Change of plans - and a reason to prefer a non-itinerary!

     When I began to write yesterday what I thought we'd do today, I realized it probably wasn't the best idea...and it turned out that we didn't do either of those today. Our first experience was an open-air market under the Metro across from our apartment - amazing the variety of what's for sale - and it looked like it must take several hours to set up and take down. I was glad that we weren't in a shopping mode because today, we had a schedule.

A small section of the market

     The Opera House only offers guided tours in English on Wednesdays, so we decided we'd better get to that today, since we'll be on the way home next Wednesday. The Palace Garnier, home of the Phantom of the Opera - was amazing. We had a guide (we have chosen mostly find-your-own-way-around visits, but were very glad we'd gone through this with a tour guide) whose first language was Spanish, and she was describing the French Opera House in English. Cultural fusion!! She said she didn't have a very loud voice, and handed out voice amplifiers with an earpiece (made me think of students who are hearing-impaired), which was great - she could be anywhere in range and we could still hear clearly. The Palais Garnier is nothing less than impressive...and...it was on this tour that we learned the answer to yesterday's wondering - the high-up art is done in a studio and then glued where it is seen. Ha! I would never have thought that was how it was done, (obviously, from yesterday's post!) but it makes so much sense - a blinding glimpse of the obvious! We saw THE chandelier, THE staircase, and learned a lot about the place that we would have missed if we had not done this tour. (I suppose the same is true for most of the places, but we've been overwhelmed just looking without having a lot of extra information to process - at least I have been!)

    This the chandelier seen from the seats

This is a closer view of the artwork around the chandelier - Marc Chagall

     After the Opera tour, we took a different train, which went through a huge station - and there were lots of shops there, one of which was a bakery with pastries. Mmmmm...I decided I had to have a macaron - a meringue sandwich cookie filled with buttercream. I couldn't decide, so chose pistachio again...it's always a safe choice for me. The macaron was HUGE - and I asked the clerk/baker if I could take his picture. (I ended up carrying that macaron around until we got back to the apartment - a little worse for the trip, but still quite good.)

Just to show how big this particular macaron was - look closely - that's one of my rings next to it. Yes, I shared it!

This guy was so happy to be asked for a picture that he grabbed his tongs, then had me wait while he grabbed a baguette with them. Hahaha!!

     The tour at Palais Garnier was supposed to be at 11:30; it was overcrowded, so they added a 12:00 tour, which started about 12:20. These Parisians have a very relaxed attitude toward time. Ok...that left us plenty of time to get to the 3:00 wine tasting - if we could have found it. Oh, we tried to get to the wine tasting, but kept going around it and never found it. It was in the middle of a busy, crowded section of the city, and it was not the kind of lost one would enjoy wandering the streets of Paris. It was in an upscale neighborhood, and we tried with the GPS on the phone, and I must have asked at least seven different store clerks (figuring they worked in the neighborhood, they should know...), and the only person I asked that actually had a clue was a butcher in an outdoor boucherie (meat market) - all smelling of fish, and slippery, wet floors. Sigh. I supposed that the butcher might have delivered meats and seafood to the place, as it was a wine bar that also served food. Unless we have an entire afternoon open (the wine tasting is at 3 pm) we'll probably miss this one. Good thing I'm not able to drink wine, really. Maybe that's why we didn't make it - someone up there was steering us away, every time we got close. France, - what better place to try wines, right? Oh well - we had a wonderful experience prior to getting lost looking for "Ô Chateau."  (no photo for obvious reasons...)

     The stop from the train was at "Les Halles" - a huge, 3-level underground mall, which also presented its challenges in navigating. We rode a lot of escalators, climbed up and down a lot of stairs, asked a lot of people for directions, many of whom gave us wrong information, and were ready to get something to eat and call it a day. So we did.
   

Napoléon, Rodin and Monoprix, with a pleasant surprise!

