Paris trip report 9/1 - 9/10
 

Hello all! I'm back from Paris and my sister and I had a great time. We did sooo much during our time there that at the end of every day I wrote down a rough outline of what we did. Since my body is still on European time, I'm up quite early (woke up at 4:30 a.m.). I won't post much at the moment, but I wanted to get this started. Over the course of our stay there I shot 2 hours worth of video, hundreds of pictures, ate at least 5 different national cuisines, and visited 3 countries. During my lunch hour today I'll try to type up as much as possible, so until then stay tuned!

looking forward to it

Don't eat, just type!

ok, here is the first installment of my report. It's gonna sound a bit whingy/whiney at the start, but all the good fun I had on my trip far outweighed the blemishes. Read the below as humourus, not as venomous. :)

09/01 - The Journey begins / Address all complaints to...

My dear sister (to be referred to as DS) and I began our journey at the new International terminal at DFW. I really have to say that this new terminal is really GREAT! It's nicely laid out, good restaurants and a very open feeling about it. Boarding our BA flight went smoothly and I was able to take onboard this little bottle of saline solution due to my contacts (this was one of my concerns). When the boarding process began, the called for rows 35 and back. Now, if I hadn't changed our seats to row 34, we could have been in the first boarding party. Eh, oh well. My video screen in the headrest in front of me was a bit buggy, but I wasn't too bothered as I <b>tried</b> to get some sleep. I do stress tried because as I was in the middle section in an aisle seat - the plane was a 3 seat - 3 seat - 3 seat configuration - and 2 rows back on either side of me were screaming toddlers/infants. The earplugs I put in my ears were of little help as their wails seem to cut through them like a hot knife in butter. Oh, and the toddler to my left, his name was Noah because his parents kept saying his name quite a bit. Leaving the aircraft I jokingly said to my sister that I should go over to the now sleeping Noah, shake him awake and ask him if he had a comfortable trip over. Other than the toddlers, a little bit of turbulence but nothing to get worked up about.

The passport/immigration line at Gatwick for Non EU or UK residence wasn't that bad, even though it was quite a long line it moved at a good pace. The exchange rate for U.S. $ to UK pounds was (and probably still is) terrible. On Saturday it was $1.98 for 1 UK pound. Bleh! On to the Gatwick Express and into Victoria Station. From there it was a quick journey through the Underground to Waterloo to catch our 11:22 a.m. Eurostar to Paris. Now, the train journey would have been a pleasure except for 2 things: me feeling slightly bloated and this family of unknown European descent sitting across from us on the Eurostar. DS and I travelled Business class because for me this marked my 10 year anniversary travelling overseas. Why not celebrate in style? Anyways, we had the seat-table-seat configuration where one person faced backwards and the other forwards. The four seats and table across from us were empty, but this teenage girl went to the Eurostar person, flippity-flapped about seating and the next thing I knew she,her mom &amp; dad were now sitting across from us. This wouldn't have been problem if they a) wouldn't have been talking so loudly and b) if the girl had not decided to remove her nail polish and then put on a new coat of nail polish. Being in a fairly confined space while someone does this is not a pleasurable experience. I would hope that most people realise this. So, anyways, lunch was served and it was delicious...except with me feeling bloated and tired, I didn't get to eat all of it. I really was totally bummed out about that.

Our train arrived in Paris around 2:40 p.m. and we had no problem finding our hotel (Hotel Tourisme, 66 Avenue de la Motte-Picquet, PARIS 75015, France - Phone : +33 (0)1 47 34 28 01 Fax : +33 (0)1 47 83 66 54
Web site : www.france-hotel-guide.com/h75015tourisme.htm - Email : [email protected]). This hotel is in the 7th arr, but they listed themselves as being in the 15th arr. Whatever. The hotel is in a location I know very well and west across the street from it is the Monoprix. To the east and down the street is the Ecole Militaire. The hotel elevator is very, very small - so pretty much 1 person and their baggage. Our room was on the 1st floor and it was adequate enough - 2 single beds and a good sized bathroom. Even though our window (double glazed) faced the buildings to the east of us, you could still hear the rumblings of the above ground metro. After a day or two I sorta tuned that out. One thing we discovered was that we had no towels, so after we'd dumped our bags off and headed out, DS told the reception that we had no towels. Off we went to walk around Paris! The first thing we did was head to the Champs Elysees where as we were walking down from the Arc de Triomphe, we witnessed the start of a wreath laying ceremony. So we stood around where all these old men in uniforms were gathering, as well as a marching band, and waited for the procession to begin. I shot quite a bit of video of this as well as taking pictures. It was quite something to see them walk up the Champs Elysees with the band behind them. Unforgettable. After chasing after them to take pictures/shoot video, we resumed our walk. Every time I'm in Paris I have to head to the Virgin Megastore. It's a ritual for me. After that, we continued walking and then crossed over to head back up towards the Arc de Triomphe. Now, I'd been reading much about Laduree and even went to their website. Visions of me sinking my teeth into their macaroons was much on my mind. Since I didn't see Laduree on the way down on the one side of the street, I figured that they had to be on the other side. We stopped in and DS and I each got a box of 12 mini macroons each (they were in sort supply of the larger ones). Were they good? Yeah! But macroons do not a dinner make, so it was time to find somewhere to eat. Before heading off to dinner we made a call home to our mom to let her know we arrived safe and sound. Dinner was had at this Chinese restauant on Blvd. de Grenelle (can't recall the name - I know, for shame). I'd eaten there twice a couple of years ago with my nephew, so I thought it best to go somewhere I knew on this first day. After dinner we walked around a bit and then headed to the Monoprix where we each bought a bath towel and washclothes (we still had no idea if we'd have a towel and washcloth once we got back to our hotel), but once we arrived back at our room, we discovered that they'd given us towels &amp; washclothes. The towel did come in handy later on. Our first day officially over, it was time to hit the sack. Oh, even though we did not plan to watch much TV, the pickings were pretty slim, most of the channels were French, 2 - 3 were showing tennis, 1 was German, 1 was CNN International, and the other was a porn channel that came on in the evenings. What choices. End of day 1!

Off to a good start. Looking forward to the rest.

So far so good, keep going.

