The farewell breakfast for Max and Di
It was our last day in Paris and it was a rainy Sunday. We’d had mixed weather during our Paris stay. Some beautiful sunshine, plenty of rain and a fair dose of wind like the day before at Versailles. We started (of course) with a selection of breakfast pastries. We definitely weren’t on a low-carb diet in Paris……
Di (Granny) and Max were off to Belgium and the Netherlands for a few days before their Christmas market cruise and then meeting up with us in Switzerland for the rest of our Christmas adventure. Soren and Anto were feeling strong assisted them to Gare du Nord, with their bags.
Rain and more walking than anticipated….
We were planning to meet up with our Scottish friends Jamie, Ceri and Bree who had just flown into Paris from Glasgow. They were staying in the Latin quarter, which isn’t normally that hard to get to from where we are. Unfortunately this was not the day to be walking around Paris, as the official Notre Dame opening meant half the RER and metro stations were closed, and every cop in Paris was out on the streets.
We started out by wandering our way down in the cold and wet to Les Halles to check out the giant Christmas tree, and the park Astrid and Soren had spent plenty of time at in previous Paris visits. Sadly it was too wet for a park play today.
Zinnia might have been a bit tired and temperamental and didn’t want to be looking at pretty christmas decorations…….
Next we were off on the Christmas window trail and thought we’d check out the Samaritaine building to check out their Christmas windows, which were definitely not as good as the Galeries Lafayette ones from a couple of days earlier……
What should have been a fairly quick walk down to the Seine and across the river, proved to be anything but. We ended up with a very long walk along the Seine trying to get across the other side, with every bridge blocked as they didn’t want anyone near Notre Dame with all the heads of state hanging around all day for reopening festivities.
It might have been a dreary day but I did get some nice moody shots of the Seine. Zinnia refers to the Seine as ‘the poo river’ after the Olympics debacle, which we find highly amusing.
There were still plenty of people out jogging in the rain. They were probably having as much fun as us getting around the bridges blocked with police, TV and security vans.
The security issues, meant the long way around by the time we finally found a bridge we could cross. We well and truly worked off our breakfast with an extra 5km walk.
We had originally hoped to have a look at the restored Notre Dame before leaving Paris, but a distant view from the bridges across the Seine was going to be as good as it got on this trip!
A crepey lunch…..
We eventually made it to the other side of the river and located the Scots, who had definitely brought the weather with them. Jamie, Ceri and Bree had had an early flight out of Glasgow and were hungry and we realised we hadn’t yet had crepes this visit to France, so it was off to a crepe restaurant. We located one nearby and they had inside seats out of the weather.
There were difficult decisions to be made about which of the many flavours of crepe we wanted. The kids voted for salted butter caramel and nutella and cream and thoroughly enjoyed them. Anto had a banana and rum and I had a savoury goats cheese, walnut and honey as I was still over-sugared from breakfast.
Prior to lunch we’d be planning on going to Berthillon for our favourite ice cream, and taking along our Scottish friends. Unfortunately, it’s right near Notre Dame so there was no way of getting there until the roads and bridges reopened. The kids were disappointed but we suggested we might try and fit it in on our return flying visit later in January.
Despite the sugar high our Scottish friends were needing a rest after their early morning flight, so we assisted them we purchasing appropriate metro passes and ensuring they didn’t get lost before planning to meet up again later that evening for dinner.
The Louvre and Christmas markets in the rain…..
We were now over a week into our trip and acclimitising to Winter rather than Summer in Australia, but today it was a whole 7 degrees all day and wet so we were not feeling overly warm. It was our last day in Paris and everyone was keen for a bit more sightseeing but the kids had not consumed enough calories on the trip yet (somehow?) to feel warm so we head back to our apartment for some baguette late lunch and to pick up extras gloves and beanies as it was rather cold and windy.
We’d realised that Zinnia hadn’t yet seen the Louvre glass pyramid. We had a quest to tick off major highlights for her and the pyramid is a great one. We walked down to Les Halles for a visit to the Christmas market where we resisting buying treats then on to the Louvre.
The giant head statue at Les Halles is a favourite of the kids. We’ve had many photos of this one over the years!
On the walk down to the Louvre, Soren wanted to know why we weren’t going in as he wanted to see the Mona Lisa. We have actually only once ever attempted to go inside and that was when Astrid was one, and we lasted half a day before giving up and hoping to return when the kids were older. Soren was trying to convince us that he really did want to walk around the whole Louvre……. until we approached the museum and then he realised the size of the building.
While there are many treasures inside, the outside and the courtyards are very pretty. Zinnia was indeed rather keen to see the glass pyramid and the people down below waiting to go into the Louvre.
A wet Sunday in Paris it was – we feel like we’ve had many of these over the years! We really must visit in warm weather one time…. We normally like the walk from the Louvre down to Jardin Tuileries. Today it was rather cold and very muddy and full of puddles.
When we got to Tuileries we found another Christmas market, so we of course had to check it out. This one had plenty of games and ride. The kids wisely agreed they’d wait until our next couple of weeks of markets through Germany, France and Switzerland to indulge in some of the games and save their Euros. Anto and I did succumb to the lure of vin chaud as it was cold! We have subsequently learnt that the Paris Christmas markets that offer very large cups of vin chaud for 10 Euros are a really good deal compared to many of the other markets and they don’t have a mug charge. Our Paris Christmas market cup is still in high rotation for the kids.
At least the adults were feeling much warmer after our vin chaud but the rain had definitely not stopped and the apparent temperature was rather low. We jumped on the metro with a plan to head back to Les Halles for some shopping. We always enjoy this shopping centre and we found some Christmas jumpers for the kids and had to restrain ourselves further as the suitcases had already gained quite a few items and it was only country two and the start of the second week of 7!
Zinnia was now in a much better mood than the morning and wanted photos with the giant Christmas tree, as did the other kids.
An Italian dinner in the 2nd…
Saving us from needing to expand our suitcases even further, it was time to meet up with the Scots. They had not been to Paris before so we took them around some of the local streets to show them some of the Christmas decorations and lights around the 2nd arrondissement, and of course all the culinary delights of favourite street Rue Montorgueil.
The vote by the Scots was for Italian for dinner. We found a restaurant in the 2nd that looked pretty good and they had inside tables to seat all 8 of us. We somehow accidentally convinced the waiter we were German by randomly speaking to our kids in German, while practicing for our German for later in the trip. Despite the fact that we were all conversing in English most of the time and our family have very strong Aussie accents, and the others very strong Scottish accents, our poor waiter was convinced we were German and kept trying to speak to us in German. So we were German for the night, eating Italian in Paris.
The food and wine were top-notch and the adults enjoyed our catch-up while the kids kept Bree entertained and enjoyed the company of a non-adult for a bit!
After a little more sightseeing around the 2nd, checking out the Christmas lights and needing to hold the kids back from wanting even more food as we wandered past endless pastry and chocolate shops (they’d pop)! We then had to farewell our Scottish friends and head back to our apartment for the kids to sleep and the adults to wrangle all the things into the suitcases before our Paris departure the next day….
Next stop Germany!
Up next…
Farewell Paris, hello Cologne, Germany to meet up with Alan (Gramps) and Kim and the first of many wonderful German Christmas markets…..
