Dear Viewfinders.........
Having set the alarm for an early start to ensure that we were ahead of the crowds we jumped on the metro at Saint Paul, changed trains at Invalides and then got off at tour Eiffel station. We continued to be amazed at both the friendliness and helpfulness of the Parisians and at the efficiency and cost effectiveness of their train networks. Tres brilliant!
We were among the first group to ascend via lift when the tour opened. No endless and wasted time queueing. And if anyone thought after Montematre that this little bunny was going to hike up billions of stairs then Tuff Merde to you! We went to the summit and quite frankly it was spectacular. Paris is an enormously large city beyond the immediate first circle of inner Paris and from up the tower looks more like any sprawling major metropolitan city anywhere. But confining your aerial viewing to the inner ring or even the second ring and you see the preservation of low rise beautiful buildings and roads with amazing precision and boulevards and gardens of symmetric lines and great expanse. There is one truly ugly high building that for some reason was allowed to be built in the inner area and I think it's called or is near monteparnesse. It dominates the skyline from many directions and is like a grotesque 70's vertical brown brick boil on the marble and cream stone skin of Paris. Is tres yuk! The only good thing to be said about it is that when you go to the bar and viewing platform of this building, it is the only place from where you can see the beautiful Paris skyline not blighted by this building!
After the Tour Eiffel we headed to Musee D'orsay which is the museum that has a permanent large collection of all the impressionists and neo impressionists works. Brush wielding dudes like Renoir, Monet and Manet, Dega, Vincent Van Gough, Toulloise LaTrec and a whole lot more than this philistine can recall. Suffice it to say seeing these famous works of art just casually hang in salles or rooms off the central glass domed walk way of this former railway station was terrific.
Lunch time we headed to their cafeteria. Trust me , not talking Coles caf here folks. Full a la carte service in the most spectacular room with floor to ceiling glass windows, guilded trims on all the walls, cornices and architraves and an amazing painted ceiling depicting some heavenly mythology no doubt. - natch! To accompany this lovely lunch of canard (duck) for me and prawn and scallops for Siobhan, we enjoyed a half bottle of Pommery champagne at Spumante prices!!!!!!! Have I said before how much we LOVE this place.
Back to our apartment in the Marais for a quick change as the day had heated up and off we went to enjoy the specialty artisan shops that the Marais is just chock-a-block stuffed with. First stop was this amazing leather belt place. This gorgeous lady who spoke almost no English was a true delight. What occurred over the next 15 minutes was the best form of free entertainment you could ever hope for. It was part pantomime, part charades with lots of gesticulating and miming on all out parts as Siobhan selected two belts to accompany her ever expanding collection of european jeans! The brilliance of her "ledhur" selection was only exceeded by her selection of "boo-cleys" including the coolest white and silver vesper you have ever seen.
The remainder of the day was spent wandering from shop to shop including the incredible fishmongers, charcuteries and cheese places. Occasional outsells for a fortifying glass of bubbles intermittently and it was off again.
To end our time in Paris we headed to Bofingers It was one of the first if not the first brasseries opened. It was all glass and brass and black and white ceramic floor tiling, beautiful wooden chairs, tuxedo'ed waiters balancing full and heavy trays on the five fingertips of one hand as they weaved smoothly and efficiently through the wonderfully crowded yet intimate space.
These waiters, snooty maitre de aside, were great to watch and a delight to interact with. With flair and aplomb they would fillet your fish perfectly, flambé your creme caramel and theatrically refill your glass of poison of choice. The only downside , but perhaps not really, was getting stuck beside an American couple who could best be described as Blake and Alexis Carrington - not Krystal. All loud and showy and.........American. Honestly, their accent can peel paint!
On the other side of us was this very quite French couple but as I may have made the previous observation, these people do not do sun smart at all. And whilst I can hear Clare, Craig and anyone else who knows me, saying hypocrite- she who has been known to climb onto tin roofs with Pauline Crameri and rotisserie herself in days of yore, these people make me look like the palest skinned English red haired by comparison. This woman was soooooo tanned and tiny and she had dyed blond shoulder length hair. She looked like ET with a bad wig on.
We packed up and were ready for our four-thirty start to get to Charles DeGaulle Airportto fly EasyJet to Catania in Sicily to catchtheferryto the Aoilien Islands and The island of Salina in particular to stay at Hotel Signum (google the hotel to see how beautiful it is as I am still working on the pictures). A particular slow food book had brought it to our attention and we thought it was the best place to stop and recharge after our sights and shopping sprees in London and Paris......and of course a nice remote place for me to officially turn into an old bag!
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