Our journey started with an early morning road trip to Montpellier to catch the TGV. What a cool way to travel. High speed (the way it is meant to be). Easy. Parts of France that we won't get to visit were glimpsed through the windows.
We arrived at the Gare de Lyon and what a shock to the senses. I had expected things to be busy but it was quite overwhelming how many people there were standing, moving, sitting; as well as trains coming and going from platforms; as well as service vehicles driving right through it all. The little people wanted to move after having been stuck on the train, but there was nowhere that was safe it seemed. Our plan had been to catch the Metro to the stop right by our apartment in the Montmartre area. But all that turned too stressful - with buggy, suitcase and the kids, with no elevator access to the Metro. So we did the thing we said we'd never do and caught a cab with no carseats! Eeek! In Paris - one of the craziest cities in the world to drive in. We at least got to get to the top of the taxi line as we had a buggy and kids. A theme that continued pretty much everywhere we went in Paris - queue jumping with the kids. Got to love that.
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| Blending in around where our apartment was. Kind of. The buggy stands out because it is big - and also the buggy board on the back. |
Anyway, we arrived safely at the apartment, met our 'landlady' Alice. So nice to have an apartment and not a hotel room. Must get around to writing their review...but given this blog has taken weeks to get up, I'm not sure it will be happening in a hurry.
There are a bunch of photos of our time in Paris on facebook here that you can access even if you're not a member of it.
Gregg had never been to Paris before so we had to try and do as many of the must sees as possible, and we think we managed to get a good amount in. The difference of how we actually experienced them to how we would have liked to often had a gap though... We raced past amazing paintings in famous museums at break neck speed, often chasing one or both the kids, or carrying one out who had decided they had well had enough. At the Louvre, a security guard came and asked me (en Français) "Are they your children?" "Oui", I replied. "Stop them pulling on the ropes around the paintings because they are alarmed". Sacre Bleu! They shouldn't put the ropes at toddler hand height then!
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| Are you the mother of these children??!! Sacre bleu. |
We were sssshhhh'd at the Sacre Coeur as we walked through the church with thousands of others. There were the SILENCE signs at the entrance and around the well trodden aisles of the beautiful church, and I can understand that for crazy outlandish talking. But to have fellow sightseeers and the staff glare and ssshhh us for having Jonathan (who is a happy 15 month old toddler) make a few happy sounding 'ahhhh's made me really question how stupid tourism has become. Jonathan loves the sounds of his ahhhh's when he is in the old churches and most people so far we have met in them have smiled that we have a little man who is happy.
I would rather have a happy little boy in a church than vending machines that were at the end of the trek around the Sacre Coeur and the souvenir shop inside as well. Screams of hypocrisy!!! But apart from that, Elena and Jonathan danced with the three guys playing guitars and drums and singing and having mini concerts all the church visitors stopped at. Jonathan joined in the act by climbing the stairs and one band member came and sang to him and gave him high fives. The crowed all have photos of this - but unfortunately we don't as I had the camera and was trying to juggle the kids and their antics. But that was great fun.
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| Clash of sacred and beautiful and tourism gone ugly with the hawkers |
We caught the bus mostly as there are generally no elevators into the Metro stations. This was such a good way to travel and see so much of everyday life as well as scooting past attractions we might not have managed to get to otherwise. I can really only say good things about the service the busses provided. We had some lovely interactions with other passengers on the bus. Elena befriended many an old lady, and Jonathan made friends with almost anyone. There was a group of three people probably in the mid 20's who were high-fiving him and picking up his 'money' that he kept on dropping. (One of his first words has been 'money' and both he and Elena have become a little obsessed with always having a piece of money. Elena was playing with some at one of the museums can calling out 'money, money'. Some other tourists looked a little quizzically at her wondering if she was talking about famous artists (Monet or Manet) - and then cracked up once they realised she was playing with the little coins). Not all trips were when the kids were on their best and funniest behaviour - some were when they were tired and over the day, and of course there were some tears and protests. Fellow passengers were not so enamoured with the kids then. Nor with us. It was like we were the worst parents ever having a child that was making a noise. Is that why most French kids I see, often even if they are about 4, have a dummy/pacifier? It was something to grin and bear, and not worry about as we were never to see any of them again.
