March 22nd - March 23rd Day 1: Thursday, Arrival into Paris – 1st night Grand Hôtel du Louvre
Upon arrival into CDG, we grabbed our bags and took the metro straight to our hotel. It probably cost us less than $10 each to do this. The location of the hotel, right beside the Louvre Museum and the Palaces, is a great location, but in a very touristy location. The room was very small but nice, and the staff was super friendly. We arrived at the hotel mid-morning and checked in. Chris did not choose to follow my strategy of getting on the right time zone and face planted into the hotel bed. I explored the immediate area in a haze of jet lag by walking in a straight line down Rue Croix des Petits Champs for as long as I could without getting lost. When I got hungry I found a place called “Paul” and bought a baguette sandwich for me and one for Chris and headed back to the hotel. I later discovered that “Paul” must be the French version of Subway sandwiches because they were everywhere. When Chris woke up, we walked around the area – saw where we were in relation to the Louvre and Jardin des Tuileries etc. It was pouring rain for part of the day but the forecast looked good for the rest of the week so we weren’t worried. We were up pretty late with our body clocks still on CA time.
Day 2: Friday, March 24th
After waking up at the crack of noon, we headed out to find the tourist office to get a museum pass. We got loaded up with literature and the pass and had lunch at a Les Petit's Choux, a cute cafe nearby, again a baguette sandwich and water, this time upstairs in a quaint alley with a nice view of the other buildings. Fueled and ready to go, we headed to the Louvre. What an amazing place – we saw lots of naked statues and beautiful paintings. We spent most of the day there and getting our bearings and sea legs. Seeing the Mona Lisa was special, although it is in a plexiglass box - not so special... I preferred the ones out in the open air.
After a day full of art, we had dinner at a restaurant/wine bar that was recommended by our concierge, a young lady, and she didn’t steer us wrong. We had a lovely dinner at O Chateau which was walking distance from our hotel and just what we were looking for. We had a platter of meats and cheeses and a glass of french wine (we each had a different type of red wine, both were absolutely wonderful). We made a friend in the young waitress, who was a very knowledgeable in wines and had her hospitality internship in the royal palace nearby. She promised to hook Rhys up if he ever wanted to do an internship in Paris! Stayed our 2nd and final night at the Grand Hôtel du Louvre.
Day 3: Saturday, March 25th
Checked into AirBnb – 57 Rue de Charenton, Paris Located in the Bastille area, 11th arrondissement of Paris. Only a couple minute walk to 2 metro lines and bus stations abound.
Checked into AirBnb – 57 Rue de Charenton, Paris Located in the Bastille area, 11th arrondissement of Paris. Only a couple minute walk to 2 metro lines and bus stations abound.
After getting up "early" and rushing out of the hotel to get to the Bastille by 11am, We met Michel, the "Superhost" of his AirBnb outside the door of the entrance to the building. He was just as I had expected from the recommendation of Keeran Reidling, who had stayed there November 2016. He was so cheery and welcoming. He gave us a tour of his "Beautiful Apartment Paris Bastille" which was exactly as in the pictures, with a full kitchen and bathroom. This building was built before the French revolution.
After the tour of the apartment, Michel took us on a brisk tour of the area. He showed us which his favorite Boulangerie, Patisserie, restaurants, markets (we were a block from the Place d'Aligre which has the daily market and a block from the Marché Bastille, which is on Thursdays and Sundays. Michel also took us down into the metro to show us how to purchase a book of 10 tickets for the metro/bus/train - each one way was 1.45Euro - very reasonable. We either walked or took this transportation as we explored Paris.
After Michel finished with his tour and left us in the Metro station with our newly purchased tickets, Chris and I decided to go back to eat lunch at one of the cute tiny restaurants he had introduced us to (and to the owner/cook).
It was called "Miss Lunch" and the gal who runs it is called "Miss Lunch"! She is delightful - she looks and speaks very french but she is originally from Canada so she spoke to us in english. We learned that you don't just walk into a restaurant in Paris without reservations - she was scheduled to be full that day (there were only a few tables) BUT she allowed us to sit down as we were early and noone had arrived yet - and she made her customer "Simon" eat WITH us since this was supposed to be his table.
She told us Simon's wife had just had a baby and we chatted with him throughout lunch. It was really fun - he was commiserating with us about our election - saying that France was in the same boat right now. We ate a lovely home cooked healthy lunch, reasonable in price, and loved our "Miss Lunch" experience. She has a cookbook, but currently only written in French - she says she'd love to publish it in english soon!
After lunch, we headed up to Montmartre and Sacre Coeur so Chris could take pictures of the city and the Eiffel Tower from afar. We walked there and thought we'd take the funicular up but didn't see the entrance so we ended up walking the entire way. That was some exercise I did not expect! We made it, though, and stayed until the sun set and Chris took lots of pictures. I took a few with my phone - It was beautiful but crowded - lots of musicians and artists, people having food and drinks and the views of the city were amazing. We walked all the way back down again. As you can see - we had great weather!