     I thought it would be difficult to keep the excitement momentum going after yesterday, but each place/activity/experience is so wonderful that I have no more doubts. We set out today to a different area - we'll return to the center of Paris tomorrow to see the Musée d'Orsay and, if there's room, participate in a wine-tasting experience [included with our Paris Pass - so, we figured we ought to try to get there; it would be a waste if we didn't at least try, since it's included :)]

      But - I'm getting ahead of myself here, including what's to come tomorrow, so back to today. The exterior of Les Invalides - which houses Napoléon's tomb, and is a home/hospital for disabled French war veterans - is beautiful, with a golden dome. (We approached from the side, and there was some sort of structure being constructed at the front, so we didn't get an exterior photo today, but did from the bus tour.) There was a veteran sitting outside in a wheelchair, smoking, and as we were leaving, a handicapped man was being helped out of a taxi - how interesting that their veterans' home/hospital is attached to the museum - or vice-versa, I guess.

Sharing a birthday with Roger, Mona Lisa, Sainte Chappelle, and Notre Dame

       As much as I've wanted to come to France forever, I never really wanted to go during the summer vacation (I know, most people's jobs don't include "summer vacation" like teachers have, but it's really not all vacation time - but that's a different topic entirely.) I didn't want to share such a trip with all of the other tourists that descend on Europe during June, July, and especially August - when most of France - if not Europe - is on "holiday." So...well worth the wait, and now I have the opportunity to celebrate my birthday here! Crowds are really tolerable, waits haven't been too long, weather has been comfortable, and, for the most part, people have been polite and pleasant.
    Having the Paris Pass for six days gives us lots of flexibility, so when Roger asked me what I wanted to do/see for my birthday, I chose the Louvre, Sainte Chappelle, and Notre Dame - not sure we could fit it all in, but we did! We also strolled the Seine, at a couple of different times, and I got an ice-cream cone from a street vendor (pistachio, one of my favorites!) Now, that might not be a big deal to most, but, in USA, I have a problem with dairy products inducing asthma symptoms, so indulging in ice cream is a BIG deal to me. And - it affected me very little, if at all, that wonderful pistachio "boule de glace" (scoop of ice cream). Sainte Chappelle is often overlooked - it's fairly near Notre Dame, and much smaller - but it is awesome! The second floor has stained-glass windows that reach to the ceiling, and depict books of the Bible. Then - Notre Dame! No line, and such splendor! We happend to be there just in time for evening vespers, and heard the priests and the organ before going outside to look at the architecture and gargoyles. We did not do the 387 steps to the tower - just didn't have the energy or real desire, since we'd already overlooked Paris from the Arc de Triomphe. We may later regret skipping this, but we felt very fulfilled with what we did see.
      It was getting late (we'd had breakfast, skipped lunch, and were close to "normal-at-home-in-Ohio dinner time"), so after we left Notre Dame, we ducked into what we thought was the better of two brasseries which were right next to each other, but the smell of the outdoor smokers was wafting in from the open door and windows, so we moved to the other one - and it was a serendipitous move.
  I decided to go with the "plat" - a combo with either an appetizer and main course, or main course and dessert. Want to guess which I chose? haha!! We had a very nice, young man for a server (he was very attentive, checking on us several times - ok, I admit it, the place wasn't really busy until we were leaving - and he was also cute) -so we left him an extra tip.
    About the tips here in restaurants - they're always included, and if you like the service, you leave a little bit more. After Versailles, we stopped in a casual place (those are our favorite kind!), and the waiter not only talked us into appetizers that weren't even on the menu (luckily, they were good) so we'd know the price, he told us that the tip wasn't included. Hmmmm....I pointed out to him that it was stated on the menu that it was included, and he said, "No, no - whatever you wish, Madame." After the Versailles experiences, we were pretty tired, and thought, ok, so left him MUCH more than I should have to be the "pourboire" - a small tip of about 3-5%, since most include 15% in the pricing of the food. We tipped as if we were in the US. After we left, we talked about it and decided that he just plain lied to us - guess he needed the money more than we did at that time. Not extravagant, but also not very nice treatment by the server.
     So - back to my birthday dinner...I chose a salmon filet with a light cream basil sauce, which came with French green beans and a small, peeled, baked potato. Dessert - another highlight for me, since I haven't dared have it for a very long time - crème brûlée!! I could have not enjoyed it more! Serendipity, to be sure!
    So many photos from today from which to choose - here are a few:

