Barb and Baden’s Excellent France Adventure 4.0 – Part 2
Starting Off Just Right
It’s been our experience that after a long day of traveling to a destination, checking into your hotel, it’s vital that things start off just right in your new destination. For us, it typically means that the place that we go for dinner has to be great.
Of course, we all know that without some additional insight or information that you have been given in advance, this can often just come down to pure luck finding a restaurant close to your hotel that provides a really memorable experience.
The previous two times that we had been in Paris we stayed at the same hotel (called the Hotel Du Lavant) and we had come to know the area around that hotel fairly well which is known as the quartier latin or Latin Quarter. When we were planning this fourth trip to France, we had decided that we wanted to experience a different part of Paris and as a result we are in an area on the other side of the Seine river or what is called the right bank. The Latin Quarter being on the left bank.
Our hotel that we are staying in now is called Hotel Hautville Opera and the first thing that we have noticed after walking around last night is that it has a much different feel that the Latin Quarter. I’ll want to wait a few more days until I describe this in more detail.
Getting back to the first meal being really important, we happened to find a place just two blocks from our hotel which was a Spanish restaurant called El Papi Chulo (sorry, no web site but located on rue Petites Ecuries) and it really set the bar for small, great restaurants that we’ve eaten at. The service was really friendly, we had some great tapas, some great (and so inexpensive) Rioja wine from Spain. It really set the tone for another good time in Paris.
Staying Connected
One of the tasks that we have on our list to do tomorrow is to get our two cell phones connected. When we were in Germany last year we bought an inexpensive cell phone that we used for emergency purposes while we were driving around the country. Buying a cheap cell phone here (in Europe) is very easy and it cost us about €25. The second, related task is to get my iPhone connected. Having the iPhone and being able to instantly tell where we are and where are the local destinations will be invaluable and a huge time saver. And by time saver, I also mean argument saver. 🙂
Sidebar: In hindsight, it was impossible to predict how incredibly frustrating it would be to get the iPhone connected in Paris. We would end up spending almost half a day on this task alone. More on that later.
No Pictures
It rained most of yesterday (Friday) and as a result I have taken only 1 picture so far. The low picture taking is actually not that unusual as I often start very slowly but the weather has played more of a part this time. Barb and I were thinking about it yesterday that we have actually never seen rain in France before in our previous three trips. It’s supposed to be raining most of the weekend so today (Saturday) we may do a lot of inside things. And by inside things we probably mean inside department stores.
There’s an App for That
On Saturday morning we woke up and it was still raining so we decided to follow through on our plans to make it a shopping day. After breakfast we found the the main shopping district down by Blvd. Hausmann was actually within walking distance so we decided not to take the subway. This turned out to be a great idea as along the way we stumbled upon several really cool vintage stores that had all kinds of unique items for sale from the late 1800’s to early 1900’s.
Unfortunately the detour of exploring these stores got our directions mixed up and our simple walk to the department stores became more complicated. Luckily I finally had Internet access with my iPhone and within seconds we immediately knew where we were and had the correct course plotted to get us back on track.
I’ll Only Need 6 Hours
Without a doubt our single most favourite store that we have ever been to is the large department store here in Paris called Galeries Lafayette. We’ve been here all four times that we’ve been in Paris and it is our must-see destination. If you only have time to see one last thing in Paris and it’s down to Galeries Lafayette and the Eiffel Tower, well I can email you plenty of pictures of the tower. 🙂
For those of you who don’t know it is common for Barb and I to split up while we’re shopping as no possible god will result in me hovering over Barb while she is doing this. Also, there’s the practical side that the men’s and women’s departments are actually in different buildings at Galeries Lafayette. We typically decide when to meet up and today my response from Barb as to how much time she was going to need was: about 6 hours. 🙁
Red Eyes Today
As I write the final section of this post on Sunday morning I know that we will have red eyes today due to lack of sleep. Last night our quiet courtyard view turned out to be a noisy mess as the apartment about 10 metres away had this all-night party. Loud music and shouting occurred until about 5AM and no amount of closed windows or ear plugs made much of a difference to get to sleep. It’s about 9AM right now and Barb is still sleeping so we may not get out of the hotel room until close to noon today. The good news is that it looks like it will be sunny today and the rain may have gone.
Until later.
Baden
