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Published: October 28th 2008
Arrived at Charles de Gaulle airport around 7pm Sunday. The plane trip was a 45 minute flight, although 30 of it was on the tarmac waiting to take off. We both dozed off, woke up and thought we had landed in Paris but we were still waiting. No problems getting through customs; one of our bags was the last bag to come through; a little scary! We arrived at our hotel: Relais Bosquet Hotel on a narrow residential street. Like the French, we decided to go to dinner late; a quaint restaurant a few steps away from our hotel. Our waiter was friendly and spoke some English; I tried some of my French. Bottle of Bordeaux, French onion soup, cheese and bread, Bon appetit! After dinner we strolled through the streets, looking at the Eiffel Tower only a few blocks away. Ken was pointing out the different sports cars along the street; he walked up to one to look in and I said, "why are the windows so steamed up?!" He saw passion in Paris. Back to our hotel and to bed. The French like the indoors to be hot, so our radiator heat was on. We had to turn the
AC on to be comfortable. Up the next morning after sleeping in; went to a cafe down the street: cafe au lait, ham and cheese omelet, apple tart and freshly squeezed OJ; We enjoyed watching the locals start their day, shopping, etc. We headed to the Metro and headed to Notre Dame. We got stopped by a police along the river Seine: he asked us in French; where we were going; I was so excited I understood him. Apparently there was some police matter, so we had to go another way; Walking along the Seine was beautiful with the leaves changing. We did not go in Notre Dame, just walked around. We stopped to get coffee so we could go to the bathroom; it's difficult to find them here! Next we headed to the metro and could not find it; had to ask a policeman. We headed to a nice area of town I believe called Merais; not sure; it's east of Notre Dame. Victor Hugo lived in this area; It started to rain; we stopped in a market and picked up a bottle of wine, some cheese, bread and headed to a park. The rain stopped and we enjoyed
our purchase and watched the kids playing, etc. Back on the metro, headed to Jardin des Tuileries. It started raining really hard as we got out of the metro so we went to a cafe. We ordered more wine and Ken decided to smoke a cigar; a group of young Italians noticed his cigar and hollered 'cigar' and were laughing. Ken decided to give them a cigar and they gladly accepted. Ken had to show them how to bite the end off, light it; We had a good time trying to communicate with them, using English, French; Italian, jesters, drawings; everyone around us was laughing as Ken taught these young people this bad habit! We also met a nice Chinese couple on their honeymoon. We exchanged email addresses, phone numbers and of course Ken invited the Italians to visit us in Tucson; They left and we continued to enjoy our wine. About 20 minutes later, they returned and wanted to meet us for dinner; we picked a place and time for later. See pictures of Ken and the Italians; the new cigar smokers.
Next we headed to Place de la Concorde, Champs-Elysées, and the Arc de Triomphe; Along the walk,
Place des Vosges in Marais
Drinking wine from a bottle!we came upon some Maintenance workers in the park; Ken wanted to get a picture with them, and tried to get them to take off their uniformed vest so he could act like a French park worker. They said 'non, non' and gestured that the police would handcuff them. There was definitely a communication problem since Ken knows no French.
At the Arc de Triomphe we came upon a celebration; A girl told Ken it was a WWII celebraton, honoring a survivor of the a Holocaust camp; We got a picture of him and also another picture of Ken trying to explain to one of them that his father helped liberate the French in WWII and that he should be allowed to march with them; again 'non, non'. Perhaps too much wine. Began to rain again, we headed to the metro. We are getting tired but wanted to walk past the Eiffel Tower at night. It was beautiful, but I don't like the blue lights; it was white lights when I was here 35 years ago!
We headed back to our hotel area and went out for a late dinner. Tonight we head to Rome on the overnight train. We
Place des Vosges in Marais
A beautiful park in upscale residential area of Marais did not do much today as I felt a little sick!
Can't wait to meet up with our friends.
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josette Nicholls
non-member comment
Bonjour!
Comment ca va? Bien ? Quelles aventures a Paris ! I can see Ken was up o his usual fun tricks (witnessed l'amour en France......then cigars, trying to fix the park or march) NON NON, you can't fool with French people like that, much too serious ! I'm glad you liked the food, the Eiffel tower (despite the blue lights...) the toilets HA HA, lucky to find them..) and the Marais which is a lovely area. I'm sorry it rained a lot, what a shame! Hope you feel better , Margie. Have fun in Italy. Love. Josette