littlemountain

We started a 24-night trip to France, arriving September 11, 2008, with 5 nights in Paris. 5 nights was just long enough to afford us the bargain of renting an apartment versus paying proportionately higher Paris hotel costs. We stayed in the perennially charming, still unspoiled Marais, in a well-appointed, well-serviced studio at the corner of Rue des Tournelles and Rue des Minimes.

We’ve been to Paris before; our last visit of any duration was 2000, when we spent a week in Montparnasse. The challenge of any return traveler is to avoid re-treading too many paths, however enjoyable the trip down them was the first time around. So, no Eiffel Tower, no Louvre (somewhat of a logistical relief, I must admit). It took more discipline to pass on the Orsay and Rodin museums.

Day 1, after 13 hours in the air, was spent lolling around the Place des Vosges, trying to stay awake long enough to eat dinner and re-set our clocks. I chose the Brasserie Bofinger, quite frankly, because its history and décor was reputed to exceed the quality of its cuisine, and, if there was a night on which our taste buds might have been dulled by fatigue and dehydration, this was it. Happily, it exceeded my expectations, with a stellar baked prawn gratinée pour moi and a small seafood tower for MBH.

Day 2 started with an unexpected disappointment: the Musée Picasso was closed for annual maintenance. We quickly diverted to the nearby Musée Carnavalet for its historical exhibits, particularly of the history of Paris. Enjoyable, but not indispensable. After lunch, after an absence of 25 years, my first (wholly defensible) return visit to the Musée de l’Orangerie. Replacing the second floor with a skylight was a brilliant idea, as demonstrated in our own visit by the effect that changes in lighting brought about by passing clouds had on Les Nymphéas. Very moving. We had dinner in an unheralded arrondissement (the 13th) which I will always hold in great affection, for it was my habitual abode as a student in the mid 80’s. Duly inculcated by the reputation of Christophe Beaufront, we went to L’Avant Gôut and both ordered his signature Pot-au-feu de cochon aux épices. It was good, and the bistro was efficiently convivial. But, as far as pork is concerned, it didn’t come close to producing the whimpering ecstasy of the dishes we enjoyed some 3 weeks later at Le Saint Cochon in Lyon.

Day 3, the jet lag caught up with us. We had a good, albeit increasingly dazed, walkabout through a randomly bizarre combination of shops and churches, including La Madeleine and Saint-Chapelle. We had dinner on Île Saint-Louis, at the bistro Mon Vieil Ami. For all its publicized fixation on vegetables, I must say, the most memorable dish it produced was a tender, moist and medium rare dorade (notwithstanding its “tomato tartare” accompaniment) which went swimmingly with a Santenay Premier Cru.

Day 4, Chateau de Versailles. It was worth the effort of planning to be in Versailles on a weekend, when the fountains are operating. Pretty lush. In some ways, however, more interesting than the main palace, notwithstanding its gilded rooms, was the “Hamlet” which Marie Antoinette created, a mock village in which she could play at being a common shepherdess. No wonder she was beheaded! Less interesting, and infinitely more annoying and banal, was the marriage of the priapic, self-aggrandizing, cartoonish “art” of Jeff Koons with the rooms of the chateau. Jeff Koons. What a %$#@&% [English idiom which starts with “w”, rhymes with “anchor”]. Dinner at Chez Janou in the Marais. Excellent Provencal cuisine: mussels gratin, grilled prawns, duck breast with rosemary, cassoulet, world-class rude, incompetent waiter, soberly, discreetly and apologetically covered for by his colleagues (one of which he rewarded by colliding with at full speed as he swept past our table).

Day 5. We went to Montmartre. One of the more maligned “touristy” destinations in Paris, but I must say, we really felt we had left Paris as surely as the turn of the century artists for whom it was outskirts of town. Excellent, simple lunch at Auberge de la Bonne Franquette, off the beaten track. Good 45 minutes in the Dali exhibition. Nice walk down the hill, past the locations of so many classic paintings of the era and the homes of their painters. Last night in Paris, dinner at Terminus Nord. We like the old art nouveau / art deco brasseries. This one, too, didn’t disappoint.

Next up: Bordeaux

flsd

Would you mind sharing a few logistical details, e.g., which apartment service you used, whether any of the restaurants required reservations, general price ranges, if you recall, etc.? Thanks.

yk

Hi littlemountain-

I'm enjoying your trip report so far. Looks like our paths crossed a little bit in Paris, as we arrived on Sept 12 and we were in Marais that afternoon. In fact, we went to Musée Carnavalet that day.

I take that you didn't enjoy the Jeff Koons installation at Versailles. DH & I thought it was quite humorous, actually.

Pizza_Tina

What's a dorade? I don't know these fancy food terms.

Let's keep it real.

Tina from the Bronx

PatrickLondon

&quot;dorade&quot; <i>is</i> real. A quick Google will tell you it's a fish. If you don't know something <i>look it up</i>.

littlemountain

More Paris Details

All the above restaurants except Terminus Nord needed to be booked in advance, especially L’Avant G&ocirc;ut and Mon Vieil Ami, which we had been advised should be booked at least a week in advance. Three course meals at L’Avant G&ocirc;ut, Mon Vieil Ami and Bofinger averaged about &euro;35 to &euro;45, without wine. Terminus Nord and Chez Janou were perhaps &euro;10 less.

Dorade usually translates to “sea bream”. Very common in France, less common in North America. A tender white fish.

