Paris

Sunday, March 29, 1998

First day married!

Jill doesn't have shoes and has to go barefoot through the hotel lobby. She has blisters on her chest from the "sticker bra." Keith carries his tux in a plastic bag.

We have mimosas for breakfast at Jill's mom's. Keith's mom could only handle one after the post wedding party at the Country Inn. We opened presents and then Jill's dad and Becky and Jill's mom and Fred send us off from the St. Louis airport.

Monday, March 30, 1998

The ride to Paris is greatly helped by Excedrin PM and a few bottles of Chardonnay. We land atop 10 am and clear customs and immigration and get in line for an ATM, only to discover Jill's missing her fanny pack with all her credit cards. Thankfully, after a 45 minute wait at the United counter, the plane is searched and the bag is found, and we're on our way into the city.

Hotel de Fleurie is a pleasant little hotel with a bustle of activity around it. It's in the heart of Paris in the 6th arrondisement, St. Germain.

Keith leaning out our window at Hotel de Fleurie.

We had an hour before we could get into the room so we wandered out for a bite to eat. We have our first frustration with Frommer's when the restaurant is not where they say it is (we later found it a block away.) So we just find a suitable looking cafe and went in. Looking at the menu, we figure out it's a West Indies / Caribbean restaurant. We still eat French though : we both have Salad Nicoise and glasses of Muscadet wine and share a plate of compti cheese.

Keith searching for a place for lunch.

We return to the hotel and are told we have to wait 15 more minutes for our room to be cleaned. We sit on the couch in the sitting room and quickly fall asleep. Jill wakes up to Keith snoring! We head up to our room - it's pleasant and the windows are pulled open letting in fresh spring air. After a short rest and hot showers we set off to explore.

We walk from the hotel across the Seine to the Louvre, the world's most famous museum. We pass some interesting shops along the way - some pastry shops, wine stores, etc. The Louvre is a pleasant walk from the hotel. It is much larger than any map makes you believe. It's a very impressive place. We walked through the main courtyard to the pyramid entrance and stood in line behind a lady from Monet, Missouri. We went through the Denon and Sully portions of the Louvre, seeing the Mona Lisa and the Venus de Milo.

The Louvre from a bridge over the Seine River.

 

Keith in the interior courtyard of the Louvre. Part of the pyramid entrance is visible to the left.

 

This is Jill with a blurry Mona Lisa behind her, and Keith with the Venus de Milo.

We might have lingered longer if the signs had English translations, but we finish about a quarter of the Louvre in an hour. With sore feet, we sit in a cafe in the museum with 2 cafe creme's. Keith and I started discussing evening plans, sightseeing and dinner and how to get there - and Jill falls asleep with her head on her arm at the table.

After Jill's 20 minute nap at the Louvre and a couple more cafe cremes, we're on our way again. We master the metro and find our way to the Eiffel Tower. We wanted to go up while it was dark but it's already 7:20 and not dark yet and we're hungry. We went to the second deck of the tower - Jill wouldn't go to the third - what a great view of the city! By the time we come down, the tower is lit up and we get a picture of the outside (sorry, didn't turn out to well..)

Jill on the Eiffel Tower (hanging on for dear life)

The view back to downtown from the Eiffel Tower

We eat at Fountain de Mars, not far from the Eiffel Tower. The place was recommended by Frommer's. We shared a bottle of rouge (red, for those Texans reading) wine and both have the scallop risotto for a starter. Keith had the crispy duck and Jill the braised chicken special. Both were very nice. We topped the meal with vanilla creme brulee and black / white chocolate terrine. The waiter was very pleasant and even gave us an English menu. We head home via the metro with a quick stop at a wine shop for a bottle to take home. We finally go to bed around 11:30.

Tuesday, March 31, 1998

Both of us are playing catch-up from the wedding and jet lag, so we sleep in until 10 or 10:30. We hit the streets around 11:30 in search of food. The sit-down restaurants weren't open yet for lunch but we found a adjoining cross streets with street vendors selling fruit and baguette sandwiches and all sorts of food. We browsed a formage (cheese) shop and a meat shop and settled on a warm Quiche Lorraine. We ate that walking down the street, then stopped at a stand up bar for 2 cafe creme's.

