The flight from Malaysia was very comfortable, we traveled in the premium economy seats which are the equivalent of 1st class, the seats lay back like a bed and are very wide, like 1st class but without the extras. Well worth paying the extra dollars.
We arrived to a very cold London, 1 degree Celsius and the wind cut through us like a knife. A bus trip into the city saw us deposited at Liverpool St station which was great except we needed to be at St Pancras station, no problems we said it's only a few tube stops away.
Ha ha ha little did we realise that there are no elevators and no escalators on the tube system only 100's of steps to negotiate to get to the tube platform, we had 4 suitcases !!!! at least they had wheels, not much help with this many steps.
We finally made it to the big cold barn that is St Pancras Station for our 5 hr wait to board the Eurostar Train. We bunkered down in a cafe and had soup and hot chocolate to keep the cold at bay.
Eurostar was great, very comfortable and quick, it was nice to see the fields flashing by at what felt like 200km an hour. Arrival at Paris Nord station was cold and wet but fortunately we didn't have to wait long for a taxi.
The hotel is walking distance to the Eiffel Tower in a nice part of Paris 100m from the river Seine.
The hotel had prepared the room well, the temperature of the room was set to 10 degrees on the thermostat, I wonder if they knew we had come from 33 degrees in Malayasia and needed to aclimatise!!!!
By now it was around 7pm local time but for us was more like 2 am, too tired to get dressed for dinner so Yogi visited the small supermarket around the corner and returned loaded with red wine from bordeaux and a couple of different cheeses including a wonderfully creamy camembert from Normandy, some duck pate and fresh fruit just to be a little healthy.
What a feast, the wine and cheese variety in the supermarket was fantastic.
Our first full day in Paris started with a great breakfast at the hotel then walking to the Trocadero to view the Eiffel Tower, we then jumped on a "hop on hop off" tour bus, you know a double decker the type with no roof, not sure given that the temperature was now only 5 degrees that this was the best idea we had! anyway we didn't care because this was Paris.
We spent the next few hours soaking up the sights and sounds of a place we had only dreamt about, I think people were staring at us due to the mile wide grins on both our faces.
Lunch in a little bistro, more soup and red wine, just to warm us up again followed by a walk through the district surrounding the Notre Dame cathederal.
The tower was still beckoning so we decided to head there and see what the lines were like, not too bad, so we queued for 30mins and boarded the elevator, I must point out at this time that Yogi is not too good with heights so this was going to be a challenge for him. The top of the tower was closed for renovations, this made the decision to go all the way a little easier!! however the 2nd level which is half way up was open.
Chris was like a kid in a candy store, she had been waiting for this experience for a very long time, Yogi was just trying to breathe!!! Chris really enjoyed the tower, she said the views were fantastic, unfortunately there are no photos from up the tower as Yogi didn't make it out of the elevator! as I said earlier he is no good with heights, all he did was go up and straight back down!!!
Time for dinner, we really wanted to experience one of the little french bistros that are everywhere, it seems as though every street corner has 2 or 3 bistros all offering their own small menus.
We choose one around the corner from the hotel, small was the best way to describe it, 16 seats and we reckon the room was smaller than our bedroom! time to order....Yogi did his best as the owner had very little english.
It went something like this (apologies to those that can actually speak French) Yogi says "Bonsuar Monsuir (good evening sir) "en table for 2" oui, "merci" (thankyou), "un menu sive u plai" (a menu if you please), oui, the owner says "and to drink monsuir?" "un vin rouge ordinaire" (red house wine), 120ml, 500ml? the owner says "500ml carafe zive u plai" Yogi says, oui, and to eat?, "entree soup de jour" (soup of the day), and "plate fish, zive u plai" oui, "merci". What a blast this was and we even got a small cheer from the other diners in the bistro!!
Food was good, atmosphere was fantastic, wine was even better.
The next day saw us back into the city and a visit to the Hotel des Invalides, hospital and church for the war veterans, and the Army museum, built sometime around 1800. The exhibits for the Napolionic era as well as the stories about the French resistance during WWII were great, the most impressive part was Napoleons mausaleaum.
The rest of the day was spent shopping and enjoying an apertif in a cafe on the Champs Elysees.
Tomorrow we pick up the hire care and head off to the cottage in Normandy, driving a left hand drive car on the wrong side of the road......you'll just have to wait for the update in a few more days!!!!