Day 4: Sunday, March 26th
Caught the end of the big outside market (Marché Bastille) near our apartment. I didn't buy anything but loved to look at the stalls full of flowers and vegetables and wares. I made a trip over to "Le Cafe des Chats" which was high on my list of places to visits - it's a cafe that has many cats living there. Only cat lovers would put this on their list! It was a beautiful cafe - very clean with, as promised, cats strolling around everywhere. I had a salad and tea while Chris relaxed at the apartment and loved my time with the cats! The cafe was in the Bastille area so a quick walk from our apartment. After getting my cat fix, I headed back to meet Chris and go out for a beautiful walk. The weather was warm and sunny!
I happened through a walkway in an area called the Cour Damoye. Here is a rough translation of the description of what this area was: "The courtyard Damoye is the westernmost of the former courses of artisans of the faubourg Saint-Antoine.This axis which connects the Bastille to Nation, was formerly the fief of cabinetmakers, carpenters and scrap dealers. Today all these small industries have left the courtyard Damoye whose entry is rather discreet between two terraces of the Place de la Bastille .
The courtyard, which is a little more than 120 meters long and 6 meters wide, connects 12 Place de la Bastille to 12 Rue Daval. It was in 1778 that a certain Antoine Pierre Damoye acquired the land which had hitherto served as a shooting range for arquebusiers in Paris. This Parisian hardware store benefited from the drilling of the rue Daval in 1780 to subdivide the land of small industrial buildings which he leased to scrap dealers, ragpickers and other craftsmen among whom many Auvergnats mounted in the capital and grouped around the Rue de Lappe in What Alphonse Daudet called "the Auvergnat ghetto".
I was so happy to have wandered through it. It was beautiful and probably more so in the summer.
After going home to collect Chris , we headed out to do a walk that I had heard about called the "Garden Walk" on the Coulée verte René-Dumont that follows the old Vincennes railway line. "At its west end near the Bastille, the parkway rises 10 m above the surrounding area and forms the Viaduc des Arts, over a line of shops featuring high quality and expensive arts and crafts. The shops are located in the arches of the former elevated railway viaduct, with the parkway being supported atop the viaduct." This walk was beautiful. They have a paved sidewalk with garden along both sides and spring had already begun before we arrived in Paris. Everything was budding or in bloom. There were people walking, walking bikes, leading kids, the weather was beautiful and the forsythias were wild in bloom.
We walked to the end and then headed back to our place, this time on surface streets. We found a bakery and bought something to snack on, as we were going to our fancy dinner at the Train Bleu later in the evening.
More blog to come in the second part of this wonderful journey!
Caught the end of the big outside market (Marché Bastille) near our apartment. I didn't buy anything but loved to look at the stalls full of flowers and vegetables and wares. I made a trip over to "Le Cafe des Chats" which was high on my list of places to visits - it's a cafe that has many cats living there. Only cat lovers would put this on their list! It was a beautiful cafe - very clean with, as promised, cats strolling around everywhere. I had a salad and tea while Chris relaxed at the apartment and loved my time with the cats! The cafe was in the Bastille area so a quick walk from our apartment. After getting my cat fix, I headed back to meet Chris and go out for a beautiful walk. The weather was warm and sunny!
I happened through a walkway in an area called the Cour Damoye. Here is a rough translation of the description of what this area was: "The courtyard Damoye is the westernmost of the former courses of artisans of the faubourg Saint-Antoine.This axis which connects the Bastille to Nation, was formerly the fief of cabinetmakers, carpenters and scrap dealers. Today all these small industries have left the courtyard Damoye whose entry is rather discreet between two terraces of the Place de la Bastille .
The courtyard, which is a little more than 120 meters long and 6 meters wide, connects 12 Place de la Bastille to 12 Rue Daval. It was in 1778 that a certain Antoine Pierre Damoye acquired the land which had hitherto served as a shooting range for arquebusiers in Paris. This Parisian hardware store benefited from the drilling of the rue Daval in 1780 to subdivide the land of small industrial buildings which he leased to scrap dealers, ragpickers and other craftsmen among whom many Auvergnats mounted in the capital and grouped around the Rue de Lappe in What Alphonse Daudet called "the Auvergnat ghetto".
I was so happy to have wandered through it. It was beautiful and probably more so in the summer.
After going home to collect Chris , we headed out to do a walk that I had heard about called the "Garden Walk" on the Coulée verte René-Dumont that follows the old Vincennes railway line. "At its west end near the Bastille, the parkway rises 10 m above the surrounding area and forms the Viaduc des Arts, over a line of shops featuring high quality and expensive arts and crafts. The shops are located in the arches of the former elevated railway viaduct, with the parkway being supported atop the viaduct." This walk was beautiful. They have a paved sidewalk with garden along both sides and spring had already begun before we arrived in Paris. Everything was budding or in bloom. There were people walking, walking bikes, leading kids, the weather was beautiful and the forsythias were wild in bloom.
We walked to the end and then headed back to our place, this time on surface streets. We found a bakery and bought something to snack on, as we were going to our fancy dinner at the Train Bleu later in the evening.
More blog to come in the second part of this wonderful journey!
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