Nina

Last night I decided to transfer the video I had shot in Paris on to DVD. Things started out ok, but then to my horror I discovered that I'd somehow messed up on the recording/pausing of stuff, so I have about 15 minutes worth of ground shots of the sidewalk of the Champs Elysees! Wahhh!! I was totally gutted. There was some footage of the old soldiers and the marching band, but not the shots I wanted. Perhaps DS has some good video. Anyways, on to day 2!

- Sept 2nd. We have a fire! / Walk, Walk! -

Our first morning in Paris started on a hot note. While DS was in the bathroom getting ready, she had set her curling iron on this glass ashtray on top of the dresser. As I was gathering things up and getting ready, this pungent smell wafted around in the air. It smelled like something burning, but what? That's when I heard this noise and looked over at the curling iron. The handle of the curling iron had hit the glass counter of the dresser and I noticed the heating element inside of the iron was glowing red hot and then burst into flames! I called out frantically to DS, still in the bathroom, to come out. I grabbed the handle and started to blow the fire out. Luckily no damage was caused, but it sure did stink in the bedroom. I opened the window for a few minutes to let it clear out and DS went back to the bathroom. DS probably didn't realise that her curling iron was not multi voltage (like my electric shaver), despite her having a plug adapter.

When we left the hotel for the day, there was an outdoor market going on underneath the above ground metro on Blvd. de Grenelle. Super! I love when these markets are going on...the smell of the fruits, vegetables, fish, etc. The market stretched for quite a ways, so we walked from one end to the other and back. As we got to the one end of the market, we found this vendor who was selling various types of wine from regions in France. Knowing that one of my objectives was to bring back at least one bottle of wine, I selected this white Reisling wine (something like 6 - 11 Euros). After completing the market circuit, it was a quick trip back to the hotel to put the wine in the room and back out.

As this Sunday was the first Sunday of the month, all the museums are free. As DS really wanted to go to the Louvre, that's where we went. Our visited started with the gardens near Place de la Concorde. From there we walked towards the Louvre. This was my second time in the Louvre - the first being 2 years ago with my nephew. It's such an overwhelming experience when you go through there...so much artwork to absorb. I know there was stuff we didn't get to see, but it really was crowded that day. There was stuff I hadn't seen before, so that was a plus. After the Louvre, we rested a bit on the outside not too far from the glass pyramid. From there we walked through the one arched entry into the courtyard, then hung a right to go through the other arched entry that lead you out towards this footbridge that crossed the Seine and in to the Latin Quarter. Then the rain started to come down. Luckily it was a light rain that came and went. Our walk along the Seine took us to Notre Dame. Unfortunately it was closed that day due to a swearing in ceremony of some public official. We hung around Notre Dame a bit, watching this guy feed all these sparrows that were perched in all the small bushes around the area, then it was back across the bridge to the Latin Quarter.

We wandered through the narrow streets of Rue de la Huchette, Rue Saint-Severin and Rue de la Harpe - these places were buzzing with activity. I'd never been in this particular area of the Latin Quarter, so it was a new experience for me. The weather was starting to warm up, so it was time to cool down with a nice coconut with chocolate chips gelato! Yum!! Where to go next? DS suggested Sacre Coeur, so off we went. Down in the Metro I did something really dumb. As we'd gone through the turnstile, realised that I didn't know which line we needed to take, so I exited to go read the Metro map. When I tried to go back through, the turnstile wouldn't let me. I then asked DS for hers and the same thing happened. A flash of panic went through me. Were our tickets no good anymore? I pressed the &quot;assistance&quot; button and was told that we should go &quot;x&quot; amount of meters to the next Metro entrance. DS suggested that maybe there was some sort of time limit on when you could use our ticket again (we bought the 5 day Paris Visit ticket) - that seemed to be the case as when we got to the other turnstile, we got through.

After changing lines a few times, we were now at Sacre Couer. To give our feet a rest, we took the funicular up to SC. Before we entered SC, we spent a bit outside just admiring the view of Paris on this sunny day. There were lots of people up around this area either sitting on the steps or on the grass. I've never quite understood this, so maybe someone can explain, but why can't you take pictures or shoot video inside of SC? Anyways, when we left the church it was time to explore the Montmarte area. I was trying to find the Moulin Rouge, but I think it was down a couple of stops from the Metro stop we got off at. It was around this time that our feet and legs were aching, so it was back to the hotel to rest for awhile.

What shall we do for dinner tonight? I really hadn't a clue. We walked along Blvd. de Grenelle as I was sure something would pop out at us. Nothing really did, but we went down this one side street and saw this restaurant called PastaPapa (http://www.pastapapa.fr/ - you may have to look at the cached version of it as it wouldn't load properly for me). Ok, hey, it was a chain restaurant but when your stomach is doing the talking, don't argue too much. The one we at at was the Pastapapa Grenelle on 7 rue de Lourmel - 75015 (Metro Dupleix). The food was decent and I had the ravioli (it was quite a huge dish of it as well), a Coke light, some evian and this fudge cake for dessert. Oddly enough, this restaurant is right across the street from the Timhotel my nephew and I stayed at back in 2004. With dinner over and feeling full, we made a quick stop at the minimart across from the restaurant to buy some water. Back at the hotel some more resting took place while watching a French dubbed version of &quot;Some Like It Hot&quot;. I had suggested to DS that we head towards the Ecole Militaire around 9:40 p.m. to catch the twinkling of the Eiffel Tower, to which she said that sounded like a good plan. We made to the Peace Monument in time to catch the 10 p.m. sparkling effect. I love to see the Eiffel Tower do that. :) I'd say we spent a good half an hour around that area just enjoying the area, watching the people who were on the grass enjoy their wine or whatever. It was a moment that makes me realise why I love Paris so much! From there it was back to the hotel where we finished watching &quot;Some Like It Hot&quot; and then to sleep. Sunday is next!

I don't think I had quite recovered from jetlag over the past few days. This morning I was rifling through my notes, wondering where my Sunday journal entry was. It then dawned on me that We left on Friday 9/1 and that my first entry should have been Friday 9/1 / Saturday 9/2. So, that being said, my previous entry should have been dated 9/3 which is a Sunday. Right, so that's sorted out. On to Monday!

- Sept. 3rd. From drizzly to sunny and from east to west.

