P is for ....preparation.

thanks as ever to those kind people who spared the time to help me rationalise my thought, steered me away from my mistakes, and generally made the planning of this trip so much fun. anyone who really wants to can click on my screen name and find the thread I posted when I was trying to plan the trip.

OK - now onto the report. i needed that help, because this was a trip planned at short notice - when we came back from Rome a month earlier, [I know, it's a hard life but someone's got to do it] I'd had no idea that we'd be heading off again so soon. but DH had been hinting [I'm the mistress of understatement] that having indulged my love of Italy, he ought to get a crack at France. And as our Rome trip had taken in the Italy v England 6 nations match [rugby to the uninitiated], it seemed to make sense to aim to go to the last match of the series, which threatened to be a cracker - France v England at the Stade de France.

Now here's a question - which to book first? Flight, match tickets, or Hotel? well, I had a look at all three to see what my options were. Firstly match tickets- the only way I could get them was through a ticket-exchange like seatwave, and as they always add on a sizeable commission, this was going to have to be DH's birthday present [and Christmas, probably!] but it wasn't impossible. then flights- I looked at loads of options, but in the end opted for Exeter to Paris CDG [could it really be as bad as some other fodorites have said? - YES IT COULD!] and hotels - this was the one bright spot - a month out, there was plenty of choice, albeit it was going to cost at least €100 per night. still, that was OK - we were only going for 2 nights.

I spent quite a lot of time [you're on that laptop again?] trying to find the "perfect" hotel. after a few false starts [looking around the gard du nord, for example] I hit on aiming to be near an RER stop [line B] . this seemed to make sense as not only would it be convenient for the journey to and from the airport [which is on the RER B], but also getting to the match as the stade de France is also on the same line. that meant either near Chatelet or St. Michel, [a bit noisy and touristy perhaps] or the area around the jardins du luxembourg, which is what I eventually chose, as we'd never been that far south before! [well, not in Paris, despite the fact that DH worked there for a few months nearly 30 years ago].

Eventually I hit on this: the originally named hotel des jardins du luxembourg - www.les-jardins-du-luxembourg.com. it appealed because it was close to the RER station, reasonably priced [€131 per night] had a lift [we're getting too old to be humping luggage about] and the address given was an "impasse" - which with any luck would mean that it was reasonably quiet.

then all we had to do was wait...and wait....and wait...until finally the tickets turned up about 3 days before we were due to leave. Phew. they turned out not to be exactly stellar - but they did at least look genuine.

OK - time to get going.

PPPParis!

I knew you'd share this weekend with us, Ann. Don't rush through it.

Q is for....

arriving at Exeter only 2 hours or so after we left home despite the fog was pretty good we thought, and the "antique centre" [which bizzarely runs some off-airport parking] was easy to find, though it seemed a bit odd to be leaving our car amidst a load of stone lions and other artifacts. they ran us down to the airport in their van, and we joined the first of many, many queues - this one to check-in. strangely, even if you used the automatic self-service check-in manchines, you still had to joint the same queue to deposit your bags, so unless you were just doing carry-one, there didn't seem to be much point. From there, it was a very short walk to the security check [Exeter is very small, but I wouldn't say perfectly formed!], where we added our two bodies to yet another queue. Finally, once through security [really not too bad, and at least they were cheerful, unlike some] we queued to buy some sandwiches to eat on the plane, which was probably the most painful of the three queuing experiences, as the staff were sooooo s l o w .

Boarding the plane was the same as anywhere -[are airports having some secret competition with each other to see which one can check our passports the most times?], the pre-flight demonstration as routine, the take-off and landing thankfully as uneventful. leaving the plane we found that Paris was noticeable warmer than the south west of the UK that we had left, and I began to wonder if I'd really needed my raincoat [sadly, I was proved right, I did] especially as we stood in the queue for passport control. NOW I know why people grumble about CDG. only 2 people checking EU passports - WHY? still, look on the bright-side - by the time we were through passports, our luggage had arrived on the carossel!

