5 days in Paris for art-loving walkers

Old May 21st, 2009, 04:31 PM
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5 days in Paris for art-loving walkers

Greetings,

This is an intro to our 5 days in Paris during which we did lots of art-related activities and walked 8-10 miles each day. I will try to highlight some special things we did rather than hit all the news of the day. We have been to Paris many times where I lived for a year, I am fluent in French and enjoy drawing and painting. First some mechanics and how they worked.

a great direct flight from USAirways from Charlotte to Paris--$550 each plus ins.
hotel which we paid for in $$ --Hotel Raspail Montparnasse, a bargain in the 14th at the original hotel where I stayed 45 years ago on my first day in Paris when I arrived as a student. 3* hotel in a very handy location, our room available for us at 8 in the morning.

Hotel Raspail Montparnasse, thru Clickhotels which included continental breakfast which was delicious. Much less expensive than booking directly thru hotel.

Booked pickup with Shuttle-inter however we did not the same good experience as others. Driver was 25 minutes late, we had to call company and eventually found him--no sign, no nothing--he talked on the phone in an Indian dialect for the entire time.

Will update on key experiences on the next comment.
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Old May 22nd, 2009, 03:30 AM
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*drums fingers impatiently on desk*
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Old May 22nd, 2009, 07:20 AM
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Thursday: After a walk in the St. Germain area, we decided to go to Picasso museum as it was a rainy day. Had a good visit, walk around Marais and on to Hotel de Ville. DH wanted a little nap late in the day, so I decided to take a walk around the 14th by myself as that had been an old haunt of mine. It's a great neighborhood--took photos of some of the tile fronts of buildings and of the gardens at Fondation Cartier on Blvd. Raspail. We had pre-booked for dinner at 138 Parnasse on Montparnasse a few blocks from Raspail--booked on thefork.com at no charge and got a champagne aperitif as a gift. We recommend both the booking service and the resto. For 19e, we had 3 courses, very good, a nice setting and extremely hospitable service. We also had a 1/2 carafe of wine--total with a little tip on top 50e. We decided right then and there to go back on our last nite. DH has smoked salmon and risotto entree, 2 fish in crust with fresh veggies and sauce, fantastic and a chocolate dessert. I had the pleurottes (a type of mushroom)in sauce entree, little lamb chops in sauce and ice cream selection for dessert A BARGAIN. I shall do a first time attempt at posting from Picasa--hope it works.
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo...eat=directlink
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo...eat=directlink
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FRIDAY--slept late and enjoyed a lovely breakfast with a charming madame who has worked there for many years--one can have breakfast in ones room or in the little breakfast room--we chose the latter. Fresh-squeezed orange juice, croissants, pain au chocolat, cafe au lait--worth coming to France just for that. Unfortunately, weather cool and rainy on and off. We decided to stop at FNAC on rue de Rennes at
St. Placide to buy tix for musée d'Orsay. Although we have been many times, we always enjoy it, and with immediate entry on a less than ideal day, weather-wise, it was a good plan. Can't emphasize enough how convenient and inexpensive it is to get preferred immediate entry through FNAC at their billeterie. I will post a few photos here and then be sure this photo posting is working before continuing.
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo...eat=directlink
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Old May 22nd, 2009, 07:52 AM
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Friday cont. After leaving Musée d'Orsay, we decided to walk over to the Petit Palais. The garden is beautiful there, although we had on again off again rain--ate in their self-service cafe--shared a delicious chicken and crudité sandwich on multi-seeded baguette, with 2 glasses water (we are super budget-oriented travelers) and that was just what we needed and quite a lovely setting.
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo...eat=directlink
Petit Palais is free--has a terrific and varied collection with quite a few impressionists and a vast collection of icons (I had studied Greek icons at a divinity school in conjunction with art department so it was very interesting to me.) Decided to walk up and down the Champs Elysées where u will see me posed with my new car (perhaps u doubt me!) http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo...eat=directlink