Monday morning started out on a cloudy, drizzly note. The rain was almost like a light misting, so it wasn't one of these run for cover situations. After we had left the hotel, we stopped by the bakery next door so I could get my pain au chocolat. This would pretty much become a daily morning ritual for me. Our first stop was the Arc de Triomphe. We arrived there quite early, too early to walk up to the top. I wouldn't have had any problem going up those stairs, but DS wasn't too keen on the amount of stairs you had to go up, especially since the staircase is quite a tight one. Add to that the rain and we nixed the idea. Before we headed to our next destination, a quick stop was made at the hotel to change out batteries in my digital camera. Now, Where to go on a rainy and overcast day? Why, Pere Lachaise Cemetery of course! Of course, I would have gone there if the sun had been shining (which it eventually began to do when we finished up at the cemetery). This was my third time to visit the cemetery. It's such a serene place. You have to wonder if any of the people buried there still have family in the area. What upsets me most about the cemetery is some of the broken stain glass windows on the crypts and some vandalism I saw. Anyways, we covered quite a bit of ground in the cemetery, saw some of the famous names buried there and even stopped by Jim Morrisons grave. A couple of hours or so spent there and it was time to go. We made a quick stop at one of the pastry places nearby and then we headed west.

Our next destination was the Palais Garnier et de l'Op&eacute;ra bastille or the Opera. I'd only been to that area twice (to go into the Amex office), but I'd never gone into the Opera building. We weren't able to go into the auditorium due to rehearsals, but we did get to check out quite a few other places in the building. Talk about an impressive staircase! One can only imagine those attending the opera all dressed up and mingling on the staircase. Up on the second level is this huge room with a fireplace at each end. At first I thought you couldn't go into this room, but it turns out that at each end of the room the doors are open. I don't think we spent too long in the building. Is it worth visiting? Yeah. I just wish the auditorium had been open. From there we headed south to Notre Dame.

Our second attempt to visit Notre Dame was a success. It's amazing to see the front of the church all cleaned up now. I have pictures of it in the various stages of clean up, so it really is something to behold. DS and I had thought about going up to the top, but the line was too long, so after we had gone through the church, we sat on a bench in the garden behind ND and rested a bit. My feet and shins were killing me! Usually the amount of walking we had done since our arrival in Paris wouldn't have bothered me, but this time around my feet were hurtin'. The next destination was the Arch of the Defense. Now, I know some people may not find going out there to be interesting, but I think it is. The arch is an impressive structure and the area with its wide open space, shops and some new art sculptures does make it worth a visit. Currently there are these (what appear to be) stainless steel sculptures in front of the arch. DS and I did go to the top to see all over Paris and beyond. After some picture taking, we went back down and just sat on the steps of the arch for a bit to people watch. We discussed where we should go for dinner. So far we'd done Chinese and Italian. What should we have now? French? Nah...wasn't quite ready for that. Instead, I pulled out all these bits of paper I'd printed off from the Fodor's forum and suggested a place that aucho53 had gone to - <b>Les Argonautes</b>. Aucho53 made the place sound <b><i>so irresistible</i></b> that I really wanted to go there - so, back to the Latin Quarter we went!

We did make it to the Latin Quarter, despite us getting off a stop too soon. Finding the restaurant wasn't too difficult since I'd printed off a map of it's location, not to mention dragging my 10 year old Michelin road map of Paris along with me as well! I've taken that map with me every time I've gone to Paris and it's kinda starting to fall apart. DS and I made our way to the restaurant and while we were outside just looking at their menu, the guy outside started pitching the restaurant to us. Before I knew it, he was leading us in to be seated! We were there quite early, so the place wasn't full. The concept of eating late, say around 8 p.m., isn't something I'm use to. Both of us were served a complimentary glass of a rose wine (which was pretty darn good), 2 bottles of water and a basket of a baguette that had been cut into smaller pieces. For an appetizer we had the fried calamari and let me tell you something, they were huge!! They looked like onion rings, but it was deep fried calamari with this sauce. Yum! For dinner I got the Keftedes - minced meat (essentially what looked like 2 thick hamburger patties) that came with a baked potato seasoned with olive oil and herbs. I skipped dessert as dinner stuffed me quite well. Would I recommend this restaurant to others? Definitely! After dinner we walked around the 6th arr. for a bit, making our way up towards the Medieval Museum and then back down to Notre Dame a bit before 9 p.m. so we could watch this film about the church. The film was about an hour or so long and an interesting look into why/how the church was built. Once the film was over, we headed back to the hotel and to bed. Tomorrow would be a busy day!

Argh! Still not quite over jetlag. Ok, my last entry above <b>should</b> be dated Sept. 4th as it was Monday, not the 3rd!

Hi Trafaelwyr! We were in Paris at the same time! I was there 9/1 - 9/6, then to Brugge for 2 nights and back to Paris 9/8 - 9/11. We probably crossed paths. I'm enjoying your report!

heya cls2paris. Wasn't the weather during that time pretty good? It was such a relief to get out of the 90 to 100 degree temps here in Texas. What all did you do while you were in Paris?

Here's how our Tuesday went.

- Sept. 5th - It's Good To Be Da King/The Statue of Liberty -

Today was our visit to Versailles. We hopped on the Metro for a quick ride to the Bir Hakeim stop and then down to the RER where we bought a train/Versailles combo pass (I highly recommend). Paying heed to all the guidebooks and to those who've been there before, we got there early to avoid the tour groups. The weather was good...a bit warm...and I got to see parts of the palace that I'd not seen before. The only real let down of the visit was that the fountains were not on. I'm not sure what the reason was...I thought maybe it was due to drought. As we walked around the large fountain, we noticed people in these golf carts tooling around the grounds. These were obviously people that didn't work there but tourists. So we headed down towards the place where you could rent boats and wound up renting one of the golf carts! It costs about 28 Euros to do so and make sure you have your drivers license if you want to do it. They show you how to operate the cart and the recorded audio tour that goes with it. There's also a map they give you that you need to follow or else your cart will stall out and this voice will tell you that you've left the designated trail. Anyways, it takes you out to the Trianon and the Petit Trianon, so that really saves on the walking to those places! If you do decide to walk, they have signs indicating approximately how long it will take you by foot. There's also this little train/tram that will take you out to those places (but I think the cost is like 5-8 Euros). Once we'd finished tooling around in the golf cart, we stopped off at La Flottille (a restaurant, brasserie, tea room, takeaway) at the edge of the Grand Canal for lunch. It wasn't anything spectacular, but it did fit the bill. After lunch, we walked around the gardens some more and then hopped on the train back to Paris.

