Alouette, Gentille Alouette

Well another lovely week in Paris and have slowed down the pace to look more around the city’s outside rather than inside. The weather has stayed good and we have enjoyed looking at all the old buildings.

Tried to find the old Art Nouveau train stations that remain, the two they listed were in poor form, but would have looked very nice in their day. Originally every subway station had these exteriors and it would have been wonderful if they had kept them.

 

 

 

 

Christmas day was a nice walk in the morning, a simple Christmas lunch of Moet, cheese and chicken and then Michael decided a route march to the Arc de Triomphe via the Champs Elysees would be a good way to see the sites.

 

 It seemed that every tourist and Parisian had the same idea and after 4 hours of walking back to the apartment we had tea, which was some more cheese and a bottle of Chateauneuf du Pape. It was lovely to see the boys and Anne and Phil on Skype.  It was a big surprise seeing James in Sydney as we thought he was in Singapore!

The sales don’t start here until the second week on January so walking around the shopping area is nice and not as frantic as back home.

Unfortunately we could not extend our stay at the apartment and have found another one in the 5th arrondissement near Jardins de Plantes. One tip is to get an apartment with a lift as we are on the 4^th floor with a steep, spiral staircase.  I thought Michael was going to have a heart attack carrying our bags up the stairs. It is a nice old apartment with plenty of exposed beams for Michael to hit his head on as well as an internal staircase to get to our bedroom.  Michael has managed to fall down these stairs twice!

Let Michael wander around the Catacombs of Paris with more bones for him to look at which he enjoyed.  Robespierre’s bones are there as well which doesn’t seem a very dignified way to end up.   

 

We then ventured off to Montmartre to the cemetery in hunt of squirrels with no luck, but a nice cemetery with even a road going over the top of it.  Alexandre Dumas is buried there.

Visited the Liberty Statue, which is known as the unofficial monument to the Princess of Wales, as it is positioned over the tunnel in the Place D’Alma where she was killed. People still place flowers there in her memory and a nearby wall is covered in memorial graffiti. I stopped Michael from telling his Thomas the Tank Engine joke and Phil H - there is no sponsorship or mention of Interflora in the area.

Another nice walk around the small islands Ile De La Cite and Ile St Louis and then wandered back over to the Marais to see another unofficial memorial to Diana in a kindergarten. We found the kindergarten and the garden but not the plaque. Still, it was near the best falafels in Paris, which we queued for 15 minutes while watching the shop across the road that had the sign best falafels have no one go near it. Must be a Paris thing.

Well New Years Eve in Paris was planned around some roast duck and then to see the town. However, Michael’s understanding of French is not so good and we discovered that the duck needed to be defrosted before roasting. Plan B was dinner at a nice French restaurant and wine, which was very good and then off through the streets to see what was happening.  No fireworks here and as it started to rain we headed back to the apartment to watch the celebrations on TV. France TV (English channel) flashed over to Berlin at midnight as there was nothing happening in Paris.  One thing that did amuse us – the TV station did a round up of the top stories of 2012 and the only mention of Australia was footage of our illustrious Prime Minister falling over!  Rather fitting, I thought.

Spent New Years day with a cruse on the Seine which was nice and saw the Mini Me of the Statue of Liberty and the other famous buildings from a different perspective. 

The next night Michael cooked the bird and when eating I said it did not taste like duck. After a bit of Google translating we worked out that it was stuffed Pintade which is Guinea Fowl. Close but not the same.

Last day in Paris and decided to go to Versailles to see the palace. The queues were horrendous so walked around the city, which was lovely with a lot of the Royal buildings from the 1600 still there.

Well our last night in Paris is finished off with vol au vents, small bottle of Mumm and a good bottle of Chateauneuf du Pape.

One thing we noticed was the number of smokers, even in restaurants, where they have outside areas, which are enclosed, so you had to walk through them. One restaurant we saw was called Au Chien Qui Fume (the dog who smokes) so even the animals get into the act.

Well, we say a sad farewell to Paris and head off to the land of beavertail, poutine,  maple syrup & bad accents.