Hey, so yeah, I went to Paris the weekend before last and it was fantastic. Fantastic! There's something pretty liberating about deciding, "hey, yeah, let's do it!" and not really planning anything beyond plane tickets and hotel room. Both David and I had a pretentiously blasé "been-there/done-that" coupled with a nerdishly excited "let's do it again!" attitude about Paris.
We flew out of Luton airport--a bit of a headache to get to compared to Heathrow, but fine, fine. A shaky take-off and across the sleeve we went. RERed from Charles-de-Gaulle to Hôtel Blois in Montparnasse, near Denfert-Rochereau station. The proprietors were very kind, our room was clean and comfortable, and it was nice and close to metro stations.
Our first day involved wandering around, munching on jambon-fromage baguette sandwiches, bumping into the Eiffel Tower, wandering along the Seine, strolling up the Champs Elysées, shopping, drinking, eating a supper of cheese, bread, and wine in our room while practising our French (nobody responded to me in English when I spoke to them while I was there! J'étais pas mal fière) by watching American shows dubbed in French. Day two: Mont-Martre, Sacré-Coeur, pilgramage to the shockingly closed huuuuge flea-market at Saint-Ouen, zip through Notre-Dame, overwhelming schlep through Galleries Lafayette, drinking, eating in the Quartier Latin. Day three: leisurely stroll through Père Lachaise cemetery (Morrisson, Piaf, Wilde, Chopin), wander around Opéra, David went to the Louvre and I went to a café (the "been there/done that" attitude, remember?), where I read a book called Imagining Early Modern London and almost felt like a local. Except, you know, for the rampant anglicism.
Sunday, we made it back safe and sound, only slightly perturbed by some rudeness at the train station and on the plane. Mais tant pis, Paris était magnifique! ...oh, and while flying over the Channel on that beautifully sunny day, we could see Calais on one side and Dover (complete with white cliffs) on the other.
You wanna see? Go to flickr.
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