The City of Love. It is. It's kind of like being in Paris invites couples to bring out the PDAs (public displays of affection) like never before. Everywhere you look were people smooching, cuddling, hand holding and just being lovely. And it was a little infectious. We put a padlock on the Pont des Arts along with thousands and thousands of others. We wondered what happens when people break up....do they come and cut off the padlock? We went to the Wall of Love - a tiled wall with I Love You written in 250 languages. Someone offered to take our photo together and it is one of the few photos of us together in Paris. We also made other couples happy by taking theirs. Another excuse for acceptable PDAs in front of lots of people. Was all very nice to watch - happy people - Lovers, friends, parents and kids. The City of Love.
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| Some of the most amazing Roses I have ever seen. But the loveliest thing was this watching people buying them. |
Montmartre was great. Wish I could have bought some of the art. Wish someone had asked to draw our happy little family....but alas no one did. Is it because they know parents of young children have no sitting power as the kids wriggle and want to wander away.
We got to the Eiffel Tower at the end of our last day in Paris. We did a quick admire of it, looked at the long lines to get up it, saw the signs about having to fold up your buggy and carry it with you, assessed the state of 'how close to losing it' the kids were and decided to go up the Tower another trip to Paris. Instead we went about 100m away to a little park where we could peek at the top of the tower between the trees and the kids had fun. We met another mum who had arrived the day before and was staying for three years (how jealous was I!!) and she was checking out the playgrounds. Felt almost local-ish when I was able to tell her about some of the good ones we had discovered.
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| Under the Eiffel Tower and yet another playground, where Jonathan mastered the art of going down the slide by himself |
We had a few 'we feel like locals' moments when we were stopped a few times and asked for directions or other random questions by real locals. And sometimes could even help them!! One guy even stopped his car while we were standing at a bus stop. Must have blended in quite nicely. Perhaps we are starting to turn a little bit French after a few months here...
We had a fab time and saw more sights. I loved walking and taking in the sights and sounds; meandering, stopping and looking up little streets, through half opened doors and gates into courtyards that are normally shut from prying eyes.
We had kind of done our dash after 6 days - and were happy to be heading home again. But I loved it, miss it and will be back. Paris - je t'aime!
Travel tips
- When travelling by train with young kids who are 'free' but don't get their own seat, pay the extra 9 Euros for them to secure their own seat. It is so worth it. And also try to get on the lower level of the train carriages.
- Take a small buggy if you need one. The good old kiwi mountain buggies are too big to get comfortably on the buses, too hard to collapse in apartments to leave at the bottom of the stairs, and you can't go up the Eiffel Tower with it....because how do you take baby and collapsed buggy?!
- Buggys are great for being able to get to the front of the long long lines at many of the attractions. You get priority entrance at many places. So good! The other way to get in early is to buy your tickets in advance, but we didn't have a printer so didn't do that.
- Buses are great for getting around. Buy a carnet of 10 tickets from any metro station or some Tabac's near the metro stations for about 13euro. Much better value than the tourist buses with their 30euro ish tickets. They are valid for 90 minutes and you can change as many buses or trains as you need to within that time. Bus rides also act like the car does and sends tired kids to sleep! Nice when you need that to happen. You also see so much.
- Fit everything you need into one suitcase, allowing room if you're going to do shopping. It's too hard to move around if you have more luggage than you can pull or carry easily.
- Break the day up with the kids. They get bored with the things we wanted to see, so we learnt (the hard way) to get better at finding the playgrounds, giving them time and space to run around. Although, often we thought we had found a nice big green space for playing on...but the grass is either fenced off, or there are 'no walking' signs. What on earth are they thinking?
- Cool websites:
- http://en.voyages-sncf.com/en/ for booking trains.
- Apartments in Paris.... All Paris Apartments We stayed in this one this one - which was great...
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