A Post from Paris

When we arrived in Paris we booked into Arsenal Port for 5 days - the number of days we spent here on our last visit 3 years ago. I did add a question mark beside the date of leaving though. We are still here 10 days later! There is just so much to see and do and not all of it new to us. I could happily walk along the banks of the Seine every single day (and night is even better) for, well, years probably.
Paris is full of tourists. I was going to say at this time of the year but perhaps it always is. I don't know. Tourists + Beautiful Buildings = Queues. Long ones. So, we didn't revisit the interiors of any of the sights we'd seen before.

Queues at Sacre Coeur

People watching at Montmartre - surely the busiest spot in Paris

We've walked, metro-ed, bussed and cruised. We've been part of the crazy Mexican wave of cheering crowds that accompanyed the Tour de France cyclists as they whizzed several times around the Place de la Concorde and up the Champs Elysee at almost 60kmph.

Flyover at the Tour de France

Even queues to get into this famous bookshop

We've visited churches, galleries, the Opera, museums parks and a cemetery. We've sat in the sand at the Paris Plage with the real Parisians, eaten in restaurants and people watched whilst sipping wine and beer at pavement cafes (and what an amazing variety of people there is). We've had an impromptu quayside party with all the 'colonial' boaties (and some Brits) - and quite a crowd we made.

Paris Plage

Notre Dame from  Pont Sully. The 'lovelock'  craze. The weight of all these padlocks is a concern

We've shopped in markets, swanky department stores (well looked) and all manner of weird and wonderful little shops and boutiques (and I have to make special mention of our all time least favourite - the telecom boutique with the fruity name. 2 different branches, the first being totally flummoxed and referring us to the 'Technical Centre' who were no better. Our technician seemed never before to have even seen the little wifi gizmo we bought and had to go away and ask someone how it worked. I have now come to recognise the precise moment when they actually start just making stuff up to get you out of the shop.)

You get classy buskers in the Paris Metro stations!

But we're in Paris and I love it just as much as I did the first time round. It would be so easy to stay longer but needs must. We're off tomorrow morning. A final cruise under the bridges, past the Eiffel Tower and Paris' own Statue of Liberty.
Along the winding Seine and then towards the river Somme.
A bientot.

View from our boat in Paris. Port l'Arsenal with Place du Bastille in the background.

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