DS and I were going to go to the top of the Eiffel Tower once we got back, but the lines were hideously long, so we pushed that back for another day. I did stop at one of the ice-cream places and get me a swirl of chocolate and vanilla. Can some one please tell me what's up with all those girls around the Eiffel Tower who come up to you and ask you if you speak English? At first I would just shake my head and move on, then it got to the point that I just told them, &quot;Nope, I don't speak any at all.&quot; I'm assuming they're gypsies? We headed back to the hotel to drop off some of the souvenirs we bought and then walked up the Blvd. de Grenelle to Pont de Bir Hakeim. At the middle of the bridge you can walk down to the Alle des Cygnes - it's this long &quot;jetty&quot; of sorts in the middle of the Seine that goes from Pont de Bir Hakeim to Pont de Grenelle. What's cool about this is that on the other side of Pont de Grenelle is the Statue of Liberty! Well, not a full size replica, but a scaled down model. I remember seeing this over 20 years ago in the Harrison Ford film &quot;Frantic&quot;. I was surprised to see that there was a Statue of Liberty in Paris, so this time around I was able to make my way to it. From there we headed south on Pont de Grenelle trying to find a Metro stop. My feet were <i>really</i> hurtin' bad around this point. We wound up back at our hotel and rested a bit. It was at this point I told DS that I needed some new shoes. I hadn't seen a Foot Locker during our wanderings (despite seeing posters for it), so up and off we went to the Champs Elysees. Again, I utilized some info from a Fodor's poster (Aucho53) and looked for the Nike store. At this point, I didn't care how much the shoes cost, I just needed a comfortable pair because I had blisters on my 2 far right toes! The guy in the store was helpful and 100 Euros later I had a good pair of shoes. I should have changed shoes in the store, but I walked a bit outside, trying to find an empty bench to do it on. No luck with finding a bench, I decided to go to this bus stop on a side street and change. What was kinda funny about this is that there were all these police men around. I think there was some sort of premiere going on at one of the theaters on the Champs Elysees. Anyways, DS told me later that the police men were a bit bemused by my shoe changing episode. With new shoes on, we walked back down the Champs Elysees looking for a place to eat. We looked at a few different places, but couldn't make our minds up, so we headed back to our area as it was getting a bit late and settled upon American food - McDonalds. I love the mayonaise that you get over in the McDonalds in Europe. Too bad you can't get them here. With dinner done, it was back to the hotel and to bed.

I'm enjoying your report, t.

Hi trafaelwyr - I thought the weather at the beginning of the trip was a little hot and humid and was glad that the hotel had a/c so we could sleep. So I guess it depends on your perspective! :) I'm working on my trip report and will get it posted in a few days. I'm enjoying yours!

Thanks to all who are enjoying my trip report. It's not littered with too much wit and humour, nor too many specific details. There's just so much that we did and saw that I'm sure this report would be 2 or 3 times longer than what it is. The main thing is that we had a good time. As long as you can come away from a trip with that feeling, then it was worth it.

Cls2paris - yeah, you know, my sister thought it was a bit humid there, but I really didn't notice. Our hotel had air conditioned rooms as well. Since my sister likes the 'cold', our thermostat was set around 18-20 degrees celsius! Mind you, it did feel good to enter the room at various points in the day with that feeling. Where 'bouts in Paris were you staying?

Hi - we stayed 5 nights at Hotel Monge and 3 nights at Hotel Muguet. I liked both hotels and enjoyed staying in new areas. I usually stay in St. Germain or Marais. Hopefully my trip report will be as informative as yours!

oh, I think you have tons of specific details, which is good for a lot of people. I know what you mean about the nail polish on the train -- I've had girls do that when sitting next to me on an airplane, and I nearly got sick, literally. The smell is just nauseating and chemically not good in such an environment.

FYI, you were staying in the 15th arrondisement, that hotel is in the 15th (I've seen it and know where it is). No hotel would probably list its postal code wrong and wouldn't want to say they were in the 15th rather than the 7th (which is generally more upscale). The 7th arr. stops at ave de Suffren, which runs alongside the public area of the Ecole Militaire, and UNESCO.

cls2paris - hmm, where 'bouts is Hotel Monge and Hotel Muguet? This is the website for the hotel we stayed in: http://www.france-hotel-guide.com/h75015tourisme.htm. The next time I go back to Paris, I might opt to rent an apartment and try to get one in the Latin Quarter - or anywheres between there and the 15th.

Christina - luckily that's never happened to me on a plane! That did happen to me on the light rail service that we have in Dallas and now I had it happen on the Eurostar. Oh well. And you're absolutely right about a hotel and listing it's postal code. I thought it was in the 7th, thinking that the metro line served as a boundary...but whatever, it was still a good hotel and I really liked the area. :-)

I can tell you why Notre Dame was closed the first time you went -- the mayor of Paris was inaugurating the new name of the square in front of the cathedral : &quot;Place Jean Paul II&quot;.

Glad you got some new shoes. Hope they were better. I was feeling your pain. I was in Las Vegas some years ago and wore a pair of boots that I had had for a long time and never had given me a bit of trouble, but for some reason my feet were killing me!!!! Every step was torture..I do NOT exagerate. I finally found a pair of black Keds..OMG...it wanted to kiss them!!!! What a difference!!!! It's just HORRIBLE to have your feet hurting, it takes the joy out of the whole trip. Wonderful, fun report. Love your detail.

Trafaelwyr -
Hotel Monge is in the Latin Quarter on Rue Monge. The rear rooms overlook the Arenes de Lutece. We spent 5 nights there. The hotel was very nice, if I were to stay in LQ again, I would stay here. I think the room was 106 euros for a double.

Hotel Muguet is in th 7th, near the La Tour-Maubourg metro stop. I would stay here again also if I stay in the 7th again. The room was 125 euros for a double.

