A selfie in front of City Hall, raincoat keeping me dry
A few weeks ago a friend was visiting and Mark was explaining to her how obsessed he is with our condo project. His dad wanted Mark to go to Paris with him, even if for just a few days, but Mark just didn’t want to be away. I looked at Mark and said “I’ll go to Paris with your dad.” I emailed him the next day and within about 24 hours we had flights booked and hotel rooms reserved.
I had a great time and did not miss daily visits to the construction site one bit. Mark and I have been to Paris at least once a year for probably the last eight or 10 years, and I’d thought I would break my streak this year but that was not meant to be.
The Luxembourg Gardens is always one of my favorite places. I walked down there on Sunday during a brief respite in the weather and found it locked up. Closed. There was a HUGE rally close by – some 70,000 freaks I later read – protesting a new French law that would give single women and lesbians the right to use in vitro fertilization to get pregnant. Obviously a communistic attack on the family. These were, I later learned, the same idiots who held massive protests against marriage equality a few years ago. How pathetic that they would waste a beautiful Sunday to try to interfere with other people’s happiness.
It was a reasonably short visit – out on a Friday night, back the following Thursday – but it was just about perfect. The weather was drizzly as you would expect for October, but it was Paris, right? I was so amused the first couple days: temperature in the upper 50s, drizzling on and off, and the outdoor cafés were packed. Who’s going to let a little damp weather interrupt the espressos, wines, and cigarettes that you’re supposed to enjoy on the weekends.
And visiting with Mark’s dad was great fun. We were both sleeping in a bit due to jet lag, but we’d have breakfast, go our separate ways for a few hours, meet for lunch some days, or just make plans to meet for drinks and dinner. Otherwise it was just walking, exploring all the beautiful neighborhoods that I know so well. Here are the photos.
I wasn’t thinking about the awful fire at Notre Dame when I came around the corner and saw this. Not that I’d forgotten, I just wasn’t thinking of it. My heart sank as I quickly saw that pieces were missing.
Food of course is a big deal in Paris. Here is Lidd at Balzar’s, a Left Bank bistro open on Sundays, with a plate of choucroute.
Lidd was in charge of making dinner reservations, but there was one place I wanted to suggest, a place where I had a great lunch when he just wasn’t hungry. I never got a chance to suggest it because that very night it was the restaurant he’d chosen for dinner. Great minds and all that.
Salad Niçoise the way it’s supposed to be made
An amazing fish dish
The Saturday market at Place Monge
After the awful anti-women protest was over the Luxembourg Gardens eventually opened
More from the Luxembourg Gardens
Parc Monceau, another of my favorites
The entrance to the Promenade Planteé, an old railway bed converted to a beautiful park. The precursor to New York’s Highline.
On a drizzly afternoon I had the gardens along the Champs-Élysées to myself
Rain adds a sheen of beauty to the Petit Palais
And one of the most amazing rainbows ever
The construction site of Notre Dame
Mark & I, along with much of his family, have been staying at the Agora St. Germain on the Left Bank for over 25 years. When I tried to make a reservation this time, though, it was closed – their last night of availability was the night I flew out of New York. We discovered that it was closed for renovation and here they are putting up the scaffolding to start what is supposed to be a six- or seven-month project.