Jill ordering a Quiche from a street vendor. Notice the wine store next door...

After breakfast we walked to Isle de Cite to see the Cathedral Notre Dame. The cathedral was neat although half covered for restoration. The inside was impressive stained glass and can hold 6000 worshipers. We also go below the Cathedral to look at the foundations of buildings going back to the first settlement of Paris.

Jill in front of Isle de Cite. Notice the river cruise boats everywhere.

The Notre Dame

We were blessed with a beautiful spring day. Sunny and breezy and in the 70's. After Notre Dame we walked south across the Seine and into a greek section of town with amazing smelling food. We settled on a French cafe for lunch and ordered the set menu. We both had French Onion Soup for the starter (excellent!) Keith had steak in pepper sauce and Jill the pork kebabs - both with french fries (of course). For desert : chocolate mousse and crepes with chocolate sauce. And wee split a small bottle of Muscadet.

Jill crossing the Seine after the Notre Dame

Keith on the same bridge

Keith having french onion soup

Jill having crepes in chocolate sauce

From lunch we took the metro up to the Arc de Triumph which also has a great city view from the top. However, the 284 steps are a challenge - all spiral.

Jill atop the Arc. Just over her left shoulder is the Eiffel Tower (darn scanner...)

After the Arc, we walked down Champs de Elysees and sat on a park bench for a while enjoying the nice sunny day. Another metro ride got us back to the hotel for a break.

We consulted the tour guide on dinner locations and went looking for one of the bistros around 7pm. We didn't have reservations but Parisians don't eat until 9pm so we were very early anyway. We wondered about, not able to find the place and went into a wine store to browse and discuss strategy. The owner was American, having been in France 15 years after flunking out of chef school for his non-rising souffles. We asked him if he knew Cafe Muniche and he told us it had moved, but he hated "places like that." He sent us to one of his local favorites : Bistro de Henri. He even placed a call to see if we could get in and the owner joked that his food must be horrible - the place was empty! Of course, it was only 7:30. We got seated (the only two people in the small bistro) and looked blankly at the menu which we understood little. We ordered 3 kir's as aperitifs and a bottle of wine and got the waiter to explain the menu in the little English he knew. Keith had white beans with garlic for the starter and Jill the avocado with shrimp. Both were good but potent. For the main dish, Keith had veal sausage in tomato sauce ("cooked all day") with buttered noodles which was so good it popped our eyes open with excitement with every bite (Jill's words). Jill had roast beef with buttered mash potatoes which was good but didn't come close to the veal (luckily Keith shared.) Creme caramel with two spoons completed the meal. (The place did fill up completely on the stroke of 9pm).

We walked up to the river, now quite familiar with the streets in the neighborhood, and considered a river cruise. However it was 9:30 and they may have stopped and they didn't look to exciting anyway. We wondered with a stop for another bottle of wine.

 

Wednesday, April 1, 1998

With a half day left, we head to Jardin de Luxembourg, but it was cold. We both also had sore feet. We stop for a couple of cafe creme's and pick up a ham and cheese baguette and the leftover Muscat wine from the night before and head to the Jardin (garden). Cold and without a hotel room (we checked out and left our bags), we next head to the Hotel de Invalides for a look. We found our way back to the Greek section for lunch and both have gyros with fritos (french fries.) We make it back to the hotel in time for the taxi to the airport. The taxi was a few francs less than we expected, so we bought some postcards and mailed them. We had a small bottle of California Merlot leftover from the first flight, so we split it waiting for our flight. It's an hour late because of congestion. The Lufthansa 737 is quite nice (leatherish seats and cheese or salmon baguettes and wine.) Got to Munich and ran through the airport to make our connection only to find out we were on the same plane to Rome and it would also be delayed.