Hi Trafaelwyr! I am so enjoying your trip report- I was in Paris at the sametime and yes the queues for the Eiffel were a bit much, I so feel your sore feet, I also had to buy shoes. But carry on - waitng for the next chapter.

Hello all!

kerouac - ah, thanks for explaining that! The Policeman just mentioned, as best he could, that it was some sort of public ceremony, so we took it at that. I was really jazzed at how many special events we witnessed, especially the 2 wreath laying ceremonies going from a certain point on the Champs Elysees to the Arc de Triomphe.

crefloors - yeah! those new shoes were ALOT better. This had <b>never</b> happened to me before in my 10 years of going overseas and all the walking I'd done. So, everyone, very important lesson is that make sure the shoes you take are comfortable ones! Heck, I had these pair of Nikes that I had to retire (re: throw away) after last years visit to Zurich because they were literally falling apart. But they served me well for the 10 years I had them.

cls2paris - hmm, what is the Arenes de Lutece? Did you ever visit the Medieval Museum in the Latin Quarter? It's very interesting place! I dig that kinda stuff. Thanks for the info on the hotels. I'll keep them in mind when I go back to Paris. :-)

yasron - when we finally did do the Eiffel Tower, the lines weren't that bad. We arrived there before noon time and the view we had was just amazing!

Ok, so on to Wednesday.

- Sept. 6th - Cramping and the Catacombs -

DS and I were up at the usual time of 7 a.m. to begin our day. When I was finished getting ready, DS informed me that she wasn't feeling well (cramps - is that tmi?). Anyways, she told me to go ahead and go wherever I wanted but be back at the hotel by 11 a.m.. I was fine with that, though I really wish she had been feeling better so that we could both visit some places. Off I went! This morning there was another open air market underneath the above ground Metro, so I wandered through there taking in the sights and smells. Did I mention how much I love these kinds of markets? :-) Where to go, where to go? Ten years ago when I was backpacking, I joined up with some Australian girls who were staying at the same youth hostel that I was staying at (The 3 Ducks). Somehow we found ourselves in the Latin Quarter at St. Sulpice. I hadn't been back there since, so I decided to pay the area a visit. When I arrived at the church, I discovered a couple of things: 1) it looked like the church was undergoing some sort of renovation and 2) the water fountain in the square was not on. Not seeing fountains on was a real let down. :-( In to the church I went. If you haven't been in there, you should the next time you're in the area. While I was in there, a small mass was going on, so hearing them sing lent an even holier feeling to the visit. As I was about to leave the church, I noticed something familiar all the way to my right. The church has, what appears to be, a 'copy' of the Shroud of Turin. This is really something to behold. I took a few pictures and even some video (I think) before I exited the church.

Ok, where to go now? I pulled out my tattered Michelin map and saw that I was pretty darn close to the Luxembourg Gardens. Hadn't been there before! Ugh, my feet were still killing me despite having the new shoes on, but I managed. I started on the far end from the fountain and made my way over to that. What a really nice area the gardens are and talk about relaxing near the fountain! Sitting in the coolness of the shade and watching the ducks for a bit was a nice way to chill out for a bit. From the gardens I made my way up to the Pantheon. When I got there, it hadn't opened yet. Unfortunately for me, just as I was about the leave the area, they opened up the church and the gate that let you gain access to it. There is a charge of 7 Euros to go in the church. I really wanted to go in there, but I had to make my way back to the hotel. DS was feeling much better when I got back to the hotel, so we headed off to the Eiffel Tower. As I mentioned above, the lines weren't too bad, but it was crowded as usual. DS and I went all the way to the top and with such great weather, we had an excellent view of Paris and the surrounding area. The video tape on my camera was almost out, so when we got back down it was back to the hotel to secure a new blank tape.

The next attraction on my places to visit was the Catacombs (never been there before). We took the Metro to the Denfert Rochereau stop, but I made the mistake of getting off 1 stop too early, so it was back on the Metro to DR. Once you come out of the Metro station, it's easy to spot the entrance to the Catacombs across the street. As it was beginning to get warm out, the idea of going down 123 step to get to somewhere cooler was definitely worth it. Going through the catacombs is certainly it's own experience. DS asked me if the grounds down there where all the bones were put was consecrated. That is something I did not know, but I'm assuming it would be given the fact that all these graves were dug up. The dripping water lent to the eeriness of the catacombs. I can only assuming that the dripping water is condensation due to all people visiting the catacombs. At first I thought it was water coming from pipes, but I dismissed that idea after I saw all the droplets of water in various stages of dripping to the ground. I heeded the advice given by the guidebooks regarding the catacombs and brought along a flashlight. This helped when it came to taking pictures. They request that no flashes are used when taking pictures, but I did see a few people do that. I did shoot video down in the catacombs as well and the night vision function helped in the really dark areas. Our visit concluded with the 83 steps back up. It's really not that bad, but DS was quite winded when we got back up into the warm air of Paris. A quick stop into a minimart to buy some water and it was back on to the Metro headed towards our neighborhood.

Once again we found ourselves asking what to do for dinner. And again we walked up and down the area trying to find a restaurant. We even headed back towards Pasta Papa and the surrounding area, but nothing really grabbed us. Off to the Monoprix we went! We decided to make this an easy dinner and just got a premade sandwiches (I got this real yummy chicken/bacon sandwich), some potato salad, cookies, a bag of Doritos (Sweet Chili ones no less!) and this orange version of diet Coca-Cola! Ah!! I love when they have these limited edition items out in Europe. I hope they come out with this flavor here because if they can do lemon and lime flavored ones, orange is surely next up! Before we headed back to the hotel, we stopped in at the bakery next door and got ourselves this Samba chocolate mousse cake. Delicious! That was pretty much the end of our day. I'm sure I could have handled some more walking out and about, but I think we earned some rest.

Hi T - the Arenes de Lutece is an arena from the Gallo-Roman times that was used for watching sporting events and maybe theater events. When we were there, an informal soccer game was going on. Yep, also did the Medieval Museum (the thermal baths there are from the same era as the arena). But, I went mostly to see the Lady and the Unicorn tapestries. I had read an historical fiction about the tapestries so wanted to see them for myself! Still enjoying your trip report and I'm working on mine!

