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Paris, Spring 2001 |
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Thursday, March 29 - Friday, March 30: Redeye Flights and Homecomings
After claiming our bags, we successfully hunted down a French ATM and bluffed our way through the menu, ending up with a fistful of money and thus bypassing the serpentine lines at the Change booths. Flagged a taxi, and we were off to Paris! We got to the city limits in about 20 minutes and promptly became mired in rush-hour traffic. Didn't bother me much, though, as I kept seeing sights that triggered nostalgia for 1984, when I'd spent, as a teenager, several months living in France--primarily in Paris and Normandy. The little sidewalk cafes, the Metro stops, even the obelisk at Place de la Concorde...they all brought back great memories. We eventually got to our Latin Quarter hotel, the Minerve, and were told by the desk clerk that we'd be in a smaller room than we'd requested for the first two days of our stay, switching afterward to a larger room. The room was approximately the size of our bathroom at home (and the shower, sans curtain, made a phone booth look roomy), but we figured we could deal with it for a couple of days. There was literally space only for a bed and a solitary armoire. To cross from one side of the bed to the other you had to climb over it. Still, it was a bed, and as it was about 7 p.m. we decided to do the only appropriate thing for jet-lagged travelers: Go to sleep. On Saturday, we discovered the other side of jet lag: waking up in the pre-dawn hours. David and I were wide awake at 4:30 a.m., which pretty much meant we were stuck in the room for at least a couple of hours. We watched CNN, then showered (flooding the bathroom in the process--did I mention there was no shower curtain?) and had breakfast (croissants and coffee) in the hotel dining room. 37 francs each, about $5...not a riproaring deal, but we supposed not much else would be open anyway. Then we hit the streets. Rather cold and breezy--happy we brought warm jackets. We discovered that Notre Dame was amazingly close (about a 10-minute stroll) and enjoyed checking it out; when I was last there, it was undergoing repairs, but it looked fantastic now. We walked up Ile de la Cite, past the Louvre, and explored the Jardins des Tuileries on our way toward Place de la Concorde and the Champs Elysees. Enjoyed a lunch with my favorite Paris sandwich--the inestimable Croque Monsieur, a top-notch sort of grilled ham-and-cheese--and gave our tired feet a rest by hopping the Metro. (Discovered it was surprisingly easy to get around via Metro--I'd remembered it as a frightening labyrinth, but I guess that's what you get when you're 16 and not used to public transportation.) I also found, happily, that my command of French was returning quite rapidly; on a couple of occasions, shopkeepers and waiters had already appeared to take me as, if not a native, at least not a clueless American. David let me do all the talking, although I kept trying to teach him snippets of French; he simply insisted that "bonjour," "oui," and "merci" were all the French words he needed. Our expedition wore us out, and we napped all afternoon. In the evening, we wandered around the Latin Quarter, had falafels for dinner, and even did a little shopping (of course). We also discovered an Internet cafe; although the French keyboard gave me pause, I was able to dash of a quick note letting everyone know we'd arrived safely. Then back to the hotel, where we watched TV until 2 a.m. (hurray for the BBC) in an effort to beat the jet lag. Sunday morning proved to us that our efforst didn't work. Again, we were up early, this time at 5:30 a.m. We decided to hit the streets anyway, and were out and about as the sun rose. (Perhaps not surprisingly, most of the restaurants seemed closed, either due to the hour or the day.) We finally found a little boulangerie (bakery) where we had croissants, pain au chocolat, and cafe au lait. I wanted to check out Montmartre, as I had wistful memories of the sun-dappled steps of Sacre Coeur and artists all over the streets. We decided to walk and passed through Les Halles on the way. No longer a flea market, it's now a subterranean shopping center with a fairly cool church (St. Eustache) and some interesting gardens atop it. We chuckled at a saucy sculpture outside the church...a seemingly stand-alone giant head resting on a hand. We kept going to the Montmartre area (long walk, and up a considerable incline), where we lunched at an outdoor cafe and watched the umpteen pigeons (and various stray dogs) begging for scraps. Sacre Coeur looked like a vision as we glimpsed it through the winding alleyways, but when we reached it we found it to be overrun with tourists--the steps were jammed with camera-slinging families. And nary an artist to be seen. We approached the church the back way but didn't enter, then spent an hour or so people-gazing from its heights and looking down into neighboring courtyards at Parisians playing endless games of boules (think bocce, but with cigarettes hanging out of the mouths of almost every player). But much to my disappointment, we didn't see a single artist plying his trade in the streets. Another teenage memory washed out. Metro'd it back to the hotel, where we napped from about 3 p.m. until dinnertime. We foraged