Versailles, a marathon, and lost!

    Ever wait a v-e-r-y long time for something, and find that it doesn't meet the expectations you've created whilst waiting to actually experience it? Well...been waiting a LONG time to get to France, and I am not at all disappointed. Confused at times (and I know the language, so I can only imagine how it is for those that don't!) - signage is not as clear here, or maybe I should say signage is not as present here.
     I really wanted to go the Château Versailles tomorrow, but it's closed on Monday. That should have been my first clue that today was not a good second choice. We had to decide to go somewhere, right, and I was concerned that doing the Louvre/Notre Dame/Ste. Chappelle might be crazy on a Sunday. Well, it seems as though LOTS of things are crazy on a Sunday - maybe these Europeans need to open stores on Sundays so the crowds have places to go other than tourist sites.
     Getting there was easy - there's a RER (train) stop about 1/4 mile from our apartment, with the right train to Versailles. Check. We had no trouble knowing where to get off - it was the end of the line...check. As the mass of passengers poured out of the train, we followed the crowd - not knowing that TODAY was the Versailles-Paris marathon. Evidently, we were following marathon well-wishers, and did a little marathon of our own - added an extra mile (1/2 going and 1/2 retracing our steps - first "lost" of the title of this post), but were comfortable with shade and a nice breeze. It was pretty warm in the sun, though. See the marathon runners:

     I was going to ask one for permission to take a photo, but these guys were obviously ok with photos, so I surreptitiously got my photo without having to ask. :) Once we realized we were going the wrong way, we arrived at the Château - it's pretty easy to find once going in the right direction! We had entry tickets already with our "Paris Pass" so avoided the ticket line - and had to stand in the entry line for a little over an hour. (A little aside here: Americans are NOT the rudest tourists...there was a group of a different nationality - a sizeable tour group - that just kind of merged into the line in front of us partway through the waiting line. There were no line guards  - it was basically a free-form line snaking six or seven times the length of the courtyard - and when we and people in front of us told them that the line started elsewhere, the guide told us they'd been waiting for a long time in this line. Hmmmm...we suddenly had all these same nationality group, an umbrella, people we didn't see in front of us before - they took cuts! Only about 8-10 of their group actually got in front of us, and the guide was walking even with us - they just widened the line from two across to about six...not cool. I did not name the nationality group because it's not fair to generalize - but - there were a LOT of this particular ethnic group here at Versailles today, and most were not polite, as our culture has been taught to expect from their culture. Sigh.)

    Waiting in line, I suddenly realized that I had either dropped, or someone had grabbed my nylon windbreaker jacket - luckily, I only had a couple of tissues in the pockets, but shuddered to think that last night, I'd had the key to our apartment in one of the pockets. I liked that jacket, and we actually saw a man with one just like it folded up in his bag!  I wanted to have faith in mankind (it was, after all, a common black and white Adidas windbreaker), but it seemed a little suspicious...but not worth worrying about - thus the second "lost" from the post title. Here's Versailles from the courtyard:

     The final "lost" was the lost opportunity to see other parts of Versailles. We looked at the beautiful gardens, and I decided I wanted to visit Marie Antoinette's hamlet - but didn't realize we had to get off the tram and we missed the opportunity to do that without a lot of extra walking (not high on my list of activities at this time of the day...) - so we went to the "Grand Canal" - which can be seen from the Château when looking out over the gardens from the higher floor. We took the tram back, and had a bit of an adventure at the train station - although our transportation pass got us TO Versailles, it would not get us back - it was in a different zone than was included on our passes. So, we had to purchase tickets (not bad, just €1,70 each - just a bit annoying). Home after a quick dinner, and continuous viewing of the Eiffel Tower light show...another good day, in spite of being lost and losing my jacket. (If that's the worst that happens to us on this trip - we are all set!)