Ahh...this weekend was something I really needed. No messing about with computers, just relaxing a bit and getting things back in order. DS and I took our mom to this great French restaurant in Dallas called Lavendou (http://www.lavendou.com/). It was a nice way to round off our trip (which was almost a week over with) and sorta celebrate what would have been my parent’s anniversary (father passed away in June of last year). The dinner was wonderful and before we ate, I presented my mom with gifts I had bought for her while over there (one of which was this crystal mosaic piece of jewelry I bought in Paris - www.crystalmosaic.com). So, one full day left in Paris..here we go!

- Sept. 7th - The Latin Quarter -

Today we decided to give ourselves a bit of a break and woke up later than usual. As we were going to go to Lausanne on Friday, we needed to go to Gare de Lyon to pick up our tickets. Now, I'm sure I could have probably picked them up at Gare de Nord when we first arrived in Paris, but this gave me a good opportunity to gauge how long it would take from our hotel to the train station (including changing metros). It took us about 20 minutes or so to get from our hotel to the train station. Not too bad. After we got our tickets, it was off to the Opera Garnier stop to make a visit to the Amex office. I'm not sure if I mentioned this before or not, but this is the <b>ONLY</b> Amex office in the whole of Paris. When it comes to changing money, it's a bit of a fussy situation for me. I like to get it done at an Amex office due to the whole &quot;no commission&quot; charge. I learned another thing while I was there. After I'd changed some dollars over to Euros, I was going to change some dollars into Swiss Francs. The guy at the office to me that it's better to do that in Switzerland because to do it at the Amex office (or any other country that uses the Euro) they would have to convert the dollars to Euros and then the Euros to Swiss Francs, so I'd be losing about 10%. So, remember that before you head off to Switzerland from any country that uses the Euro.

With money changed to Euros, we headed towards the Latin Quarter. We would spend most of the day there doing various things. As we walked around the Latin Quarter I spied something that stirred my blood. I had hoped to see one of these while over there, but wasn't quite sure where'd I'd see one..or two for that matter of fact. Like a bee to honey, I crossed the street and honed in on.....and independent (re: used) record store! I am a vinyl junkie. CDs fit the bill as well, but I was mainly interested in finding some French pressings of some of my favorite groups. I went into this one store and went up to their second level. Up there they had this row of used 7&quot; singles. Ah! I started to flip through and move them about, using the eagle eye of the record collector in me to spot things I had in mind. I could have spent at least an hour in there, but the purpose of our trip wasn't to let our time be gobbled up by pursuits such as this. I did score, however, this Duran Duran French 7&quot; of their single &quot;Skin Trade&quot; in the banned &quot;bum&quot; sleeve and this 7&quot; of Mel Brooks &quot;It's Good to Be The King&quot;. I never knew this existed, but found it a bit quirky being that the whole &quot;It's Good to Be The King&quot; joke was done during the French Revolution in Mel Brook's film &quot;History of the World Part 1&quot;. Bought it for a laugh but haven't listened to it yet.

Our stomachs began to make noise and it was time for lunch. DS bought a sandwich as this little cafe and then I wound up buying a panini from this place near the McDonalds. With lunch in hand, we made our way across the street and into the little park that's part of the Medieval Museum. The weather was gorgeous that day! It was nice to just sit, relax and eat our lunch. My panini was delicious and I'm sure I could have gone for another one. As we were there, our next stop was the Medieval Museum (naturally). I highly recommend visiting this museum. In the museum you will see many tapestries, including the famous unicorn one that's actually part of this 5 tapestry set (it's all about the senses - hearing, smell, etc). Before we left the museum, we purchased some gifts or stuff for ourselves. I was tempted to buy a tapestry they had for sale, but decided against it. My powers of persuasion did get DS to buy one. :-) We walked around the Latin Quarter some more, venturing down small side streets. Ten years ago I'd stumbled into the Latin Quarter and saw these really unique art pieces in the window of this one store. I was hoping to find this store again, but after 10 years it may have moved on or just closed. As we were walking down this one small side street, DS spotted this gallery with sparkly stuff. This turned out to be the Crystal Mosaic store. At first I had not intended to buy anything, but the more I looked at the stuff and talked to the lady, I decided that this would be a place to buy something nice for my mom. Everything in that store was made by hand, no machines were involved. Our purchases made, it was off to wander about again. Before we headed back to our hotel, we made one final stop at this costume store. They have a website address - unfortunately I don't have it on me. This store had some really nice masks and costumes...so European looking! :-)

Ugh! The daily question of where to eat dinner was upon me again. Ok, we'd done Chinese, Italian, Greek, American, sandwiches &amp; junk food, now where to go? French of course!! I flipped through the various papers I'd printed out and found these two pages from the Paris Digest that had a list of suggested restaurants. I scanned over them, looking for one that fit the bill. Le Train Bleu was a consideration, but I'd been to their website and frankly, nothing on the menu grabbed me. The descriptions of the restaurants listed sounded good and I had to make a choice. Which one was going to do it for me? The one that clenched the deal for me had something I wanted - history. The choice was Procope (13, rue de l'Ancienne Comedie). Reading the fact that this place had been around since 1686 and the names that had dined there (Voltaire, Napoleon, etc) really hooked me. Cost was not an issue for me. We arrived there a bit early and were seated close to the window that looked out on to rue de l'Ancienne Comedie. What can I say? The food was wonderful in my opinion. It was a nice leisurely dinner. They did have a fixed price menu which DS opted to do. I went the other route and picked out what looked good to me. After dinner we once more found ourselves ambling about the Latin Quarter. We crossed over the Seine River as I'd wanted to make a visit to St. Chapelle. We'd gotten close to St. Chapelle when I decided to nix the idea of going there. The next morning we were going to have to get up quite early and I wanted to hit the Monoprix to stock up on junk food to take back home. This was pretty much the end of our final full day in Paris. Once we got back to our neighborhood, DS took my video and digital camera to the hotel so that I could use my backpack to pack in all the stuff from the Monoprix. Our evening ended with a bit of TV watching and then it was off to bed. Friday would be Lausanne!

Thanks for sharing your Paris trip. I flew out of the DFW Int'l terminal and it is great. What did you have at Lavendou. I'd planned to take my mother there when she was in town in August for a convention, but her schedule didn't permit.

