By Benna Strober
I had the pleasure of traveling to Paris this summer for a 6 day trip with my oldest daughter, who I have since dropped off to start her four year adventure at Case Western Reserve University. When I made the summer plans for all 3 of my daughters, I knew I wanted to do something special with my oldest to give us both a trip to remember.
We took an overnight flight on July 31, 2017 through Delta who partners with Air France. We tried our best to get a few hours of sleep on the 8 hour flight so we’d be awake for our first day of sightseeing. When we arrived from Charles de Gaulle airport we drove 40 minutes to our home base for the week, the Hotel Moderne St. Germain. We put our stuff down and set out for our first day of adventure. The boutique hotel is no frills, but clean and inviting. The staff were very nice and helpful with any information we requested. They made sure we had our shuttle plans for our return trip to the airport and even made a deposit to ensure a smooth departure. There was a display of croissants and water throughout the day with a small sitting area in the lobby.
Prior to our arrival, I purchased the Paris Pass which is supposed to get you easier entry to museums and other sites. It also gives you unlimited use of the local buses and trains, but not to all locations. Note, children under 17 already have free access to museums, so if you plan to get the Paris Pass you do not need it for the museums for children. Also, while it helps in avoiding lines to buy tickets (at some locations), you still have to wait on security lines. You might be better off purchasing tickets for specific sites online instead of getting the Pass. There were also many sites that didn’t take the pass (mostly all of them except the actual museums) so I’d have to say it wasn’t really worth it for us after all. On a positive note, having the unlimited transportation passes caused us to use the buses and trains and also walk. This was a much smarter idea than taxis due to the traffic and quicker routes that can be taken by foot. They say Paris is a walking city and Ally and I definitely walked many miles every day!
After settling in to our room we were quite exhausted from the overnight flight but that didn’t stop Ally and me. The first thing we did was change into running gear and hit the streets. Ally decided to take a run along the Seine which was less than a mile away and I went through Luxembourg Gardens, also less than a mile away. After returning from our invigorating runs we were on the go again and walked less than half a mile to our first site of the trip, Notre Dame. It is truly a beautiful site to see, both inside and out. We grabbed a quick bite sitting outside at one of the many surrounding cafes (we tried to avoid sitting next to smokers which was nearly impossible every where we went). After the walk through Notre Dame we felt we needed to add one more site to our first day so we took a bus to the Eiffel Tower.
I don’t know where we got our energy but looking at the long line waiting to take an elevator up, and the shorter line to walk up, we chose the walking up line. You have to pay a nominal fee (8 Euro each) to climb to the 2nd story. The views are spectacular! We finally decided it was time to go back to the hotel and change. After which we hit at an outdoor cafe for dinner before returning to the hotel to pass out!!
A trip to Paris would not be complete without checking out the Palais de Versailles. This is a 2 train trip and that is when we found out our Paris Pass train tickets would not suffice for the transportation, although it did work to get us into Versailles. Basically, the way the trains work in Paris is they have the Metro lines that serve Paris and the RER, which is a train system which serves Paris and its suburbs. The Palace of Versailles is in the suburbs, about 12 miles away from the center of Paris. To get to Versailles, you will need to get the RER C.
The RER C is a train which will take you directly to the Palace of Versailles. It runs alongside the Seine River. It took us approximately 45 minutes in total to get to Versailles. The walk from the train station to the Palace is short and you can see the magnificent building in front of you for much of the short walk. We spent a good portion of the day wandering through the Palace and the Gardens out back. Note that it was very crowded and many groups walk along with headphones on guided tours. After leaving Versailles and heading back to our hotel, we took a nice long stroll along the Seine, ending with a delicious dinner at another outdoor cafe. I love wandering into small neighborhoods accidentally, finding tons of people walking around, sitting at outdoor cafes and eating delicious sorbet!
We started our third day at the Louvre and Tuileries Garden (with views from the Ferris wheel). Then we were off to the Rue de Rosiers in Marais, the Jewish section of Paris. We headed straight to L’as du Fallafel for an amazing falafel (thanks for all the recommendations!). After resting at the hotel and doing a bit of shopping on the Rue St. Germain, we ended our day with dinner and yummy sorbet at Amorino on the Rue de la Bucherie. It is near Shakespeare and Company, an independent bookstore on the Left Bank that has been in existence for 97 years! The bookstore is a great place to get lost in, looking at new and second hand books, as well as antique books. The shop houses aspiring writers and artists in exchange for their helping out around the bookstore.
Day 4 started with a run (Ally again along the Seine and me again in Luxembourg Gardens). We started with yet another yummy breakfast at an outdoor cafe near our shopping destination, Galleries Lafayette which is a huge and beautifully designed department store. Don’t forget to keep your receipt and go to the office at the end of your shopping spree to get forms to send in for tax reimbursement. If you go to the customer service desk at the store they will help you. After shopping we had to add a bit of culture, of course, so we went to the Musee L’Orangerie for the Monet exhibit. Room after room of his beautiful Water Lilies will take your breath away. Then we walked all the way to the Champs Elysees and took a river cruise up and down the Seine. The ride was included with the Paris Pass, but you have to enter at the dock near the Eiffel Tower and take the Bateaux Parisiens boat. The Pass says you can take it from either the Eiffel Tower location or the Notre Dame location (which was closer to our hotel), but we found out when we got to that site that this is not actually true, or wasn’t when we went.) The boat leaves every 30 minutes and lasts around an hour. When we got back to the hotel we ran out for a quick dinner and went back to the room to collapse! Today was the most walking we’ve done!
We started our last full day in Paris with yet another run (I’m getting used to this!) and then it was off to South Pigalle, another long bus ride, for a delicious brunch at Rose’s Bakery. After some shopping in the area we made our way over to the Musee D’Orsay for our bit of culture of the day. The endless rooms of different impressionists and many different famous pieces of art could take you a few hours to explore. A rest was well needed so we headed back to our hotel and relaxed while watching the perfect Movie .. The Da Vinci Code. It was cool to see the different parts of the Louvre and the City itself in the movie that we were just in ourselves. We ended our day with a trip down to the trendy Canal St. Martin part of town for a delicious dinner. This was a long bus ride and then walk through a bit of a sketchy part of town, but once we arrived we were glad we kept walking. There were tons of restaurants and people hanging out by the Canal.
Overall, we packed a lot of culture, shopping, eating, walking, running and bonding into our 6 day trip to the City of Lights. It is a trip I highly recommend to anyone interested in exploring one of the most beautiful and interesting cities in the world!