in the Latin Quarter for a restaurant and found a little Italian place ("Pizza Roma") with a hideously tacky sign but amazingly good food. A little more romantic strolling through the streets after dinner, then back to the hotel. We'd made arrangements for a tour to the Moulin Rouge (included transportation and the show) that evening, and we left the hotel around 10 p.m. On the way, our driver assured us that there were still artists in Montmartre...we just hadn't looked in the right areas. Darn. The show began at 11 p.m. and was basically a Las Vegas-style song and dance review...with bare-breasted women. It was all very exciting and glamorous for the first hour, but by hour three I think even David was bored with breasts. The most entertaining portion of the show was during the scene changes, when the sideshows took the stage; our favorite was a hysterically funny ventriloquist. Back to the hotel in the wee hours. Surely this'd cure the jet lag? Monday dawned sunny and bright, and we were getting better; this time, we woke up at the respectable hour of 7 a.m. But I was feeling grumpy: nearly all my meals for the past three days had consisted of the bread group. For those of you who know me, you can imagine the havoc my wheat allergy was playing with me. By mutual consent, we decided to go in search of an omelet. We found a brasserie that would serve them to us early (typically, they're a French lunch food, not a breakfast meal) and swooned over how good they were (didn't want to think about my cholesterol count; they were practially steeped in butter and cheese). We headed back to the hotel to switch rooms, as we'd been told we were expected to do. Unpleasant surprise: the desk clerk said they had no rooms available and, in fact, that our reservation ended today. After several moments of heated conversation, it appeared that we were out on our ears. Frustrated, we headed back upstairs, and I fumed while David tried to calm me down. I finally decided that I'd go seek out accommodations at one of the other nearby hotels we'd passed. As we went to drop off our key at the front desk, I told the clerk (in French) that we were going out looking for a new hotel and would be back. As it happened, the manager of the hotel, Erich, happened to be standing nearby and overheard me. He asked why we were looking for a new place, and I explained it was because we'd been told our reservation was up--even though we'd confirmed it weeks earlier. Upset, he looked through the computer--and not only found our reservation, but also discovered a very nice room that he'd be happy to give us. (Maybe it helped that we had the conversation in French!) He led us up to the room, which was lovely; somewhat larger than the other, but with a full tub and shower (heaven!). All was right with the world. We moved our belongings to our new room and, refreshed and happy, headed back out. (The desk clerk wouldn't meet our eye again after the debacle and, in fact, was barely civil to us from then on. So much for gracious apologies.) David wanted to check out the Jardins du Luxembourg and the Palais du Luxembourg, which is where the French Senate now has its headquarters. (Indeed, some armed guards eyed us suspiciously as we ogled the architecture.) The gardens were charming and quite lovely; they also housed a myriad of activites, including a marionette theater for kids and several tennis courts. We watched some pretty good tennis for a little while before continuing on. We'd decided today was our Monument day...that is, we'd get serious about exploring Paris and see some of the requisite sights on the way. So we were off, walking for hours through the 5th, 6th, and 7th Arrondissements. We saw Les Invalides and waltzed past the Eiffel Tower (we didn't go up, shunning the madding crowd). In the early afternoon, we had lunch outdoors at a brasserie and basked in the hot sun. After our refreshments, we wandered over to the Jardin des Plantes (a botanical garden/zoo) and checked out (what else?) plants and animals. For dinner, we determined to try a creperie that David's sister Kathy had suggested. We found it, but it was closed, so we ate instead at Cafe Latin. For the first time during our trip, we felt like complete outsiders. The waiter's manner was faintly mocking, and crowds of college-aged kids around us kept snickering and sending glances our way. We must've been completely obvious Americans sitting in a completely French hangout. Not a nice feeling. After dinner, we roamed the streets a while (the shops were open quite late) and I found a store that sold interesting silver-and-semiprecious-stone jewelry by the pound. (I bought a few pounds!) Back at the hotel, we watched curling (OK, we were desperate for sports!) for a few hours, then fell asleep. For Tuesday, we'd made plans to spend the day at Versailles with my French "mom," Francoise, and her companion, Henri. They picked us up at 11 a.m. and drove us out to the town of Versailles, where we had lunch at a completely French restaurant (no tourists here). It was an interesting conversation, because Francoise spoke no English and David, no French; Henri knew a smattering of English, but basically it was me trying to keep chatting away in my fractured French. It must've gone OK, though, because they even seemed to understand my jokes. On to Versailles: wow, talk about opulence. We visited