Paris, Las Vegas and Paris, France go tete-a-tete

Having visited both Paris, Las Vegas (PLV) and Paris, France (PF) recently, I felt I should offer an honest comparison of the two cities. Both were visited as part of birthday celebrations, PLV was a present for my 27th, and we went to PF for Charlotte's 30th. 


Attractions

PF has the Eiffel Tower. So does PLV. While PFs version is slightly larger, PLV has to win as the ticket to go up is included with the hotel room. I'm not sure if this should be positive or negative, but PLV does not have signs warning about pickpockets, nor touts selling miniature versions.

A similar story with the Arc de Triomphe, and the gardens at Versailles. PLV picks up points here as all three can be visited within about 30 minutes. In PF we spend a whole day visiting Versailles, an evening on the Arc, and a good hour looking at the Tower. PF has a lot to learn from its American cousin about efficiency. The pools at Versailles PF were freezing cold and uninviting, with no towel service. Louis XIV would be disappointed. 

PF does beat PLV on sheer number of attractions. Notre Dame, St Sulpice, the Catacombs, and the Louvre were particular highlights. 

Food, Restaurants and Cafes
The variety of food in PF is unsurpassed, and the quality and service is excellent. However, you do have to go outside in the cold to get to them and I was fortunate to have several translators on hand to navigate the menus. On the other hand, PLV has a handful of authentic-sounding restaurants, all easily accessed from inside... but most just sell burgers. Cafe Flore in PF does an exceptional hot chocolate (according to the waiter it has no water in it), and Le Bonaparte does a superb Foie Gras. Ahhh, charmed life. PF wins.


Transportation
The PF metro system is a complex web of subterranean tunnels, difficult for simple foreigners to navigate. PLV on the other hand, has an elevated monorail, free and easy to use. It can whip you over to Venice (aka The Venetian) or New York, New York in a matter of minutes.






Accommodation 
The luxury hotel room in PLV was hard to beat, but the tiny, tiny, central city apartment in PF was a clear winner, fitting 9 people in a space not much larger than the PLV room, with novelty factor to boot. Charlotte booked both, and her talents for finding great places to stay shone through on both occasions. 


Entertainment
The constant rattle of slot machines, and the selection of shows make PLV a standout. We had to make our own entertainment in PF.

Summary
All in all, a difficult comparison, and I'd recommend visiting both to make up your own mind. I've decided to give the award to PF for sheer authenticity. Next time, I'll compare Paris, France with Paris, Hilton.


(PS. Check out this post or this one for our notes on PLV)

Drogheda... rhymes with "broader"

Our first excursion out of Dublin and into the Irish countryside was to Drogheda. Like most Irish words, only half the letters have any impact on how it sounds.

We caught the train up on Saturday afternoon, dropped into a local pub (signposted as Matthews, but known locally as McPhails for some reason), and dined well at the hotel restaurant - "The d hotel". We had a great view of the town from the hotel balcony.

Drogheda and the nearby Boyne valley is absolutely full of history medieval ruins and more recent churches.  In 1649 Oliver Cromwell slaughtered most of the town, including 200 men who had surrendered. In 1690 the Battle of the Boyne took place just up the river, where Catholic King James II and Protestant King William III (aka William of Orange) faced off. William won, and thus began the Orange Order which continues to be a controversial force in Ireland.


But a few thousand years before that, stone-age Irish were busy further up the Boyne, building strange mounds. And that's what we were there to see. A short taxi-ride out of town is the ironically (it's 5000 years old) Newgrange, which is essentially a large mound of stones and dirt with a tunnel in it.

The photo above is of the entrance to the tunnel. It heads in about 20m and up about 2m to a point where the stone-age folk scattered the remains of their dead. The stone in front of the entrance is engraved with the triple spiral which was an important symbol of the day. The rest of the exterior (the little white stones) is reconstructed from material found on the site, but the tunnel and mound are all original.


The really clever bit of this whole arrangement occurs on the morning of the winter solstice, when the sun rises (yes, even in Ireland) and shines through the box above the entrance way. It illuminates the tunnel for around 17 minutes before returning it to complete darkness.


The countryside around Newgrange is picture perfect Ireland. We headed back into town and swung by the church where St Oliver Plunkett's severed head (he was hanged, drawn and quartered for treason) is on display, before catching the train back to Dublin.


We missed a lot of the Droghedian (a word?) sights, so we'll definitely be going back there a some stage to check out the things we missed.