Trifecta of food (yesterday) completed, and officially tourists!!

    Seems as if yesterday (Friday) was foodie day - totally unintentional. We ended up going to an Italian place for dinner - very close to the apartment - and again, later than we really wanted. We're slowly moving into the correct time zone...the main problem with eating so late is it's not as easy to go to sleep at a decent time. It was after 2am last night, so of course, that led to a later start than we'd thought. Nothing to worry about though...the beauty of this vacation adventure is NOT having a schedule, and doing whatever seems to be right at any particular moment. No specific plans, no time schedule (except when catching trains and metros and buses...more on that  later...) - just being "relaxed spontaneous." So - here is last night's dinner - I was going to wait to see if anyone could figure out what it was, but it may be more obvious than it was to me...and I know what I ordered!

Lasagne à la forno - a bit too much "forno"... I didn't finish it, intending to take it home, and have room for dessert, and the waiter admonished me, telling me I had to finish it to grow up hahahaha! I told him I was saving room for dessert, and wanted to take the rest home - he obviously didn't listen or understand me (he was speaking English, so I did, too), because he whisked it away and it never came back. Oh well...it was just ok, so no great loss.


Lemon meringue pie - serious meringue here! It was described as "ancienne" - not sure if that meant old-fashioned (it did) or just plain ancient! Luckily, the lemon layer was strong enough to be tasted with the couple of inches of meringue - and it was also dusted with powdered sugar. It was in a shortbread-kind of crust, and really good. I really had my eye on a crème brûlée - we were seated next to the dessert cooler case - but deferred because there was cheese in the lasagne, and I didn't want to overdo dairy. Good second choice, though.

    Ok...enough with the food - at least for now. When we have particularly wonderful food, I'll continue to "share" knowing how much I've enjoyed others' posts of interesting, delicious-looking food. We spent yesterday, in addition to eating, ordering and retrieving our "Paris Pass." It took a lot of adding, discussing, back-and-forth decisions, and we decided to purchase a pass that gave us entry to almost everything (not the Eiffel Tower, and not Giverny) we want to try to fit in while in Paris. We rode a ho-ho (hop on - hop off) bus for the entire loop, and then found lunch (unremarkable, but the place we stopped took liberties with the word "saucisson" - it should have been sausages, but turned out to be hot dogs - how disappointing! Hot dogs are either "hot-dog" or "saucisson de Frankfort" - but it was a casual place, and we guessed the "hot-dog" on the menu must have been the one served to another customer in a baguette) and walked through the outside of the Louvre. It was too late to really get through some places we'd considered whilst (I'm adopting this because every translation here uses "whilst" instead of "while") having lunch - the Louvre, Notre-Dame, Sainte-Chappelle - all were closing before we could get there with time to spend after waiting in line to get in.
  We decided to go to the top of the Arc de Triomphe; there was some sort of military remembrance ceremony with militia (looked like veterans) laying wreaths, singing songs, very official-looking people keeping tourists at a safe distance. View was magnificent - first picture here is when we were on the bus (top level) the first time we stopped at (but didn't get off the bus) the Arc:

And this is from the top of the Arc: (looks much better bigger; I edited out a stranger and the wrist strap of the camera, so it's a little small here)

 Interesting revelation on the way home - about 7:45 pm, we got off the bus at the Eiffel Tower. People in all sorts of groups - couples, singles, families, groups of several people, etc. were sitting on the grass looking at the Tower. Suddenly we realized they were waiting for the Tower to light up - a pleasant Saturday evening activity. The nearby restaurants were practically empty...we walked back and also predicted that they would probably soon be full, as the nightly lighting begins at 8pm. Feeling spoiled, we headed back to the apartment and looked at the view from our windows. We WILL be turning in earlier tonight - have a lot to see tomorrow! Bisous to you! 