We stopped at the auction house on ave. Montaigne and decided to walk around--very posh--a cafe inside but we chose to continue on. One observation--all along key tourist areas there are the usual homeless and beggars but in particular, women sitting on the sidewalk with a paper coffee cup, greek design--they are gypsies and I believe part of a ring. They all wear the same carpet slippers and long skirts and I saw a young gypsy girl making the rounds to them picking up the money and speaking with them. We also saw one "on the way to work" early one morning, same outfit, but with a little briefcase in hand, headed to the Champs Elysées. Be careful, they are not working alone and they have spotters who may soon be after your wallet. We walked back to our hotel, quite a long walk from there and had 2 beers in the lobby and read the paper. We saw tons of little Smartcars everywhere--here are 2 mating. http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo...eat=directlink
Tonight we have a reso at Charles - Victor 8 Rue Brézin, Paris, 75014 which we booked through toptable.com. Very satisfactory dinner and a cute local place. About 4 metro stops for us, but we walked and enjoyed the walk. It was 18 euros for 2 courses, we chose entree and main and skipped the dessert. We had the 1/2 carafe of rose, a bit more than last night-- we enjoyed it and stayed within our budget. DH had an interesting starter tiny potatoes in a truffle dressing with a salad and a Moroccan chicken pastilla with apricots in papillotte. I had a fantastic aubergine gratin with delicious tomato sauce--honestly I would have it everyday if I could. I followed that with a roasted salmon and zucchini. All in all a lovely experience. As the desserts were another 8,50 e, we decided to forgo. We walked back to our hotel down Boulevard Raspail and we enjoyed a number of interesting sights on the way.
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo...eat=directlink
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Old May 22nd, 2009, 10:57 AM
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Excellent. I will try to stop my fingers from drumming while waiting for more.
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Old May 22nd, 2009, 02:25 PM
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Thanks Kerouac--u may be my audience of 1 right now, but I shall continue on --if others want to check it out, it is available but of course, there is lots out there on Paris.
Saturday--Boy we are getting this sleeping in thing under control--and it feels great. After our breakfast, we headed out to the Sorbonne--to walk the streets I used to walk as a student. Much fun. Walked through the Luxembourg gardens on our way, seeing folks practicing Tai Chi under the umbrella of trees. http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo...eat=directlink
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo...eat=directlink
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo...eat=directlink
We stopped into Saint Severin to admire the interior, before heading over the bridge to go to Hotel de Ville.
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo...eat=directlink
Place des Vosges and rue des rosiers are faves of ours--so we walked there and enjoyed the locations--hearing musiciens in the galeries and finally some in and out sunlight. We decided to go into the Musée Carnavalent and the garden at the Hotel de Sulley--both free and lovely.
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo...eat=directlink
From there, we took a long walk to Place Vendome, enjoying the lovely space and gorgeous windows. It is interesting, with all the recent jewelry heists in Europe, it is only about windows anyway--one must make prior appointments by phone, and be thoroughly checked out to enter these exclusive shops (fortunately, no problem for us)and there are spotters all over the place. The whole place is like a gorgeous vault. We walked to Madeleine metro from here and took the metro back to the hotel, as we had a BIG evening ahead.
Once a year, France has the "nuit de musées" when all the museums in the country are open to midnight and free. We grabbed a snack at a charcuterie and headed to the metro to be at the Orangerie when it opened for the evening. Alas we were not the first to arrive, and we waited in line for the museum to open. It was fun chatting with the folks in line, primarily Parisians where we were as we waited and in we went in about 30 minutes. Monet's waterlilies in the large rotunda are the famous attraction of the Orangerie and we enjoyed them--but for us, the most incredible experience was the lower level of the museum which housed the incredible collection of art dealer Paul Guillaume and his wife, Mme Jean Walter. These works of art were held privately until 1984 and not viewed by the public. Until the renovation of the Orangerie, they did not have a permanent place--and it is an amazing collection. We stayed for about 1 1/2 hours talking with one of the curators who just happened to approach us and telling us so much. It was great. When we came out, the Eiffel Tower was just lighting up for the first time in the evening at about 9:15 or so--it was great.