Thanks for your report. I enjoyed following your decision making process beforehand and what you actually ended up doing. I think you've talked me into visiting the Cluny... Have never gone.

Hi BettyBoop - At Lavendou I had the tomato and mozzarella cheese salad (delicious!), the Pork Tenderloin with Lavender Honey and Red Currants Served with Roasted Potatoes (had to lift this from their site cos I wanted it to be listed right!), and the Gran Marnier Souffle. This restaurant is <b>SO</b> worth going to. The extent of my French dining cuisine has been La Madeline, but this place is definitely a cut way above. If you do go, I strongly suggest making reservations around 6:30 - 6:45 because by the time 7 - 7:15 rolled around, it was packed!

amwosu - Yeah, I had pretty grand expectations about what I was going to do on certain days - then had the input of the Fodorites here. Of course, you know how the best laid plans go. I hadn't planned on my shoes affecting how much I walked. Then there was the weather that kinda affected decision making, not to mention my sister not feeling good on one day. Once I've posted my report, I'll go back and compare the suggested itinerary to what we actually did.

- Sept. 8th - No smoke on the water, no fire in the sky -

On Friday the 8th, we were going off to Lausanne, Switzerland to visit my aunt. DS and I were up pretty early so we could get ready and catch the 7:22 a.m. TGV to Lausanne. Now, I must admit that I thought that hopping aboard a TGV train would mean speeding through the countryside and a good rate of speed. Whilst this train did go fairly fast, it didn't seem like it was living up to the idea of a &quot;high speed train&quot;. There were a few stops along the way, one of which was in Dijon. I believe it only takes like 1 1/2 hours to get there. Anyways, as we made our way into Switzerland, I began to see the familiar red flag with the white cross. Yay! The trip did seem like it went fairly quick. The only thing I wasn't too crazy about was our assigned seats on the train. For whatever reason, every time I get a train seat, it's one that's facing backwards. If there's one thing that drives me crazy is not facing forward on the train! There were a few times I saw things of interest and when I went to video tape them, I'd only get a little bit and then all these trees would pop up. Ho-hum.

We pulled into the Lausanne train station about 11:45 a.m. and the weather was really looking great! Once we'd left the train, I had absolutely no idea where to go. I suggested that we go down these stairs as it looked like it would lead us towards the lake. When I got to the bottom of the stairs, DS asked me how our aunt was making her way to Lausanne. Good question. I didn't know if she was coming by car or by train (I suspected train as that would have been the way to come). As I turned around to answer her, I saw our aunt standing at the top of the stairs! she'd come by train. It was such a pleasure to see her. Once we'd joined up, we got some information from the info center and a few minutes later we were on a bus and headed down to the lakefront known as Ouchy (pronounced wee-chee, but I had fun with it and pronounced it as owwchee). At the lakefront we bought our tickets for the boat, milled about the area for awhile. The water was this crystal clear blue. It was so clear that while walking along the waterfront, I was able to see some large as well as small fish swimming about. That's one thing I've noticed about the lakes in Switzerland..they're really clear. I remember last year when my nephew and I were there and went to Mt. Rigi. As we were waiting for the train to arrive, we stood by the lakefront and I was amazed at how clear the water was.

Anyways, when 1:20 p.m. rolled around we boarded our boat. None of us had eaten, so we headed for their dining room and had lunch. For some odd reason they weren't able to provide any hot meals, only cold meals. This didn't leave for a wide selection to choose from, so all 3 of us had the Swiss salad, some water, and a bottle of white wine. As we ate our lunch, the boat stopped a few times at different piers to let people on or off and we watched the scenery just pass us by...all those vineyards on the hills above...very picturesque. As the boat pulled up to this one pier, there were some boys in kayaks readying themselves for the waves that the boat created. Now, either that water was pretty comfortable (i.e. warm) or they had thick skin! When we arrived at Vevey, we had to disembark to get on this other boat that would then take us to Montreux. I'm sure there was more to Montreux than what we saw, but our goal was to get to Chateau Chillon (to henceforth be known as the castle) with what time we had. We got on the number 1 bus and it took about 10 minutes or less to get us out to the castle. Back in the early 60s when my parents spent their honeymoon in Switzerland, one of the places they went was this castle. There's even a painting of it by the lake that hangs in their house today. We took a tour of the castle that lasted about an hour. It wasn't a guided tour, but you got this info map about the place and followed the numbers. A very easy tour to do. One thing I didn't know was that apparently Lord Byron spent a few years chained up in their dungeon! He even etched his name on one of the pillars (protected by some plexiglass).

Once we were done with the castle, it was back to the bus and to the train station. It didn't take very long to get from the train station in Montreux back to Lausanne. Our aunt had to catch the 6:20 p.m. train back to Zurich, but our train wasn't until 7:22 and DS and I were going to spend our remaining time wandering about the area. Our aunt said that maybe we could catch an earlier train back to Paris. This sounded good to me, even though I did kinda want to do a bit of souvenir shopping in Lausanne. A quick check of the train timetable and we saw a train back to Paris that left at 6:22 p.m.. I only had minutes to see if I could make the exchange!! There was no problem with changing the tickets and then I was off and running back to where my aunt and DS were. What was funny is that I recall seeing the TGV train pull in while we were waiting on the one platform with our aunt. DS and I did get on the TGV in time (panting and puffing no less) and then a few minutes later we were back off to Paris. Arriving in earlier gave us a chance to get everything packed and ready for our journey back to London the next day. I was already missing Paris! It's almost over...

- Sept. 9th- London calling -

Saturday was our last and final day in Paris. Time to depart. Our time really went by fast! Aside from getting blisters during all the walking in Paris, I had a great time. DS and I got up at our usual time of 7 a.m. to get ready to go. In the past when I had stayed in this area, I really hadn't planned out my journey well enough to get back to Gare du Nord. It was always this long way around. Luckily this time I decided on a better route - essentially backtracking the way we'd arrived at the hotel that previous Saturday. We arrived at Gare de Nord with plenty of time to spare, but knowing how crowded it gets we lined up to go through the passport control. I'm glad this is how they have it now. A few years ago it was a bit of a pain to have to go through it when you got to London Waterloo. It's much more efficient the way they have it now. While we were waiting I decided to get something to eat and change my Euros and Swiss Francs to UK Sterling. This was a bit of a goof on my part. I should have waited until I got to the Amex office in London...oh well, lesson learned. The time rolled around for us to board and we made our way down the ramp.

