Louis to Ile de la Cite to get to our preferred Metro and RER stations frequently and had passed two classic sidewalk restaurants multiple times a day, and with no dinner plans, we decided that tonight was the perfect night to enjoy one of these probably touristy but so familiar restaurants. We started outside, but soon after we sat down it started raining (rain kept interrupting our fun!) and we moved inside to have a nice and light last meal. One last walk down the island before our flight out the next morning!