We found the Marais apartment on VRBO (it is #34170). You can also view it at www.topstayinmarais.com; it’s the smaller of the two. The owner was very helpful and flexible in terms of couriering keys to us before we left home, thus allowing us to enter immediately upon morning arrival at Charles de Gaulle (once she was able to confirm the apartment was not occupied the night before; otherwise we would have had to wait until 2 p.m.). Both she and her caretaker on the ground in Paris were accessible and responsive when we needed them (once) to fix something.

Jed

It would be to your advantage to keep your report together on this thread.

Leely2

It would also be to our (the readers') advantage.

Thanks for following up with the additional details. I try to hit L’Avant G&ocirc;ut whenever I'm fortunate enough to be in Paris, although I've never ordered the pork! I have enjoyed many dishes and its relaxed-yet-convivial atmosphere. Sorry you had a terrible waiter at Chez Janou.

flsd

Very helpful, thanks.

TPAYT

Enjoyed the details of your report. We also were in Paris at the same time.

Mon Viel Ami is not on our favorite list, but Bofinger is on our list of &quot;let's return&quot;.

Our favorite dinner of this trip to Paris was at &quot;L'ilot Vache&quot; on Rue St. Louis en Ile.

cigalechanta

I found the food very good at Bofinger as well as at the petite Bofinger

littlemountain

Part 2 – Bordeaux
Day 6 - We took the TGV to Bordeaux. As few urban hops have higher “sweat potential” than those which necessitate the dragging of luggage through metro stations (the weight of the luggage seemingly being positively correlated to the likelihood an escalator will be out of service), we deliberately avoided running through the big station (Chatelet) we could have changed at enroute to Montparnasse 1 et 2. Instead, we went from Bastille through Place d’Italie and arrived at Montparnasse in good time. Our rail pass and reservations had all been pre-booked through Rail Europe.
Lovely view of the countryside from the train. For its modest size (smaller than Texas!), there is still certainly a lot of beautiful, unspoiled, sparsely populated countryside in France. On arrival in Bordeaux, we checked in at the Best Western Bayonne Etche-Ona, early. It was well located, on the main shopping street, 3 minutes from the Opera, but not exactly value for money – around the same &euro;160 per night that we paid for quite spectacular chateaux later in our trip.
The City of Bordeaux is a very pleasant surprise if you’ve been there before, but not recently. Lots and lots of Euros have obviously gone into its improvement. For years, it was rather grimy and closed-off from its surroundings; the area along the West side of the river, for example, mostly seemed to consist of parking lots. No more. Buildings have been steam-cleaned, pedestrian and visitor-friendly areas opened up on both sides of the river, tramway system put in, and friendliness dust seemingly sprinkled around. At our first lunch, our carafe of wine was gone by the time our cheese plate arrived. A short time later, our waiter brought us two glasses of wine – on the house. “It’s not right to have cheese, without wine”, he said. This was at the Bistrot Romain, part of a medium-sized chain of Italian restaurants but, in Bordeaux at least, nonetheless a great, inexpensive place to sit outside on a pedestrian mall in the sunshine. We returned the next day for lunch and had an equally delightful meal with another excellent waiter, both young, both eager to please.
Dinner our first night in Bordeaux was also something special: Jean Ramet. A small, elegant Michelin-included family-run restaurant we booked on short notice. Our good luck with fish continued, for mains, sea bass in a red wine sauce. Plus the entre&eacute;s (a trio of innovative tastes I can’t recall and a sardine dish approved of by MBH). Plus the cheese, and a red fruit dessert. &euro;70 each without wine, but very satisfying, and we returned past the floodlit main square by the Opera wondering if and when we would ever be able to eat again.
Day 7: Laundry, lunch, nap – a leisurely down day. By evening, we were regrouped and, from the main tourist office, took a night open-top bus tour of Bordeaux. Much of Bordeaux has been designated as a UNESCO-recognized cultural site, and we were out seeing it with live commentary in French and English for a good 2+ hours. I was struck by how few buildings in the area had any degree of set-back from the street; every square metre of space seemed to have been used. We were done that by 10 p.m. and (having booked earlier that day) quickly made our way to Le Mably for dinner (about &euro;30 each, without wine, nice old house, satisfying meal). This evening, we were equipped to get some great late night photos of the old, floodlit buildings in the town core.
Day 8: Wine time. We took an all-day bus tour, booked again through the main tourist office. If you’re interested in such a tour, my advice would be to make the tourist office your first stop in Bordeaux to make an (essential) advance booking. It was my first stop on the day we arrived and the next day’s tours were already fully booked. By now, however, it was the day after that, and we were on the “Tour of the Grands Crus Class&eacute;s de Graves”. That involved stops at two wineries in Graves (drawn from a published list of about 10) plus a last stop at Le Ch&acirc;teau de La Br&egrave;de, a home of the philosopher and wine grower Montesquieu. The first stop, at Chateau Latour-Martillac, focused on the ins and outs of winemaking, moving through the different stages of the process and places in the winery, followed, of course, by a tasting. The second stop, at Chateau Bouscaut, focused on lunch. Lunch, a sit-down affair at tables of 10 in the main building was presided over by the chateau’s most gracious owner, Sophie Lurton, a member of the well-known Lurton family (which owns some 17 properties in Bordeaux). Beautiful lamb, very generous pours – including the stellar 2005 vintage. Lunch alone justified the &euro;85 per head cost of the tour.

That evening, we saw our first rain of the trip – a torrential downpour which came and went as we had a light dinner at Bistrot Negocian. That was the last rain we saw for another two weeks. We were lucky with the September weather.

Next up: the Dordogne and Lot Valleys