I arrived in Paris yesterday in the early afternoon. My train came into Gare l’Est and I decided to splurge and take a taxi to the apartment. It cost less than €10, and I didn’t have to hassle with buying metro tickets, etc.

Susan was waiting for me at the apartment, located in the Marais. It’s small, as most Parisian apartments are, but it’s beautiful. There’s even a view from the kitchen window of the top of the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame. I dropped my things and then we left to meet up with my friends, Nigel and Carol, from England. They came to Paris for the day just to see me. They are so sweet. We went to a café down the street and got a bite to eat. At 4:00 we were all supposed to be at Carette at Place des Vosges to meet up with a Rick Steves forum regular. Brad lives in Virginia and has been in France for a couple of weeks. We had a nice visit.

After leaving the others, Susan and I proceeded to walk around. We eventually stopped at her favorite café on Ile St. Louis. She got dinner, but I wasn’t hungry. I settled for a glass of rosé instead. Before going back to the apartment I stopped in a little store to get yogurt and bananas for breakfast.

When we returned to the apartment the tiny old elevator wasn’t working. The apartment is on the 6th European floor. That means the 7th floor in the U.S. This picture was taken looking down before the final flight of stairs.

Sunday morning we went to Château Malmaison. Napoleon’s wife, Josephine, lived there. He was often gone because war took up much of his time. The Château is outside of Paris. We had to take metro line 1 to La Defense, then a bus to Malmaison.

Susan wanted to linger for awhile and I was ready to return to Paris. When I got off the metro I had to find a place to eat. I was hungry! After I ate I just walked and walked. Here are random pictures of things I saw today.

p

I bought a bottle of wine. Looking at the rosés I saw something strange amongst the bottles of French wines. Barefoot wine? In France?