Honeymoon: Day 1

We arrived in Paris at 6am on Sunday, November 20.  We were both lucky enough to sleep a bit on the plane over, so we were ready to hit the ground running.  We gathered our luggage, exchanged $80 for Euros and went looking for a cab.  It took roughly an hour to get through the line of people waiting for a cab and to get to the hotel.  


It was approximately 8am when we finally pulled up to Hôtel Lecourbe. The driver told us it that our fare was 62 Euros. This would not have been much of a problem except that $80 equals roughly 48 Euros after paying fees and such. Jtl decided to grab a couple of $20 bills from his wallet to make up the difference...... except he accidentally grabbed one $20 and a $100 bill. The driver took off before I could bring this to his attention. Guessing we might have made that guy's day.


We were happy to find out that our room was ready for us upon arrival, took our key and headed for the elevator. I think that the linen closet in most homes is larger than this elevator, but it did the job. Next stop room 26...... except it sounded like there was a baby crying in that room and our key didn't work. We checked the number scribbled on the envelope again and verified that it said 26 before I went back downstairs to tell the guy that we believe there is a baby in our room. He checks with another hotel employee, and they assure me that our room is vacant. It seems that what we read as 26 was actually 24. Guess the lack of sleep might have been hitting us a bit more than we realized.  

Hotel Elevator

view of 24 from bathroom door

Room 24 was very clean and very small, but it met our needs. After dropping our bags and grabbing scarves, we head out on foot for the Eiffel Tower. It was a fairly short walk, and even shorter once we became familiar with our hotel's location on the map we had gotten from the lobby. The tower opens at 9:30, and we lucked out to be fairly close to the start of the line...... even better was the nice guy from Washington in line in front of us. It was nice to hear what he had seen and done so far on his trip. The top of the tower was quite crowded despite arriving early, but we still managed to get some decent pictures. We did take the lift to the top, but Jtl led me to stairs that ended up taking us all the way back to the bottom.  

self portrait from top of the tower

After we left the Eiffel Tower, we walked across the river and up to the Arc de Triomphe. From there we wandered down Champs-Élysées.  We saw lots of familiar shops as we wandered, and decided that it was time to decide what we were going to have for lunch.  We decided on George V.  The day was clear and not too chilly, so we sat on the patio where we could watch everything happening.  I had a wonderful ham and cheese sandwich and Jtl had roast beef.  


After lunch, we wandered through Louis Vuitton.  I saw lots of wonderful handbags, but quickly became aggravated with the crowd.  The lack of personal space had already begun to be an issue for this claustrophobic girl.  As we continued our stroll, I spotted the ferris wheel ahead.  We decided to walk to that before altering our course, and I'm so pleased that we did.  We ended up walking through a nice little Christmas carnival area.  There were rides for the kids, trees covered in fake snow and even a crazy ice skating path for kids.  There were booths lining both sides of the street with food, gluhwein and crafts.  

By now, my feet had begun to really ache.  For the record, Uggs are quite comfy unless you're planning to walk for hours on end.   


We visited the Hotel les Invalides before heading back to our hotel for a nap.  Les Invalides was originally set up as a hospital for wounded soldiers, and was really quite beautiful.  Napoleon Boneparte is buried here, but at a price of 10 Euros per person we opted to skip visiting his grave.  Instead we wandered around a lot of crooked roads in search of our hotel. 

Around 6:30, we asked the young man at the front desk for a restaurant suggestion.  I have to say I was a bit surprised that the same guy that was at the desk when we arrived was still working ten hours later.  He suggested that we try Montparnasse 1900 which was two train stops away.  Since we had yet to take the train, we decided to walk instead.  The area where the restaurant was located was quite busy, and we opted to try Chez Bebert instead.  The food was amazing.  I had lamb with caramelized onions and grapes prepared in a tangine.  Jtl had an amazing lamb kebab with rice.  The red table wine we had with dinner was wonderful.  I personally think that we picked the perfect place for us in this area.  The atmosphere inside the restaurant was so warm and cozy.  The food was delicious.  

We stopped at Cafe Montarnasse after dinner for one more glass of wine before heading back to the hotel for much needed sleep.  We had to be well rested for day 2!