Saturday 14th and Sunday 15th September - Paris

An early breakfast and up to the station, caught the train to Geneva, then swapped onto the Paris line. The countryside was nowhere near as scenic as in Switzerland and about halfway through the journey, a light rain started.

We arrived at Gare de Lyon around 12:50. Our first task was to purchase 4 day museum passes (jump the queue time again :)), and a carne of travel tickets (10 - bulk purchase price is cheaper). This took a lot longer than we had hoped, it would have helped if there had been more than 1 person serving at the tourist office desk!

Tickets and passes taken care of, we followed Sabine's directions (she owns the apartment we are renting), and made our way, via a short train trip, to arrondissement 6. After only a minor problem with street names, we met Sabine and she showed us around our home for the next 5 days. It is a change from a hotel room, and will be wonderful to have that bit extra room for a while.

Sadly, housekeeping had to take front spot - washing and then grocery shopping. Those two safely out of the way, we ventured out to explore. The rain persisted through the afternoon, so we had to press our 'rainbird' coats into action. Sabine has left so many bits and pieces here, we were surprised there wasn't an umbrella, but managed okay.

The area around the apartment is lovely. The short walk to the closest corner saw us passing at least 4 restaurants, all with footpath dining, and the supermarket was just around that corner. On the way to the supermarket, we passed at least 2 boulangeries with displays of delicious looking pastries. On our travels, we found a small pedestrian street with several restaurants, but 6pm was too early for dinner - they don't bring out those menus till 7pm, it was still 'tea time'. So we went back to the apartment to dry off first.


Sunday 15th September

We decided to do a 2 day blog again as we really didn't get a lot done yesterday, but we made up for it today!!

First on the list was Notre Dame cathedral. The museum pass gives us entrance to the two towers, and they open at 10am, but we aimed to be there by 9 and have a good look around the cathedral first. It is huge and beautiful. We were really surprised to find that there were services going on while the tourists meandered around the outer areas of the church!

We went around to join the queue (no jump the queue for this one :( ) by 9:40, and the line was already huge. We finally made the head of the line around 10:30, which wasn't too bad. As there is only one way up and down for part of the way, it is all very organized - first stage is about half way, and there you wait in the gift shop while another group finishes - which was good, as I had a chance to catch my breath. Then the group moves onward and upward - stairs again!! But, boy, what a view. About 10 minutes marvelling over said view and madly snapping photos, then they said: okay, you can go up to the top now!! More stairs, higher aspect, more photos! Going down the spiral staircase (some 400 steps) was much easier than going up, but a little dizzying!

We took a little time to stroll around Ile de Cite, then crossed over to Ile Saint-Louis and explored the beautiful little streets there. Errol was delighted to find Berthillion - a famous and well recommended ice cream shop that he had read about, apparently the salted caramel is delicious

Next we followed the Rick Steve's walking guide, and did a tour around the area, mainly on Ile de Cite and the left bank. We passed St Severin's church, Place St Michel, but were very disappointed to find the queue at Sainte Chapelle church was huge, so opted to try again another day. It is some sort of celebration this weekend, and some sights are open and free, we hope that has something to do with the queues. The Conciergerie was nowhere near as busy, but not very interesting either! There was also a display of old Parisienne police cars and fire engines out especially for this weekend (the police car in the photo is a Renault from 1955). The walking tour finished at Pont Neuf.

Somewhere along the way, we found a little Greek restaurant selling wraps for €5.50, all lactose free, so made the most of it. The food was good, and you can't argue with the price!

It was then time to tackle the Louvre. Museum pass meant we had jump the queue, and it was all very easy, we entered via the glass pyramid. Errol had Rick Steve's 'best of Louvre' guided tour on his phone, so we followed that. It was really good, though several rooms were closed, which was disappointing. The place is HUGE, I am sure we would have got lost without the guide, I am also convinced that you could spend all day in the place and not look at the same room twice! The Mona Lisa is small, but everyone wanted to see it, the crowds in that room were crazy (see photo below). Personally, I thought the statue of Venus de Milo was more impressive.

The second photo down isn't a display, it is just the ceiling in one of the rooms! There were 2 crowns on display too - so many gems in one place!

We then caught the subway over to the Pompidou Centre, the museum of modern art. Again on the list for the museum pass, so it was a quick entry. We went right to the top floor to check out the view, which was amazing again. Then down 2 floors to see the exhibition. I am afraid that 'modern art' may not be our thing. Let's just say that we didn't stay long! More interesting - there were street performances on outside the centre, and they were quite good.

Out with the map, and we wound our way back to the apartment for a break. We decided that to tonight was our Eiffel Tower time, it is open till 11pm. TA advice was either go early, or go late, but queues in the middle of the day are huge. It was onto the metro again, with one change, we walked out at Trocadero, where the view was said to be superb - 'they' were absolutely right!

After a few photos from there, we walked down to the Tower. Only took 35 minutes in the queue, which we didn't think was too bad, then up in the lift to the second level - the pictures tell the story. Considering we had seen daytime views, it was a good contrast to do this one of a night. Photos: 1. the Seine River, 2. Looking over to Trocadero, 3. Looking down the Champs de Mars

We were back at ground level about 9:50, and had worked out a course back to the train that gave us the chance to walk down the Champs de Mars. This meant that we would also see the 'fairy lights' on the Tower at 10. By the time we were back at the apartment, it was not far off 11, and we were both exhausted, but what a day we have had!