Now I began to remember CDG from my weekend trips to meet up with DH, so many years ago. all those weird moving walkways and perspex tunnels came back to me, as we tried to find our way out of the airport and onto the RER. THAT turned out to need another train ride between Terminal 1 [where we arrived] and the RER stop, and ANOTHER queue to buy RER tickets. Why so few ticket machines? [how many queues is that, so far? I've lost count]. [for those who like that sort of thing, it was €8.40 each, each way to Luxembourg, no reduction for buying a return, and the machine did not take notes, just coins and c/cards.]

then finally the train arrived, and we boarded a rather tatty looking train heading for Paris. and 45 minutes or so later we were getting off at Luxembourg, which struck me as pretty good - especially as we didn't need to change lines, which I was very grateful for as we lugged our suitcase [DH's idea to take a case, not mine] up the stairs.

Now to find the hotel - consult the map. it must be down here..that's right, left at the shop selling badger-hair shaving brushes and back-scratchers, and right at the Gay Lussac Brasserie, and here we are. Reception is bright and pleasant, and our "acceuil" cordial. and all in french, much to the pleasure of DH who has been refreshing his french at classes once a week for the past 6 months or so. our room is on the 5th floor [thank goodness for that lift] and though not large, has a queen bed, a wardrobe with room on to pfor the case, a bathroom with a bath! and a tiny balcony. Not sure if we'll get the chance to use it, but it's nice to have the option.

Sun is streaming in through the window, so we dump all our stuff and hurry out to explore the luxembourg gardens, just across the road, and find our first drinks in Paris.

Next ..T is for....

Great Report....

So interested to hear your experience. Just got back from Paris myself. Was there 3/15-3/25 and the weather was incredible. In the 60's and only rained once. When I got back home to TN it was colder than in Paris!

Great report annhig. Looking forward to more.

Carol, Sharon, thanks - nice to hear from you.

Sharon - we were there from the 19th to the 21st. I'd been watching the 5-day weather forecast and seeing how nice the weather was, so it was a bit of a disappointment that it changed on the evening of the match and rained, right in the middle of the rugby match. but at least it wasn't cold like it was when DH worked there - i remember walking round Versailles in April being absolutely perished.

more soon.

oops, thanks rickmav - missed you out.

Y is for yeah, looking forward to more!

T is for Turner.

Turner? Turner???? that's right, the exhibition at the Grand Palais is JMW Turner, 18th C english painter. the last time we'd been it was Manet, which is rather more what you [or certainly I] would expect. as he is a particular favourite of DH, whose birthday tread this was, I'd suggested that we book tickets in advance, but DH, being a free spirit, prefers not to be tied down to such advance arrangements and "play it by ear. which is how we found ourselves queuing in the rain [I've just remembered, it rained on the friday night as well, are you sure you were in Paris France, Sharon?]at 6pm outside the grand palais on our first night in Paris. We'd had a leisurely stroll around the luxembourg gardens in the sunshine, sat and drunk the first of some very expensive beers watching le monde parisienne go round, and then gone back to the hotel to get our raincoats, before settting off to walk down to the seine and do some sightseeing.

first stop was meant to be St. Chapelle. I'd never heard of it before coming to fodorland, but I was quite keen to have a look and someone [stoke? was it you?] suggested that the stained glass windows are best in the late afternoon. unfortunately a lot of other people had obviously read the same advice, and the queue went half-way round the corner to the lawyers' entrance to the palais de justice. oh well, a good reason to come back? where next? Notre dame looks all sparkly and clean, but the queues there are just as bad, so we walk west along the left bank, looking at the 2nd hand books, avoiding the parties of school-children, and looking for a metro stop that'll take us to the grand palais. in the end we walk all the way there - silly really, but it was just too much fag to try to find one and as ever, we had understimated just how much walking we would be doing over the weekend.

all the way there, we had been speculating whether there would be much of a queue - surely not many parisiens would be interested in an architypal english painter like turner? and definitely not on a Friday night? how wrong I was. the only good news was that the queue for the ticketless plebs like us did not stretch back as far as the "two hour" mark. Strangely, there was even a queue for the people with tickets, which I never really understood. anyway, having got there we decided to stay, and amused ourselves by watching the other queuers, listening to the rather bad busker [if you're going to busk with an electronic accompanyment, do make sure you're in tune and time with it, please] and trying to judge how quickly we were going to get in. rather than let in a trickle all the time, they were leting in blocks of people every 30 minutes or so, just after they'd let in the people with the tickets, and we were lucky to sneak in just at the end of the 3rd lot to get in after we'd queued for about 50 minutes.