the Grandes and Petites Appartements with the aid of an audio guided tour, then wandered around the vast gardens, spending about four hours in the exploration. David and I were completely "opulenced out" at the end of our visit and voted to return to Paris rather than visit Le Petit Trianon and more of the grounds. After another nap (we were starting to like this!), we ventured out to a nearby Irish pub to watch a soccer match. I lasted there all of 30 minutes, thanks to the incredibly pervasive cigarette smoke, and then escaped to the Internet cafe where I spent an hour or so. Unfortunately, part of my correspondence was to cancel a planned side trip to visit relatives in Switzerland. We'd originally planned to hop a train on Thursday and spend two days there, but the French train system went on strike on April 2 and we were told it'd be impossible to travel by train. Since we didn't want to rent a car, it looked like we'd have to spend our whole trip in Paris (yes, an amazing hardship, I know). After a late dinner of onion soup, we scrubbed the smoke out of ourselves with showers and stuck our clothes on the balcony. By Wednesday, we were finally back to normal: we slept in until noon. (Ack, reverting to our slothful ways.) We left the hotel around 1 p.m. and took the Metro to Montparnasse, where had lunch (giant salad for me--after nothing but eggs, cheese, and bread, I was craving vegetables) and saw a movie ("15 Minutes") in English. Then, on to Galeries Lafayette for shopping (David lasted an impressive 25 minutes) and a walk back home. We stopped at Les Deux Magots, the famous restaurant, for a cup of their renowned hot chocolate (which was, I must admit, incredibly good...think molten chocolate) and then strolled along the Seine. At last, we had dinner at Kathy's creperie (Creperie Saint Andre des Arts) and were impressed with how good the food (and atmosphere) was. My dinner was a crepe with onions, tomatoes, and bacon; David had onion, tomatoes, and mushrooms. Afterward, dessert crepes of chocolate, poached apples, vanilla ice cream, and whipped cream. Amazing! On the way back to the hotel we checked out some souvenir shops, where we bought a handful of postcards and soccer jerseys as thank-you gifts for our housesitters, Niki and Doug. And now for some more curling... On Thursday, we awoke to to thunder, storm clouds, and intermittent rain. Our big project of the morning was doing laundry. We lugged our plastic bags full of smoke-infused apparel to a laundromat, where we finally figured out the central-pay system, and had breakfast at a brasserie adjacent to a fruit market/flea market. Bought some amazingly priced silk scarves, then headed to the Internet cafe for a quick visit while David presided over the drying laundry. Back to the hotel to drop off our newly clean clothes (ah joy), then off on a mission: to see the Musee d'Orsay. The rain hit in earnest as we walked over (sans umbrella); yep, we got wet. And when we got to the museum, another unpleasant surprise: the strike that had affected the railway had also apparently affected the Orsay. So instead, we walked on to the Jeu de Paume museum and took in the "Picasso Erotique" exhibit. (Apparently he was quite the randy painter at one point in his career; it was a pretty racy exhibit.) We wandered home via Metro, in part, and stopped at the Cafe Boul' Mich for enormous mugs of cafe au lait, soup, and croissants. We were ecstatic when the waiter brought us a full basket of croissants, and even happier when he replaced them with a smile when we ate them all. We were not quite so happy when we got the bill and realized we were charge per croissant consumed. (For the record: nine.) Oof. Back to the hotel for regrouping; we decided with the foul weather, we didn't want to hang out in a cafe (too much smoke), so we went to another movie. "Miss Congeniality" was renamed "Miss Detective," but it was quite amusing nonetheless. Speaking of amusing: David went off by himself to get popcorn. He returned with a strange look on his face: "Try some of this," he said, offering up the bag. I took a bite and laughed; he'd gotten caramel popcorn. "Damn, I panicked!" he said. "The person at the counter said 'blah blah blah' and I just said 'oui'." (Moral of the story? Listen to your wife when she tries to teach you French phrases, hee hee.) We walked home in the rain and again passed the Cafe Boul' Mich, which was completely empty save for the waiter and the bartender. A black dog scratched at the door and the waiter appeared to be grinning at her, so I opened the door to let her in. The waiter promptly ran out another door as the dog bounded toward him. The bartender let the dog out...and the waiter ran back inside, laughing, as the dog tried to catch him. It was the funniest game of tag. We watched for a while, laughing, before we headed back to the hotel. It seemed the most essentially French thing we'd seen in a couple of days. Friday was more of the same: rain, rain, more rain. We thought about trying the Musee d'Orsay again, but the desk clerk informed us the strike was still on. Rats. Instead, went back to our new favorite creperie for brunch, then spent the afternoon at the Louvre. Was wonderful, although the wing with the Egyptian exhibits (my favorite) was inexplicably shut down. Perhaps a partial strike? Grabbed the Metro to avoid the rain (and bought an