JetStine Adventures: Fall in love with Paris, Part I

This weekend was all about Paris! I took my first day of holiday to enjoy an early start to the fun with the hubby. We took one of the economy local flights on flybe from a closer airport, East Midlands Airport straight into Paris. My thoughts were to simplify the trip since it was a late departure on Thursday evening after work. We took the National Express bus from the Leicester bus station directly to the airport for a cheap £4.50 per person and only taking 30 minutes. The flybe ride was rather bumpy, riding in a bare airplane without the perks of your normal airline. It was fine for a quick hour flight. The fare wasn't that inexpensive for us because we did not buy it that far in advance, but apparently you can get to Paris for just £20? We get to Paris and take the RER train into city the from Charles De Gaulle airport. The good things about reliability and convenience of the Paris metro was certainly confirmed. It got us around quickly and very cheaply.

The first night we stayed at the Platine Hotel near the Eiffel Tower. It was a cute boutique hotel that was all about Marilyn Monroe. Her face was the wall paper for every room and there were little bit and pieces of thing or quotes related to her all around the hotel. A little bit random, but pretty cool although it had the impression of a "love hotel"... if you know what I am talking about. We had gotten in extremely late, pretty much near midnight, and was on a hunt to find dinner. The hotel receptionist pointed us to a bistrot just down the street.

Le Linois is your general Paris-style bar food or they call it a brasserie. There are tons of these eateries pretty much on every corner. The most interesting I observed is that all of the restaurants and cafes have stadium seating in the front. What for? Well, for people watching of course! Anthony Bourdain confirms this in his show No Reservations, Paris episode . You have a seat, drink some coffee or a beer maybe a bite or pastry and just STARE at people who walk by. I had my moments of staring at Paris men "checking girls out" and found it amusing. They don't seem make it subtle at all either. Hehe... good times...

He had steak tartare and I had the duck confit. The menu was entirely in French, but somehow we managed to figure what things were. I guess when you love food, you inevitably learn the universal language around food. I was pretty skeptical about his beef. Tartare is a raw ground beef cake (though sometimes could be horse meat) with some bits of onions and seasonings. He thoroughly enjoyed it, but being a Food Scientist was so extremely afraid he was going to start the trip off on the wrong foot... more like on the toilet! Raw ground beef is among the worst for contamination since it is so processed and you have no idea where the meat is coming from, hello E. coli O157:H7! Thank God he was fine. My duck confit was a little dry, tasted like an old duck leg that was cooked twice over. Regardless, we were thankful to have gotten food despite it being so late though. With our bellies full, we went off to our room with Ms. Monroe watching us sleep through the night.

Day 2

We managed to find a nice patisserie in the morning to pick up some breakfast before starting our day. There was one pretty much on every corner and you saw random people walking around the streets carrying a giant pastry or baguette just munching away while walking to work. I have noticed that breakfast is a staple meal for the French, and that even if it was on-the-go they still had it. I have to say that in America, breakfast does commonly get dismissed since people are usually too preoccupied to eat, and is considered a weekend occurrence more than anything else. We thoroughly enjoyed the coffees in France, as they were very rich and flavorful compared to some of the coffees we've had in England that were on the lighter/blander side.

Then, we went on our way to explore the areas around the Eiffel Tower since it was near the hotel. With our handy dandy travel book that a friend had lent us, we took our time to get there and stopped by several other places on the way.

Some of these places included the L'Hôtel national des Invalides where Napoleon Bonaparte's tomb lies in the domed building. It was also a museum related to the French military so there were plenty of cannons all around and all sizes.

The next stop nearby was the Musee Rodin, where the popular "Thinker" sculpture lived. We were fortunate to have free admission to the gardens due to construction. The indoor exhibits costed money, so we opted out.

Finally, we made it to the Eiffel Tower. The entire day up until now was pretty dreadful with merciless cold rain spanning throughout the day. At least the walking helped us keep somewhat warm. The things about Paris is, everything looks like close proximity on the map and being a New Yorker is assumed for a city. However, everything seems a bit more spread out and the walking was quite far.

We decided again not to buy tickets to go up but rather just enjoyed the view from the ground while dodging the Gypsies and Africans trying to scam us into tying a string on our finger for money. It is certainly an area to be careful of scammers and pick pocketers.

By this time it was getting into the mid-afternoon and we had not eaten lunch yet. As we walked further past the tower, we came across a boat tour and decided to save lunch for a little bit more later. We had some French biscuits that we picked up in the morning so snacked on that, while riding on a very chilly boat deck. The sites were beautiful though, and helped us determine what areas we really wanted to explore further. A tip for next time, take the Batobus so you can hop on and off all day. The tour we took only took us in a circle with an audio tour of the sites.

Hello boat tours!

Cruising the Waterways

So cold on the boat deck!

Freezing and hungry, we went on the trek for grub. It was unfortunate that most places were closed for lunch and not yet open for dinner service at this time since it was around 3 or 4 in the afternoon. We walked past some very nice restaurants but ended up in another brasserie as it was our only option. Not the best food in the world - a standard smoked salmon salad for me and a very tough and cartilage-plenty piece of flank steak for the Mister.

At least we had some delicious creme brulee for dessert

The husband was very keen on visiting Moulin Rouge since it was one of his favorite movies - yes the Nicole Kidman movie. Must be the attraction of boudoir? Quite scandalous I would say! The whole time he was denying the risque aspect of it and was so adamant that it was just a classy act... until of course we get there and see the billboards. Posters of stills from the show with boobs and bling. Haha! After my moment of "I told you so" and a couple photos just to say we went there, we went off to the next stop. Regardless though, a show would have been well over €100/pp and had to be booked in advance. Oh well, I didn't miss anything. Plus, the husband can get his private Moulin Rouge show anytime from his misses. :P

We then went to what we thought was walking distance but ended up being a far hike uphill. We decided to hire a couple bikes on the Velib to take us part of the way. It helped a lot and we were glad it was a 24-hour pass that allowed up to use it anytime in the next day also... extremely cheap too at only €1.70/pp. After hundreds of steps going up, we finally made it to the beautiful Montmarte. This was a grand cathedral located on the highest point in Paris overlooking the city. I thought it was certainly worth the effort of getting there. The really cool thing was that there was a mass happening, so we got to see part of that.