First stop the loos [no facilities for us patient queuers] and the cloakroom to deposit our dripping coats, and then the cafe to build up our energy with restorative coffee and tartes aux pommes [how do they make them so perfectly?] and rest our feet a bit after all that walking. then Turner. What can I say about him? Many people [like me] really know only his later luminescent works like the Fighting Temeraire but it turns out that in his youth, he had copied and adapted many of the masters in his efforts to develop his own style and gift. this is largely the theme of the exhibition and there are relatively few of the more familiar works, but there were enough to keep us both happy, and the rest of it was very interesting and well displayed, though surprisingly busy. who would have thought that parisiens would be that intersted in an english romantic artist?

90 minutes or so were really enough for us [and our feet] so we dragged ourselves away, and set off to find supper. there wre a couple of places near the grand palais but neither of them appealed too much [steak aux cheval is really too authentic, even for me] so we headed south across the river, taking in the lovely sight of lights along the Seine shining with the rain and the spot-light from the Eiffel tower picking out the different buildings, and made our way down the Boulevard St. Germain until we found a likely spot. truth be told we weren't mega-hungry, but we mamaged to force down a steak and saute potatoes each, which with salad to start, and coffee, and a 1/2 litre of house red, come to about €50. this was more like it. it wasn't fantastic but it was tasty and reasonably priced.

Being by now rather tired, we decided that the metro was the only way we were going to get back to the hotel, so we made for the nearest stop, bought a carnet [10 individual €1.60 tickets, for €11.80] and made for home.

Tomorrow - R is for....

Maybe I'm forgetting some rain but mostly I remember everyday as being pretty warm and sunny. We didn't make the Turner show but waited as long for the Yves St. Laurent show right across the street at the Petite Palais.

lol, Sharon, perhaps Paris is like Camelot and it only rains at night.

in fact thinking about it, that IS more or less what happened - it was quite warm and sunny when we arrived mid afternoon on the Friday, and only started raining at about 6pm, and the same on the saturday.

What was the Yves St. Laurent show like?

The show was amazing. The clothes were beautifully presented and there was a portion dedicated to Catherine Deneuve who is extradinarily lovely. The big wow was the room with all the evening gowns arranged on a stairstep like stage. Contrasted with them was all the different styles of "Le Smoking" (the original was in the show as well). It really showed what a genius he was. Well worth the wait.

sadly i didn't know it was on. it sounds very interesting.

that said, I'm not sure that we'd have gone - we're not big fashion people and if we'd had to queue, I KNOW we'd have walked on by.

M is for more! I love your reports.

Sharon, I hope you are doing one.

Suffering for art! It's part of a grand tradition.

You do write a fun report.

ann, you've been busy traveling! Please continue.

Will squeeze this in for those who might be interested: The Hotel Bristol has Fashion Show/Teas that are VERY well done. I went to one last year. The information is online at the hotel site. It seems the next one is May 29th

Joan

okey dokey.

S is for ...Steps

After a good night's sleep [the room had proved as quiet as i had hoped and wasn't too hot as many hotel rooms are, though having the balcony door open slightly must have helped] we were still too full of last ngiht's steak to want to spend €11 each on the hotel breakfast, so we set out to find coffee and croissants and we didn't have too far to go, as we found just what we wanted on the corner at the brasserie Gay Lussac. Cafe au lait and a croissant each was €6 AND we got to read the latest scandal in the paper - a murder trial without a body where the verdict was expected that day. Very juicy - the wife, the husband, and the lover.

having practiced our french a bit more, we set off for Montmartre, DH having said he wished to return to one of the the places he'd seen on his school visit to Paris, when he was 13. we got the RER to Chatelet [pronounced Chat'let by the station announcer which wasn't quite how I remembered it from 25+ years ago when I seem to recall the middle "e" being annunciated, but they've even stopped eliding s's now, so what do i know] and then corresponded onto the pink line 4 aiming to get out at the Chateau Rouge, and walk up to Montmartre from the east. I'm not sure that I'd recommend this to the faint of heart, as it is possibly not the most salubrious area, with a few girls out "working" even at 11am!