umbrella from a vendor at the station), then stopped for an afternoon snack of coffee and sweets (Dave had a banana/chocolate crepe, while I had a strawberry torte). Despite the rain, we sat outside, somewhat protected by an awning, and watched the street life go by. The most amusing moment was watching a three-piece band, complete with tuba player, emerge from a nearby Metro station. That evening, we attended a classical musical concert at the Sainte Chappelle, my favorite church in the city. The quartet of harpsichord, flute, oboe, and cello played a selection of Vivaldi sonatas...it was amazing and inspiring. The acoustics were marvelous, and the music was perfectly suited to its surroundings. Upon leaving, we found that the weather had cleared and a full moon was lighting up the city, so we seized the chance to take a bateau-mouche ride on the Seine. It was crowded, but quite interesting...it was great to see the monuments along the Seine's banks--even the Eiffel Tower--completely lit up. On the way home, we were hit by another huge cloudburst, so we ducked into a restaurant to escape the rain. It turned out to be yet another creperie! Well, with nothing else to do, we decided to go for the crepe trifecta and have them for dinner, too. Saturday. More rain. The Musee d'Orsay still closed. We were going a little stir crazy; the room was too small to hole up in for any length of time, and the idea of sitting in a restaurant or cafe for a long time inhaling smoke didn't suit us well. David vetoed shopping; I wasn't in the mood for alternate museums. We were getting a little restless, perhaps a little burned-out on the city tourist thing, and actually even called the airline to see if we could head home early (no problem--for a truckload of money). We decided to stay. We decided to stay outdoors, despite the weather, and traipsed to the Bois de Boulogne via street and Metro. We'd originally intended to rent bicycles, but the lack of apparent rental stands and the gloomy weather persuaded us to stay on the ground. The park itself was pretty, and would have been impressive on a sunny day. Stopped at a cafe later on for chocolate mousse, apple pie, and coffee. Took the Metro home as the rain hit again. That evening, we went to the Paris sports hall (on the outskirts of town) to see the French Cup volleyball championships finals. We bought tickets at the door and found the place packed to the rafters...they really love their volleyball here! It was great. The crowd was just roaring at the great points. The Paris team won the championship, 3-0 (25-23, 25-20, 25-20) and the place went crazy, singing and cheering and clapping. Was a very cool thing to see. On Sunday, our last day: surprise, surprise, more rain. We put up the umbrella and ventured out in time to catch the Paris Marathon running by Hotel de Ville, on the banks of the Seine. It was a really inspiring sight. Had lunch at a way too touristy cafe (we traded quality for convenience) near the Louvre, where the waiter insisted on speaking English to us despite my equal insistence on addressing him in French. He was rather snotty. Blah. Tried the Musee d'Orsay one more time (still closed), then settled for another movie ("Proof of Life"). Another cafe stop afterward, where I tried the famed Parisian tarte Tatin...it was incredible! Kind of an upside-down apple pie with loads of cinnamon. I couldn't believe I'd waited until our last day to try it. I could have been eating it every day! We did a little more souvenir shopping, then bought wine, cheese, bread, and chocolate and ate (and got drunk) back in our hotel room. We didn't have to watch curling on TV this time, because (luckily!) David Cup tennis was on...we watched France defeat Switzerland (by this team, I was rooting for Switzerland!). We packed up our things, made sure we were all set for our morning departure, and got ready to bid Paris farewell. All in all, it was a really nice trip, marred only by the weather and our limited mobility. If we'd had a car, we might've escaped the weather (or at least seen it from a different perspective) by heading out to Normandy or elsewhere; if we'd had train service, we'd have gone to Switzerland. As it was, we felt a tad trapped inside Paris. Still and all, it was a really nice springtime trip, and I felt lucky to have a chance to revisit the city that once was my second home (and happy that my French hadn't completely deserted me). I think the biggest thing we learned is that David and I are "action travelers." We enjoy some city time, but to really get the most out of a trip, we need to plan some physical activity as well. Next time around, we'll rent bikes, ride horses, play tennis, or do something outside the eating-shopping-sightseeing triumvirate. So, until next time...au revoir, Paris! |
Boy, is that a long plane ride! After boarding our United flight Thursday evening in San Francisco, we landed in Paris (Charles de Gaulle) about 11 hours later--or Friday afternoon, local time. Encountered our first culture shock at the baggage claim carousel, as we watched people lighting up smelly cigarettes (the ever-present Gaulouises seemed to dominate) in full sight of the "Defense de fumer" signs and the recorded voices reminding us, in charmingly accented English, that smoking was not allowed in the airport. Typically French: If you don't like a rule, just ignore it.