megamanstar

Hi everyone, my fiance and I are looking to take a trip to France (starting in Paris) in mid-January, between 1/12- ~1/19, and looking for suggestions on what to do. I know it's a short trip, but neither of us have much time off from work and looking to make the best of it. I must admit, that I know next to nothing about France as I've never been there. I'm not sure about the best places to stay in or things to do, so I'm hoping some of you could help us out on that front.

About us, late 30's couple who like to explore and more active things. We both love to cook and looking forward to trying some great restaurants and even take a cooking class, if it works out. One of my fiance's favorite places, during a recent trip here in the States, was to a goat cheese fromagerie where you could sit in a really cool rustic patio area and dine on goat cheeses and wine. If there's a unique experience like that out there, it would be awesome.

A coworker of mine recommended spending 2-3 days in Paris then taking a train down to Lyon for a few days. Exploring a few cities would be great but I don't want to push our luck. Would visiting a nearby country work in this?

Any ideas? What's reasonable to do in that short of a trip?

Any help would be sincerely appreciated.

StCirq

With a week, you barely have time to do Paris, never mind another country - or really even another city - that's pretty much totally out of the question. You might cut short your trip to Paris with a day or two in Lyon, but really, you could spend months in Paris and never run out of things to do. Yours is a very short trip, very.

As for where to stay and what to do, I'm sure you're delving into guidebooks and websites and maps, no? If not, get on it.

Paris is full of "foodie" experiences these days, wine tastings, cheese visits, foodie tours, none of which hold any appeal to me because you can do it all on your own so easily but it's something you might want to google. I've heard good things about O'Château for wine or maybe it's champagne tasting, but again, I live in France and so am not so interested in tours of places.

The Michelin Guides are excellent. For young folks, Let's Go and Lonely Planet are good. And of course study a map of Paris so you know how to get around when you get there, and study www.ratp.fr and www.parisbytrain.com.

Bonne visite!

Christina

It's only a week, and the middle of January when it will be very cold. Don't you have any particular cities of interest where you've wanted to go in Europe? You could do something easy like split the week between Paris and London.

Of course you could just spend the week in Paris, but for someone who doesn't know much about France at all and I gather no particular dying wish to go to Paris, that's putting all your eggs in one basket, what if you don't like it that much? Do you even like French cuisine? YOu can do a one day cooking class there if you want, of course, but you ought to have some interest in French food first.

Lyon has good food, but it's different, depends what you like. Not sure it would wow a newcomer who has never heard of it, but it is smaller than Paris, so that's not a terrible idea. YOu could take the train farther than Lyon easily in France, anyway, depends what you want to do. Or you could take it to Strasbourg and combine Paris with Alsace (if you like German food, taht might be good). The train to Nice on the Riviera would take up a whole day so wouldn't really recommend that.

Do you have any interest at all in French cuisine, film, art, literature or music?

StuDudley

In mid-January - I would just stay in Paris. PLENTY of stuff to do there. Paris will be more "alive" in mid-January than most/all other cities in France. Take a day-trip to Versailles from Paris.

Rent an apt with cooking facilities. Go to some local markets (outdoor/grocery stores), and cook dinner "at home" a few times.

Stu Dudley

nytraveler

You must understand that in mid Jan you will have short (8 am to 4 pm at most) and mostly gray days, that are chilly/cold with strong possibility of rain, freezing rain, sleet or even some snow. Definitely stay in Paris and see as much as your can - keeping any outdoor activities for whatever sunny days you may get. If you want to get outside of Paris either do Versailles or a day trip to one of the cities quick to get to on the TGV.

But heading to stay in other cities - or countries - will really pull a lot of your very limited time and since the countryside will not be very pleasant - you risk seeing not much.

(Don't misunderstand me, we have been to many different areas/cities in France and loved them - but not in January.)

greg

Are you skiers? Then the French Alps beckons you. It is the right season. Otherwise, it is a poor time to venture out of big cities. If you must leave Paris, Amsterdam/London are possibilities, in which case, it would have made sense to do open-jaw flight into AMS/LHR, back from CDG or vice versa so as not to consume half a day back-tracking. If you already have round-trip airfare to CDG (pity) , then if you MUST leave Paris, try hard not to stay in Paris twice by traveling straight to your outside-Paris destination upon landing. A simple time and money computations would show you how much time you whittle away if you have to check-in/out of hotel in Paris for the second time.

welltraveledbrit

I really like Paris in the winter, fewer tourists, lots of lights. I think you could enjoy it. I agree that cities are better than the countryside when the weather is diced but you may find somewhere that offers something special for truffle season which would combine the time of year you are going with your foodie interests. Or you could consider Champagne which isn't far from Paris, or Burgundy?
We enjoyed a couple of nights at Chateau D'Ige
http://www.chateaudige.com/uk/index.php

Here are some Paris ideas
http://www.somuchmoretosee.com/search/label/Paris

Have fun!