Ahh....back in Business class. Now, I know that no matter what class you're sitting in on the Eurostar, you're still going to the same destination...but traveling in Business class with the little perks is something nice and I highly recommend doing it if you haven't. Once again my sister and I found ourselves in the same seating arrangement that we had when we went from London to Paris. This was all fine and good....until this lady with a baby went out and flippity flapped with the Eurostar person. The next thing I knew, the lady and her baby were sitting in the 4 seats across from us. Uh-uh. This was not on. I told DS that I wasn't having this. I'd had my fill of screaming/crying babies/toddlers during our trip, not to mention having to put up with a teenage girl on the way over who decided to put on nail polish. I wanted this train journey to be a pleasant one. Time to take some action. I went out and had a word with the Eurostar guy and expressed (politely) a desire to sit elsewhere in the coach once we got under way. He looked at his list, saw quite a few open seats, especially this 4 seat configuration, and said that once the doors had closed we could move. Yay! DS and I were now seated in the 4 seat configuration, well far from the lady with the baby. This afforded us to stretch and spread out a bit. Brunch was a delicious affair and I do suggest getting the omelet should you travel when they are serving brunch. The train sped along quite nicely towards the French coast. We must have passed at least 4 or 5 other Eurostars on our way there. The 20 minutes of darkness quickly went as it had come and we were now in England!

England. I've been here the same amount of times that I have been to France. We pulled into Waterloo station around 11:45 a.m. and then navigated our way through the Underground to Victoria station. Something I wasn't aware of going on was this football (soccer) match happening later on that day. There were loads of people wearing red football jerseys. Anyways, once at Victoria station and I got my bearings, we headed towards our hotel - the Hesperia London Victoria. My nephew and I had stayed there back in 2004 when it was then part of the Holiday Inn chain. This really is a good hotel and I like it's location because if you need to catch the Gatwick Express you don't have to worry about using the Underground! The beds are nice and comfy, our room had a 26&quot; LCD TV, mini-bar! (the room my nephew and I had last time didn't have one), coffee/tea set (I always take the Cadbury hot chocolate mix), the usual bathroom goodies, etc. Right - the one thing that I wasn't thrilled about regarding the bedroom was the bathroom door - it was frosted glass! Umm...yeah...I'm not too fond of this kind of door for obvious reasons. Other than that, great room. They also have an indoor pool, but since I forgot my bathing suit, no pool for me.

Once again we found ourselves dumping our stuff off in the room - and this time I left the video camera and digital camera in the room. I'd had enough of carrying those things around like a monkey on my back for the whole trip! I did take the blue backpack as I had shopping in mind. It was back to the Underground to go a few stops to Piccadilly Circus. A stop in HMV and Virgin, and it was off to Leicester Square, China Town, Soho, Berwick Street (where I did indulge my vinyl/cd addiction in a few stores), Oxford Street (for a quick take away lunch at this Chinese place and to buy a shirt at this one store), Oxford Circus, Hamley's Toy Store and then back to the hotel to rest. I was to meet a friend of mine in Leicester Square around 7:30 p.m. and DS opted not to go because she was tired. Off I went and my friend and I agreed on this Portuguese restaurant on the South Bank called Nandos. The area where this restaurant is has <b>really</b> transformed itself over the past 10 years! It's becoming quite the hip area. The restaurant served up some good food and my friend and I caught each other up on what was going on in our lives. I wish I had at least an extra day there, but I'd been away from home for a good amount of time. Back at the hotel it was a bit of TV and then to bed. Knowing that checking in was going to be a task, our wake up time was going to be 6 a.m..

Sunday morning arrived and the journey home was about to begin. With everything packed up, strapped in, padded and locked up, we checked out and walked over to Victoria Station to get on the Gatwick Express. This is a journey I've taken well over a dozen times. It always signals either the beginning or the end of my trip. Believe it or not, things were very organized at the airport in terms of checking in. We used the self service BA kiosk to get our boarding passes and then we queued up for baggage check in. The line went fairly quick and we were instructed to take our bags to the oversized luggage area (due to my backpack and my duffle back with the wine bottle in there). When we were about to go through the security check, DS was told that she couldn't bring her small duffle bag on board as she already had a small bag in her possession. This flustered her somewhat, but in the end she was able to jump the line, get it tagged and then took it over to the oversized baggage area. For those who don't have large baggage, you just hand your stuff off to these guys in green suits and they take it from there. Once beyond the security check-in point, we were now in the land of duty free. I usually stock up on candy and the likes, but this time around I decided not to. What I did buy were 3 DVDs. After some browsing, we spent a few minutes at the Starbucks having a light breakfast. No sooner had we finished our breakfast the call came over the intercom system for passengers going to DFW on BA to make their way to the gate. Here we go!

When I had bought our tickets earlier this year, for some odd reason I wasn't able to choose our seats, so on the trip back home we were in different rows. This actually turned out to be a good thing for both of us. I was seated in the middle section in the middle seat. Bleh. Luckily the row in front of me only had one passenger on the left aisle seat, so I asked the stewardess if I could move up once the door had closed. I'd like to think that this was also good for the people on either side of me as they could now stretch out and not feel so confined. The flight back home was smooth. I don't recall any turbulence (tho I did nod off to sleep for a bit), the in-flight movies were entertaining, the food was good, and no screaming toddlers! Our flight landed on time, but our taxi to the gate seem to take forever. Since this was my first time coming through the international terminal at DFW, I didn't know what to expect. Well, it seems like they finally got it right when it came to immigration. They were actually staffed to handle the influx of passengers!! By the time we got down to the luggage carousel, the luggage from the plane was coming up. We did have to wait until ours appeared. Time to queue up for the Customs line. Yawn. I noticed that with some people they asked questions, others they didn't. I was asked questions like, &quot;Why did you go to France?&quot;. I was a bit dumbfounded with the couple of questions I was asked, but I was too tired to care. Ugh! The heat was still here! DS and I didn't have to wait for mom too long as she was in the parking garage. A couple of minutes later and we were in the car and on our way back to our homes. Journey over!