Paris - Day One

  Paris, Île-de-France, France
Thursday, September 18, 2008

Aboard the TGV bound for Paris

This was our fourth trip to Paris and our second time this year. The train ride from Nice was uneventful. Somehow, we ended up being the youngest and the only American couple in our car. I whiled the time away perusing my Paris guidebooks and sketching out arough itinerary. Jay's only request was a visit with his beloved gargoyles at Notre Dame. To my surprise, we pulled into Gare du Nord an hour before I had anticipated. Chalk it up to not properly converting 15:45 to 3:45 pm. Soon enough, we were on the Metro, bound for the Cite stop on the #4 route. Luckily, we were able tocatch an elevator after disembarking at Cite; otherwise, we would've had to lug our bags up those long Cite steps.

Back along the Seine

As soon as we got to the surface, right next to the prefecture, a wide smile broke across my face and I said to Jay, "Yay, we're back in Paris again! It feels like it was just yesterday that we were here." Jay replied, "It's because we were." Oh yeah. I must admit to being a little disoriented, so I broke out my Moleskine map to figure out how to get to Place Dauphine. After a few missteps, we were on the right track. Not before too long, we were turning the corner at the Palais du Justice.

The View from our Apartment

I don't think that Jay had realized exactly where we were staying and could hardly contain his excitement as we approached our apartment building at 17 Place Dauphine. The owner had provided me with the code to get into the building, but a kind stranger at the restaurant below, Le Caveau du Palais, was nice enough to punch in the code for us as I was searching for it in my Moleskine.

We knew that there was no lift, but had not anticipated a narrow spiral staircase. It was a little tricky to navigate with our luggage. The apartment appeared exactly as advertised online. The high ceiling made it
feel bigger than 25 m2. The exposed wood beams were an interesting feature of the apartment and I found
myself wondering how many generations of people had lived beneath these beams.

Place Dauphine

We set off in search of a grocery store to stock up on food supplies. I'd also spied a beautiful glass vase that was just asking to be filled with flowers. However, after a quick stroll through the flower market adjacent to the Cite Metro stop, it was apparent that the main items for sale were household plants and not the flowers that you arrange into a bouquet.

We found a small grocer off of Rue Sebastapol and picked up a bottle of wine, water, Coke Light, and a small jar of Nutella. After a few "Ou est le marche de fleurs?" ("Where is the flower market?") answered by shoulder shrugs and "Je ne sais pas," ("I don't know") we headed back to the apartment. The telephone rang and it was the owner. We were supposed to rendezvous at 7:00pm but he indicated that he wouldn't get off of work (he's a doctor) until 8:00 pm and would it be okay to just meet later that night or tomorrow morning? We agreed that he would meet us at 9:30 pm after we had eaten dinner and he said he'd wait for us if we were running a
little late.

Chartier

Plans for dinner that evening involved Chartier. This is a restaurant that you will find listed in many travel guides; however many self-professed experts turn their nose down on it. I wanted to see what the fuss (on both sides) was all about. We hopped back on the Metro and resurfaced at the Grands Blvds station. After a 15-minute wait in line, we were seated at a table occupied by another couple. The restaurant is huge and it was a packed house, which I am to understand is not unusual. The couple seated next to us asked us where we were from and what we do for a living, which by that part of the trip was no longer shocking. (Over the course of the trip, we were asked that question no less than
five times, which was unprecedented.)

Inside Chartier

Although Jay and I ordered two different chicken dishes, we both ended up with rotisserie chicken and frites with a side of haricots verts (green beans). We realized that we had simply ordered different pieces of poulet (chicken). The food was great, but anything with fries always tastes good to me. The damage, including our drinks (a glass of kir and a bottle of white wine), was only €32.

Grocery Shopping in Paris

After meeting up with Giancarlo, the owner of the apartment, we headed to the Champion on Rue de Seine and picked up fixings for a midnight snack -cheese, salami, and bread. This was our first real foray into a supermarche and it was difficult not to linger too long in each aisle. I did find myself checking out the dog food and slipped a couple cans of Cesar into my basket. The French cans of Cesar are much bigger than the ones in the U.S.

Jay w/ Baguette

We enjoyed our indoor picnic/midnight snack before calling it a night.