Un long weekend à Paris

Coucou! We’re back after a lovely long weekend in Paris. Mon mari has already written his version of the travelogue here, so I thought I’d tell my version with pictures:

Here is Sam getting settled in her window seat for the train ride from Brighton to London St. Pancras.

Imagine our surprise when our usually reserved little girl makes friends with another 3-year old girl on the Eurostar from London to Paris. The fascinating part? Watching the girls navigate the language barrier. Besides songs, Sam’s French consists of “Coucou,” “Bonjour,” “Au revoir” and lately “ça va.” The little copine, named Liana, spoke a little bit more English than that, but not much. Liana spoke to me in French. Sam spoke to me in English. And the girls spoke to each other in… animal noises. Also shrieks and giggles. They got along famously.

After the biggest toddler tantrum the Gare du Nord has likely ever seen, we arrived at the Passage de la Trinité, in the 2e arrondissement, and had to wait about 20 minutes for the landlord to show up to let us into the studio apartment we’d rented. Sam took this opportunity to (enfin!) take a nap.

Breakfast the next morning was croissants and clementines, which I purchased on the nearby rue du Montorgueil, a very pedestrian-friendly street of shops and restaurants.

On Friday, AC stayed in the studio to work while Sam and I began our tour of Parisian playgrounds:

We happened upon this one walking through the gardens at the Forum des Halles.

After (no joke) two more playgrounds, we wandered around the outside of the Louvre. See the Eiffel Tower in the distance? When I asked Sam what that was, she replied, “It’s the Eiffel Tower! But it’s smaller than ours.” (In our backyard we have a 3 foot-high Eiffel Tower lawn ornament that was handmade in Senegal, a gift from my father-in-law).

We then strolled through the Tuileries gardens, stopping for a snack at the central pond. The playground here was under construction, but there was a lovely little carousel. Unfortunately it was closed for lunch when we got there. That didn’t bother Sam, though. She climbed all over the thing and tried almost every ride there was, humming her own carousel music.

Fast forward through a few metro rides, lunch, street crepes, and some shopping, Sam and I stop for “le goûter”– a late afternoon/early evening snack– to help get us through to the end of AC’s work day. We did my favorite French custom: we sat outdoors at a cafe for an hour, people-watching and sipping chocolat chaud:

We spent most of the next day with my friend Peggy whom I hadn’t seen in 5 years (Coucou, Peggy!) We had a grand time walking around the Montparnasse neighborhood of Paris, up through the Luxembourg gardens. Here is Sam collecting fallen leaves in front of Baudelaire’s grave at the Montparnasse cemetery. Would le poète maudit approve?

The Luxembourg gardens are lovely, but the real treat (at least for me) was getting to see a show at the Guignol puppet theater. (More on that in a future post, I think.)

After a delicious goûter, we headed over to see the lights and stars on the blue Eiffel Tower. That’s right, blue! While France holds the EU presidency, the Eiffel Tower is lit up like the EU flag– blue with yellow stars. And for 10 minutes past the hour the whole tower sparkles with tiny white lights. It really was beautiful. Merci, Peggy, for taking us to see it!

Eh bien voilà! When I asked Sam what she liked most about Paris, this was her answer:

“The carousels… and the chocolat chaud!”

She has fine taste, n’est-ce pas? 😉