First Days in Paris 8.1.05

Our First Days in Paris with Shawn, Kristen & Rachel and Navigating the City

We had arranged to meet Shawn, her sister Kristen, and her 4-year-old daughter Rachel at the hotel on Thursday around noon and it was so wonderful to see them again. To those of you who don't know, Shawn, her husband Stephen and their daughter Rachel were our Willo neighbors in Phoenix. They had rented an apartment in Paris for the entire month of July but since they could not stay through to the last week, had offered it to us. Unfortunately Stephen had to leave before our arrival and his presence was missed! It didn't take Rachel very long to remember us, especially Bob, who she always played with on our street in Phoenix and fell right into the old familiar teasing and tickling.

The first thing we did was to walk over to the Eiffel Tower. The weather was gorgeous - blue skies, puffy white clouds, cool breezes and just warm enough for walking around comfortably. We got in line and joined the happy crowd climbing to the top. There are a few choices, and you can either walk all the way up (not) or take the elevators, the first level has the gift shop (of course!) where you can buy your very own miniature Eiffel tower (I did) and any number of kitschy souvenirs di Paris, board another elevator to the second viewing level and then, go all the way to the top. It's quite high up there and those of us a bit claustrophobic had to just breathe deeply and not think too much about it but so worth it for the incredible views you have of the city of Paris. It's a terrific way to orient yourself and get an idea of the sheer size of this city. There are orientation maps/panoramic photographs at the top so that you can identify and locate all the landmarks.

From the Eiffel Tower, and after Rachel had a spin on the carousel, Shawn suggested we jump in a cab and go see Sacre Coeur, the basilica at the top of Butte de Montmartre. We even climbed the 234 spiraling steps to the top for one of Paris' most spectacular panoramas. This was probably one of the hardest climbs for me, since I get really anxious in very close staircases and to be honest, had a bit of a panicky feeling by the time we reached the top. But, the views were so incredible, I forgot all about it once we reached the dome and was really glad I didn't let those feelings stop me from enjoying it. This is a beautiful white church with three domes and a bell tower that is visible from almost everywhere in Paris. It was begun in 1875 but not completed until 1919 and has the most incredible Byzantine mosaics. The signs say "no photos" but I couldn't resist and managed to sneak a few. (more about this later)

I should tell you about some of the ways that the city of Paris has made navigating around and visiting the sites so easy. Shawn left us her map book called "Paris Pratique" a pocket guide to the neighborhoods of Paris, called arrondissements and quarters, as well as where the metro (subway) and bus stations, RER (intercity trains) and taxi stands are. It's an indispensable little dark blue book (L'INDISPENSABLE is written in white on a red band!) and can be picked up at the newsstands for around 7 euros - well worth the price. The city also provides free of charge 2 or 3 other maps of Paris that range from the tiny versions that literally fit in a shirt pocket to the larger ones that help those of us with "over 50 eyes" find all the little side streets.

The metro - which we used a lot - is really easy to use. All the stations are clearly marked, every train car has a map showing all the stops your train will make, everything is keyed and cross-referenced. It's an amazing system and incredibly user friendly. We found that it made sense to buy tickets in blocks of 10. Once we decided where we wanted to go, we then looked for the station nearest it, figured out what line the stop was in (by color and number coding) and determined which lines went there. It's easy to transfer to another line (which you must do in many cases since the city is so large) and the maps on each car tell you which stop to get off for the transfer. Really, really easy. And, many of the stations are like mini museums themselves, like the one near the Louvre with copies of statues and paintings, a preview of what the museum holds, and the Abbesses, with its art nouveau metalwork and glass canopy at the entrance. There is a page in my "Lonely Planet - Paris" book describing the art in the various metro stations. Unfortunately, we didn't have the time to visit all of them!

We tried to plan our visits to specific neighborhoods so that we could take the train and then just spend the day walking and sightseeing in that one area. Later in the week we found ourselves bouncing around from one area to another catching up on the things we hadn't seen and, realizing we were spending too much time on the trains, switched to the buses for awhile so we could sightsee at the same time!