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo...eat=directlink
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo...eat=directlink
We enjoyed the Place de la Concorde and then walked about 1+ miles to the Bibliothèque Nationale to see the Henri Riviere exhibit. We were pooped by the time we finished and took the metro back around 11--a memorable evening.
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Old May 22nd, 2009, 03:03 PM
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Appreciate your report. I am dreaming of a return trip to France with lots of museums, wandering and good food--so you are hitting the right notes as far as I'm concerned.
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Old May 22nd, 2009, 03:09 PM
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I'm enjoying reading about your stay in Paris, sounds like a great trip.
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Old May 22nd, 2009, 03:46 PM
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Sunday--We can hardly believe that we are awakening at 9--good grief--this hasn't happened in years. Our plan today is to attend the organ postlude at St. Sulpice, which has a magnificent organ and organist. We head out from our hotel, arriving at about 11--go on in and sit in the back pew and participate in the service. The sermon seems very focused on taking children to church at every opportunity--hmmm--after communion, we discover that the reason is in the front of the church, beyond our sight, filled with children making their first communion and that it is first communion Sunday in France. Ok--that means the service goes on a lot longer and in the end, the organ postlude, which is lovely, is shorter than usual. Oh well, still nice--we meet several American couples in the same area of the church who do not speak French and fill them in--some very nice folks, some of whom we rediscover in the airport as the Philadelphia flight is waiting to take off--isn't it amazing. From St. Sulpice, we head over to the rue de Seine area and browse around. We walk around for about an hour and then stop at a Chinese restaurant, Le Lac d'Or on rue Gregoire de Tours for lunch. We see they have a 8e 3 course lunch. In we go and have a very satisfactory lunch, nice service and a substantial French clientele. We are seated next to a couple with young boy about 9, who tell us they have come to this resto for many years, even before the yound man was born (he seems very proud of the fact that he came in his Mother's tummy). It turns out he has just made his first communion at St. Germain and this is their celebration lunch--we congratulate their son, they shake hands with us and once again we are pleased to interact with people, which is a good part of what travel is all about. We head down the rue Jacob as a French student of mine has selected a hotel on that street with my help, and I want to be sure we haven't goofed.Fortunately it appears to be a lovely spot and we continue on down the street to the Ecole des Beaux Arts, the university art faculty. It is closed on Sunday, but we ring the doorbell just the same. A young man comes out and says we can come in but not in the gallery, however in the interior restored section--it is amazing.
http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo...eat=directlink
All restored mosaic and painting with enormous domed glass ceiling--with a huge tree trunk which runs the length of the interior. Wow--glad we didn't miss this. It is raining and we decide to head back to the hotel. We relax with coffee in the lounge. Tonight we have plans to go to dinner at the studio/salon/famous get together of Jim Haynes. We take the metro there and meet lots of nice people, have a good dinner and are pleased to have met a guy who has made his living in Paris doing this for 30 years. http://jim-haynes.com/ He is charming and funny and we can see why people love to come to participate.
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Old May 22nd, 2009, 05:23 PM
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I almost died when I saw your photo of the building on Rue St. Jacques with the picture of Polly Magoo. I wish I had known that building was there as I stayed on Rue Thenard this past November.

