Paris Trip Monday 9/22/2014

9/22/2014 – Monday

 

Breakfast is provided by the hotel so this will be pretty much the same every morning.

 

We had:

Pineapple juice

Tea

Croissant and small pastry

Some  mornings we added scrambled eggs

 

We then took a city tour of Paris as part of the tour package.  We had plans to drop out of the tour and go to the Musse D’Orsay but it got later and later before we reached the museum so we decided to just stay with the tour.  This tour was about 3 hours, 9 AM to 12 PM.

 

We went to lunch at a little crepe place across from the hotel for lunch.

 

 Lunch

Creperie La Margasse

We had:

Bob – Gallette Complete aux Champognon

Iris – Gallette Napolitane

And we both had a glass of  vin blanc

 

In the afternoon Patrick, our tour director, took many of the tour group to teach us how to use the Metro and then on a walking tour of the  Marais.  Very interesting district.  It began as a marsh and was developed for the poor or working class.  When  it was developed and the aristocrats saw how beautiful it was they claimed it for themselves.  It has some beautiful mansions that have been turned into museums, or book stores.  Victor Hugo lived in the Marais and his home is now a museum.  Patrick then took us to the Metro station and left us on our own.  Bob and I walked to the Ile de la Cite (City Island) and Ile St. Louis ( St. Louis Island)  and walked around there.  We stopped at a Café Panis across from Notre Dame and had an iced tea, I had peach and he had citron.  Then we started back to the metro.  Stopped and had an ice cream cone at Bertillon’s.  Then we walked back to the metro and back to our hotel. 

 

I hope no one ever says to me that the French are unkind or unfriendly.  When we were having our iced tea Bob left the table for a few minutes.  My feet were really bothering me to the point I was ready to cry.  The waiter came over to our table to ask if I was OK.  Then in the metro a woman offered me her seat.  We waited until the last minute to try to make dinner reservations at a restaurant Bob wanted to go to and they had no tables available until 9:00.  So we headed up our street to find a place to eat.  We walked a couple of blocks and found Lebanese  restaurant

 

 

Dinner

Fakra Restaurant

We shared

Mezza for 2 (this was  an assortment of different dishes, such as Hummus, eggplant Lamb pastries.)

Wine –  Ksara Reserve de Couvent – Bekaa Valley

Dessert – a plate of Baklava and Mint Tee

 

Foch was France's leading general in WWI

Getting ready for our walk in the Marias.
Me in the foreground
Mary (in orange) and her husband next to her
Patrick in the gray short sleeved shirt.  Patrick
was our tour guide.

Our walk in the Marais

Our walk in the Marias

Covered street in the Marais

Apartment building in the Marais
See the geraniums in the window boxes.
Parisians do not have screens in their windows
so they use geraniums to repel insects 

Me in the Marais district

This is one of the oldest walls in Paris - it is
from the original fortifications of the city.  This is
in the Marais

Looking down the Seine

Bob with Notre Dame in the background.
We had just come from drinking the best iced tea

Notre Dame

Gardens at Notre Dame with Notre Dame in the background
 

View of Ile St. Louis from the bridge between
Ile de Le Citi and Ile St. Louis

One of our many pictures of the Eiffel Tower
This one was taken from across the river Seine

The Bastille Monument