This was day 47 of our Christmas/New Year epic trip and it was now Thursday January 16. After a late night arrival into Paris the previous night had enjoyed our sleep at the airport Hilton. The last one in a bed before we made it home!
We all declared the beds (and pillows) in our hotel were the best yet! With the exception of Astrid, who ended up on a rollaway. It was tempting to just hang out at the hotel all day watching planes, but we had important shopping and eating in Paris to do! With a 5.15pm flight out of Paris. we figured we’d use the day for some of our favourite Paris things before a lot of sitting on planes.
Buffet breakfast for champions….
Today’s buffet was French rather than Scandinavian, like we’d had the previous 2 days in our Oslo hotel. That only encouraged even more plates of food to be consumed by the kids as there were new things to try. French bread, butter and croissants were definitely appreciated, it had been quite a few weeks since we were last in France.
Into Paris we go…..
After breakfast, we had to say goodbye to our comfy beds, and stow the rest of the luggage at reception, before heading into the city on the RER-B. As we’d been moving around so much we’d avoided buying too many things during the trip and, particularly during our earlier time in France, as we’d planned a shopping day at the end.
With limited time it was a mission to get through a few of our favourite stores. First Le BHV in the Marais, where there were some speed purchases for a few of us, and some of our favourite salted caramel sauce had to be purchased. Then off to one of my favourite stores, Etam for new PJs.
Astrid, despite just using up the last of her pocket and Christmas money in BHV on a news stuffed toy rabbit, REALLY wanted to go to Galeries Lafayette to get the special jellycat patisserie toys she’d been eyeing off since the start of the holiday.
The Jellycat experience….
This trip over to the 9th arrondissement put a 40 minute hole in our limited time,but we agreed, and she had to go into debt to get the macaron toy she wanted (you can only get them in Paris, apparently). On the upside we got a chance to check out the beautiful roof in Galeries again. The giant Christmas tree had disappeared since we were last there in early December.
It’s such a beautiful shopping centre, that it’s always fun to visit just to admire the decor and views from the roof. They also have a very good toy and kids clothing sections.
While the kids checked out the many toys on offer, Astrid head to Jellycat land to debate which patisserie item she had to have.
We didn’t realise there was a whole procedure with the purchase of the patisserie items where you have to help mix it, baste in butter, and then add cream before it is properly wrapped as you make a wish.
We weren’t sure the intricate wrapping would survive the trip home! It was definitely an experience…. At least Astrid enjoyed herself and her strawberry macaron was cute but I think I’d prefer one I could actually eat 🙂
Last minute shopping and eating….
With our Jellycat in Astrid’s position we were running out of time for shopping. Luckily we are very proficient in Paris public transport and getting around the city fast. it was another couple of metros and back to Les Halles and it’s giant shopping centre, for a very quick shop at a couple of stores. We did some speed purchasing of clothes for the kids (all the Winter sales were on). There are always so many cute items in the French stores.
We were really wondering whether we’d get that last patisserie for us to eat, but with another couple of bags of shopping added to our ever growing pile we knew were weren’t far from some of our favourite patisseries.
We could have wandered all day in this area (this is the arrondissement we always stay when in Paris) and when we saw there market was on it was hard not to stop and look at all the yummy things. It was straight to Rue Montorgueil where the kids found one of the many Patisseries they love and I had to make a quick decision on which things we needed from the large array of delicious ones. Tart citron, tart fromboise, gateau opera and eclair cafe it was.
Meanwhile Anto had gone to find a selection of French butter to bring home. We’d googled during the train into the city, and you can bring 10kg each back into Australia for personal use. If we could have fit that in our luggage we would have tried!
Back to the airport….
At this point we realised we’d run out of time to get to Anto’s favourite kitchen shop, E.Dehillerin. I can’t believe we left it to the end. He’d been hanging out for years to get back there, but we wisely didn’t buy copper pans in the first week of this trip. Sadly we had to leave it to another trip as we needed to have time to repack our bags and still had to get out of the city.
After starting out at 1 degree when we left our hotel, we’d worn our coats, but knowing we were mostly inside and on metros, there were not too many layers on today. It had still made it to 6 degrees in the city, and running around in shopping centres we were all feeling rather hot. We hadn’t seen temps that far above zero for awhile! The last few weeks it had been negatives pretty much all day and night.
It was now 2pm and we thought we’d better hightail it back out to the airport. Luckily we landed on an express RER-B and were back to the airport pretty fast. Soren was tasked with keeping the patisserie unscathed. We hadn’t had a chance to eat it! Astrid wasn’t let her purchases out of her sight either!
Anto retrieved our many bags from the Hilton luggage storage and had the unenviable task of getting all our purchases into the bags – somehow! As we spread ourselves all over the Hilton foyer and ate our delicious patisserie, they probably wondered what we were doing but didn’t seem to care.
The patisserie was delicious. All of them excellent choices! Even though no one was hungry due to all the buffet breakfast, we concluded we should have bought more. French patisserie never disappoints but something about the last ones for the trip made them extra special.
Somehow both Soren and Zinnia got chocolate all over their fresh clothes, the ones they were going to be in til we got to Tokyo. Kids!
Patisserie eaten and bags repacked it was off to the airport, with all the bags and the journey home had begun…..
Up next…
The trip home involved plenty of delicious food and not a lot of sleep, plus a few transfer dramas (as always). After 7 weeks and 9 countries we all had our favourite memories so I made sure I recorded the kids for posterity!