Still, a girl's got to eat, and they showed no interest in DH unlike the ones we came across once in St. John Smith's Square in London! We soon found the steps that lead up to Sacre Coeur and admiring the houses [and the fitness of the people who live in them] that flank the steps, we climbed our way up to the top, where the funicular comes up from Anvers. we'd avoided coming that way because of the number of correspondences we'd have needed to do, but by the time we'd got to the top i was doubting that was a good idea. still we were feeling fit!

DH said that Sacre Coeur hadn't changed much since last time he was there [certainly less than he has], and as a first time visitor I found it very impressive, shining white in the weak spring sunshine. we made our way in and although I wasn't particularly taken by the interior, we found ourselves in the middle of a sung service , which certainly enhanced the experience, unlike the ceaseless chattering of some other visitors. we sat for a while listening to the singing of the nuns, then made our way out into the place du Tertre, where the cafes and pavement artists were vying with each other to separate the tourists from their euros. this was NOT the scene for us, so we worked our way down the hill towards Abbess, where we found many locals enjoying a lazy Saturday morning. Deciding to join them, we sat down and ordered a large beer for DH and an orange presse for me - and found that the beer was TWICE the price of the orange juice. sacre bleu! €14 for 2 drinks! however, the terrace was sunny, the waiter friendly [he kindly allowed us to practice our french though his knowledge of the rugby was a bit sketchy!] and we were in PARIS.

Refreshed we decided to have a look at the Art Nouveau church next to Abbess metro station, [great stained glass and a lovely quiet atmosphere] and when we came out, a terrific busker had started playing on the square opposite - a really professional saxophonist who would pass muster at Ronnie Scotts - so we threw caution to the wind and sat and had another drink - wine this time which was a lot cheaper!

Lunch was now beginning to beckon, and in this area you are spoilt for choice. Initally we thought about having a "menu" but really we weren't hungry enough for 3 or even 2 courses [obviously we hadn't walked far enough] so we settled for a "plat du jour" at a nice little brasserie where quite a lot of locals were already sat eating. "that's all very well" I hear you say, but how did we know they were locals? the same way they know we're not, I suppose - they weren't wearing berets, but they had their saturday shopping with them, they were talking french, and the kids were all eating "proper" food, not burgers or chicken nuggets. The "plat du jour" was a very tasty veal chop and saute pots, and with wine and coffee, the whole lot came to €40 - quite a bargain. [especially after they'd taken the rogue "jus d'orange" off the bill - i wonder how many of those just get paid because a tourist doesn't spot the error?] talking of kids, we were very impressed by the little girls [about 10 years old we guessed] sitting at the table next to us. while their parents were discussing some sort of business deal, they managed to stick away steak aux poivre, chips and salad followed by crepes and nutella. no wonder french restaurants continue to have a clientelle to cater to.

Eventually we had to tear ourselves away, and DH wanted to look at the place pigalle [I've no idea why] so we carried on our parambulations past butchers, bakers [no candlestickmakers, unfortunately] and cheese shops...hold on, a cheese shop. do we want some cheese to take home? why not? it does look nice. and nice it was. the assistant was extremely helpful in allowing us to taste a few before we made our selelction, and then vacuum packing it, AND in commiserating with us that the English team was going to lose! another customer joined in, giving his opinion that the French would lose, which led to quite a heated argument between him and the assistant, and they were still arguing when we left the shop.

Pigalle turned out to be as [un]interesting as I'd thought, and after DH had taken the statutory picture of the Moulin rouge, we made our way back to the metro and back to the hotel for a rest before the match. while we were corresponding at Chatelet there was a real crush of people and i thought that I felt someone trying to get into my handbag, but if they were, the clasp and zip defeated them. it was a good reminder to keep on the look-out though, and I decided that I'd be leaving my handbag behind when we went out later.

Next - R is for...

Waiting (not too patiently) for more.....please.