What a city! We’ve had a blast here! From the minute that we jumped off the train, we knew that we were going to have a great time in Paris. After checking into our apartment and getting settled, we had an early night in anticipation of a big day ahead.
We headed out on a guided walking tour of Paris. Unfortunately our guide wasn’t the beret-wearing Parisienne that we’d hoped for, instead we had a American on a working holiday. He was great though and we got an excellent tour of the city and learnt a lot of things about the city and French history that we definitely didn’t know before. Highlights included The Eiffel Tower, Napoleon’s Tomb, Notre Dame & The Tuileries Gardens.
We spent the rest of the afternoon exploring the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame in more detail, along with a walk along The Champs Élysées to the Arc de
Half of Wednesday was spent at the Louvre. Surprisingly, it only took us 15 minutes to get in. That museum is HUGE! You could easily get lost in there and never find your way out. We ended up exclusively using the lifts to get around as we found this the easiest way to keep track of where we were and what we’d seen already. No way did we see everything in there, but we did see The Mona Lisa, Venus de Milo, Napoleon’s Apartments, various Egyptian and Greek artifacts as well as a few Artists painting replicas in the galleries.
Following the Louvre we headed out for an authentic French dinner to a restaurant recommended by our guide as having the best escargot in the city, so we had to check this out for ourselves. With a texture similar to soft calamari and strong flavors of butter and garlic, they were actually quite nice. We also had to taste the traditional Confit de Canard (duck confit), creme brûlée and tarte tartin – all of which were delicious.
Today has been spent in Dijon (Burgundy region – south east of Paris), where we had a chauffeured trip through this world famous wine region. We made a stop at the Romanee Conti field where the finest wine in the region is produced (5,000 – 10,000€ per bottle). Luic our guide had studied at the Bourgogne Wine School, had been a Sommelier and gave us some amazing insight into the wines of this region.
A long day out to, and back from Burgundy, but we couldn’t leave Paris without a quick trip out to Montmarte to experience the vibe on the street out there. A quick cafe dinner, then the obligatory photos, be before heading back to the apartment for some well earned Zzzzzzzzzz.
All in all we’ve had an amazing time here and the food has been exceptional. Where are we going to get good croissants, crepes and escargot at home after this??
Tomorrow we leave Paris for Amsterdam, via Bruges.
A&D 