If you go to Paris and enjoy going to museums, there are more than we could see in our 10 days! We bought a pass called "Carte Paris Visite" (you can get them for anywhere from 1 to 5 days worth, available at metro and train stations, airports and tourist offices. We got ours near the Louvre) which allows you unlimited entry into a long list of museums and monuments and usually you don't have to wait in the regular line for entry. This was fun, especially at places like the Louvre and the Musee D'Orsay (where the Impressionist painting are), which tend to have very long queues (lines).

One of the other fun things we did on those first days was to take a cruise with Bateaux Mouches, one of the most famous river-boat companies in Paris, on the Seine. The weather was great, it was late afternoon and it was so lovely to travel on this river in the middle of Paris and watch the sights go by at a leisurely pace, with commentary in several languages, pointing out Notre Dame, the Eiffel tower, the miniature Statue of Liberty (I did not realize they had one), and all the monumental and beautiful bridges, palais and apartment buildings that line and cross the river.

I mentioned my "Lonely Planet" book. I used this primarily in planning for our trip to Paris partly because our Australian friends spoke highly of these guidebooks and partly because it was the only Paris guidebook we could find in Perugia that was printed in English! It turned out to be a great little guide, with all the history and background stuff I like, helpful tidbits about visiting the city, using the trains etc, broken down into the arrondissements and quarters with just enough info to wet my appetite and beautiful photos interspersed. My only complaint is that the photos are in bunches in a few places in the book instead of being next to the writing, but Shawn left us her copy of the Eyewitness Travel Guide to Paris which had all of that and more. I ended up stripping out sections we were going to visit on that day, rather than carrying the whole book, a trick I learned from using Rick Steve's books, something he suggests doing.

On Thursday evening we had dinner at a little café serving couscous and sat outside. In Paris it doesn't get dark until after 10pm, so the day is quite long for sightseeing and touring. By the time we stopped for dinner, it was getting late. (here comes the only really unpleasant part of our trip) I had my money (not very much) my camera, the guide book, the little Eiffel tower souvenir, sunglasses that clip to my eyeglasses, Kleenex and lipstick in a little cloth bag I was carrying, right next to me during the meal, keeping close tabs on it the whole time. Until, at the end of the meal, we took out the book to check on opening times for the next day, and in that quick moment of carelessness, someone snatched my bag, from right under my feet! It was astounding how quickly it happened, knowing I had kept my eye on it for so long and only turned away for a moment. And more astounding that we did not even see it happen! It was as if someone had been watching and saw that I had taken my eyes off it and took the opportunity to quickly take it. The worst thing of course was the photos that I had taken all that day of the Eiffel Tower and of Rachel on the carousel etc. We are usually very cautious when we travel, keeping our things close to us and trying to be aware of our surrounding but this one caught us off guard.

Unfortunately, we had to buy a new camera, so the next morning was spent looking for a camera shop and found one very near the apartment - called FNAC - part of a chain I believe - this one on rue St. Charles - with wonderful people who were incredibly helpful and located the newer model of my Canon digital camera allowing me to use all the batteries etc that I had for the old one and giving us a discount to boot. Nothing else was irreplaceable except for the clip-on sunglasses that were made to fit my glasses. Thankfully, our visas were not in there, nor our credit cards and the camera was not new - the new one has more mega pixels - I got to buy a tube of French lipstick and the bag was just a plain cloth bag I had that was light to travel with. So, the only things I truly miss are the photos I took that day with Rachel and Shawn, which I cannot replace. But hopefully Shawn will send me some that she took and all will be well.

We decided later that it was must have been a conspiracy by the security of Sacre Coeur - they must have seen me taking those sneaky photos; surely I had captured some hidden secret in my camera, that would unveil the answers to an ancient mystery, that will reveal the mysteries of the knights templar --- Wait a minute! --- I think I have read too many Dan Brown novels! But who was that brown robed, pale looking guy lurking in the shadows behind those candles???

(more to come - see "I Love Paris...")

photos to follow