Paris Stopover

On our way home from Nice we had to change trains in Paris so decided to stop over for a couple of days. Nice journey along the coast in First Class on the TGV!

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Our first afternoon and evening was gloomy with the threat of heavy storms. We managed to avoid getting wet and enjoyed a nice walk down to the river.

A chance to watch the Eiffel Tower “sparkle” as it does every hour.

The stormy weather was the precursor to a seriously hot spell, much hotter than the Med where we’d just come from. Temperatures were predicted to reach 40C and above while we were travelling home. We vowed to head home if temps got too much and were out early to enjoy while we could.

We headed first to Montmartre for a walk around the interesting streets and found there are windmills up there. Memories of Holland. This one is Le Moulin de la Gallette (windmill of the savoury pancake if I’m not mistaken)

This intriguing creation is Le Passe-Muraille – a man seemingly stuck in a wall. Odd but worth a look.

The streets behind the tourist scrum at Sacre Coeur are wonderful and well worth seeking out if you are sick of selfie obsessed tourists.

Sacré-Cœur itself is truly stunning even with the crowds and on a blue sky day is an arresting sight. As before the queue to gain entrance was more trouble than its worth so we admired from outside.

Views over the city from here are very fine indeed.

Needing lunch and keen to visit somewhere new we headed down to the the Canal de St Martin.

It was lovely down there with an expansive waterfront and lots of happy people enjoying a sunny Sunday afternoon.

After a lunch in one of the restaurants we strolled along the waters edge.

I was especially taken with this remote controlled speedboat which was amazingly fast and very cool – I wanted one immediately!

There were areas to take boats out and even a spot reserved for swimming although the water looked of rather dubious quality.

We were planning a walk around the Parc de la Villette but it was hot by now so we returned to the apartment for a break.

I took a few photos of our neighbourhood from the street and the apartment balcony.

One of our favourite spots from our last visit was St Germain with its numerous restaurants. We headed back for a meal out via one of my favourite spots from last time, the Eglise Saint Suplice, stunning as always in the late afternoon sunshine.

A post meal walk along the Seine to look at how Notre Dame is recovering from the fire.

Luckily its two signature towers were not damaged.

A glorious sunset on wonderful warm evening, one the advantages of hot daytime weather

And back past the odd looking Pompidou centre on the way home.

Following day was a scorcher. We took a trip to look at the Eiffel Tower from the Jardins du Trocadero and its massive water jets.

They are rather impressive. The days after when the temperatures soared the restrictions on “no swimming” were relaxed allowing people to cool off.

We took a picnic lunch out in the Jardins du Luxembourg. They are absolutely stunning but by now the heat really was soaring and we had the briefest look around before we decided enough was enough.

Ironic that we’d looked forward to our trip to Paris to escape some of the heat of the Cote D’Azure only to find it hotter here!

After another splendid meal in St Germain we took a last walk back to the apartment via the Institut de France.

The setting sun over the water and the bridges was sublime

On the footbridge of the Post des Arts was one final treasured moment. This brass group – Mouettes et Carbons – were playing and they were superb. They were covering tracks I’d never heard played with a brass vibe before. New life given to tracks such as “Total Eclipse of the Heart” and “Under Pressure”

A couple of clips to show how good these guys were. Just watching and listening to them (they were great fun as well as great musicians) in the evening sun overlooking the Seine was a treasured memory.

A fitting finish to a superb trip!

And a final sunset picture as the sun set on our trip. Just a matter of 3 months of blog posts to catch up on now!