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An afternoon post...

   We spent a bunch of time figuring out what to do with our time here...and decided to buy a ParisPass, which is unlimited transportation (not taxis, though - ha!) for the length of the pass. Since our intent was to see much of Paris, we bought a 6-day pass, but today was already 1/2 gone, so we'll start tomorrow. We tried the Métro for the first time - not too bad - but haven't activated our pass, so paid for each ticket. Amazing transportation system, once you (we!) figure it out!
    We decided to hop the Métro back to our neighborhood (how about that? OUR neighborhood!!) and look around a bit for a place to eat. It seems as if there's some sort of price regulation - everything in the same general area had very similar prices, and even though we were ready for lunch, I insisted this be a meal with dessert...we haven't really had a dessert with any meal except on the plane. So...we passed up several brasseries, and found Suzette's - a crêperie, of course!!
      I knew I couldn't comfortably eat an entire crêpe AND a dessert crêpe, so we confused the staff and ordered one plat (meal), a salad, and one dessert crêpe to split. The gentleman - seemed to be the proprietor - brought the salad to Roger, and told me not to give him any of the crêpe - chicken, tomatoes and cheese - excellent! Of course, we split the crêpes; I didn't want the salad...funny, we've never been asked about dressing, it just comes with some sort on it, and it's not French dressing. They've been different, not very flavorful, but not offensive, either. Here are our crêpes:

       

Did I forget to mention the egg? This is the 1/2...so good, and really I didn't even want to finish the 1/2 because it was filling, and I NEEDED to get dessert. For the dessert, we chose what this shop called the "William" - although we were tipped off by our Paris veteran family members that a crêpe with pears and chocolate sauce were traditionally known as "Belle Hélène"...no matter, it was fantastically delicious! Glad that we had a walk ahead of us to get back to our apartment after a quick Monoprix stop (I'm getting a little tired of only water to drink); we complimented the monsieur, and he handed us what I thought was a frequent visitor card, since we said we'd probably return. Nope. It was a comment card, with a release asking if our comments could be put online. Hmmmmm...it was fine, but strange - seemed only if we liked it, and expressed it, we were asked to comment. Back to the apartment for some more logistical planning, a quick FaceTime visit with my team of teachers who I abandoned, and then we'll be off again for our evening adventure. I love that our pace is relaxed and that we feel like we can take time to recharge ourselves before continuing on to whatever is next. Did I mention I love being here?? I do - but miss everyone at home - and am going to make the most of the time we have here. No alarm clocks, no hurry-up schedule, plenty of time to take in all on my "list" and extra time for spontaneous choices. C'est la vie!

A morning post...

    Well, I did it! I went and got fresh croissants, and an apple-filled croissant at "the" bakery across the street. Limited selection, really, but very good. Also got a coffee (exactly the same as we've made here with the Nespresso machine)  and a "chocolat" - which tastes literally like a shaved dark chocolate bar mixed with milk...and seems to be just that, as there are solids/shavings at the bottom of the cup. I wanted to drink the chocolat, but didn't (most of you know that I don't drink milk and/or eat chocolate without having some asthma effects), so I tasted it - ok, twice - and enjoyed a lovely glass of bottled water - but without bubbles - for my breakfast beverage. Fortified to begin our day, we're getting passes today to use the transportation system and see many of the sights. The luxury of time is a great advantage - we can use enough of the attractions pass to recoup the cost - and not have to run around crazy to do that. Breakfast bakery and actual breakfast - good to go!