My sn on Fodor's used to be Polly Magoo until I was banned.

Thin aka Polly Magoo
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Old May 22nd, 2009, 08:03 PM
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Wonderful! You have a gift for finding good & inexpensive restaurants. I love museums and walking 10 miles a day - not necessarily IN the museum - so this is perfect.
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Old May 23rd, 2009, 03:34 AM
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Rosetravels--we did plenty of outside walking--after all the beautiful buildings and architecture are an outside museum as far as we are concerned. And our Monday schedule is very much an outside beauty one--but will tell u about that in a min. It is a bit more difficult to find really good budget restos in Paris now--at least in the center core--the new pp "budget" level of restos seems to have been set at around 25-30e before wine--which pretty much winds up being around $50 a person with wine--that is more than our budget allows and I actually enjoy doing a lot of reviewing and prep before we go places--the internet boards are a gold mine--and then the little streets are often a good bet. But we want good food just the same and pleasant service. I have a private student (adult) who is leaving today for Paris and although her budget is way more expansive than mine, I still share tips on saving $$ and she is excited. As far as I am concerned, there is no particular reason to stand in line at Berthillon on Ile St Louis, unless that is an experience you haven't had before, when Amorino is just as delicious, one can enter and look at all the options more closely and enjoy that cone or cup every bit as much.
Cries_van--I am really wanting to see the film, Qui êtes-vous Polly Magoo? I remember the song from the 60's in France, but haven't seen the film. Thanks for the reminder--it is a really neat facade though. And Cries--u were banned?? I know not of this.
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Old May 23rd, 2009, 07:06 AM
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I have been banned 17 times. That is why my sn's always change.

I was originally Thingorjus, then Balenciaga, then Polly Magoo, then Imitation of Christ, etc., etc., etc.

Thin
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Old May 23rd, 2009, 07:38 AM
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Wonderful report! Waiting for more....
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Old May 23rd, 2009, 07:39 AM
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of course thingorjus, I know u well--we have chatted before.
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Old May 23rd, 2009, 09:00 AM
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Really enjoying your report. I'm planning 2 weeks in Paris in October, and am vacillating back and forth over where to stay - Montparnasse or the 7th. I've usually been in the 6th near Montparnasse, but my favorite hotel is now too expensive. I come to France about once a year, but haven't done JUST Paris in ages, as I love traveling around in the provinces with rental car - solo! Like you, I'm most interested in the art, museums, and architecture. AND nice, inexpensive restaurants!
So, keep going with your report - it's great for me.
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Old May 23rd, 2009, 09:11 AM
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Oh wow, your budget meals are way over my maximum budget!
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Old May 23rd, 2009, 09:21 AM
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Sue4--we do exactly the same--usually in the provinces and I have had some private students and clients who have offered us their homes in the country. But I really like to go where I want to go and often that is different from the options. We haven't just gone to Paris in ages, but somehow, this was the year for it with a good fare and I had been advising 2 people on Paris and felt I really needed to get back. Monday was a special day so as soon as I have a few minutes, I will report back.
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Old May 23rd, 2009, 10:21 AM
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You have really brought back some good memories for us. Was that view from room #202 at the Raspail Hotel? That was our first Paris experience in Sept.'01. We loved the neighborhood and found some wonderful restaurants. Les Park Au Cerf(or something close to that) was one of our favorites.

We use The Raspail as an example all the time to people who say to us "Paris, aren't the French mean to you?". We arrived there at 8pm from Italy with Lira(before the Euro) and no Francs. We could charge dinner but needed a few francs for a cab and asked to cash a travelers check at the desk(obviously before ATM's became popular). Anyway, the desk clerk said she couldn't cash a check but she got her purse out and handed us some francs and told us to pay her back tomorrow. That would NEVER happen in New York or Chicago. So that was our first encounter with the "mean" French. Also this was a few days after 9/11 and French people would hug us in the street when they would hear us speak and give us condolences.

Since then, we have returned to walk the streets of Paris(as you have) and other parts of France every year. It is the place we feel most at home and comfortable. We now rent an apartment and enjoy the French life. We even bought a Smart Car this year and love it.

Thank you so uch for your review,we enjoyed every word and the photos you have included. We hope to be back in Sept.'09 and will check out the Petit Palace---haven't been there.
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Old May 24th, 2009, 03:11 AM
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TPATT--the numbers on the room are only 2 digit now so they must have changed that when they redid the hotel. We were in room 44 on the 4th floor, front side (I think most rooms are front side--although a few on the back. You can't beat that view. Will write later today about our final day and final thoughts on the hotel and trip. So exciting for you to be planning a trip in Sept. We rented a SmartCar a few years ago when traveling in Picardie and Normandie. Very efficient and comfy we thought. Yes--the Petit Palais is definitely a beautiful landmark with an interesting collection.
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