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Visiting Paris - Part IAug 12 '02 Write an essay on this topic.The Bottom Line To fully enjoy the most romantic city in the world spend most of your time in sidewalk cafes and picnicking on the banks of the Seine. In this review I am going to talk about getting to Paris, finding a place to stay, getting around, and some brief nuggets on eating in Paris. The hope is to add a Part II which will add a recommended to do and see list. When to go: We were in Paris for a week in the first week of July. The weather was odd, it rained quite a bit and it was quite cold, about 55-60 degrees on some days. It was cold enough for us to buy two jackets! So don't expect midwest like weather in July in Paris. But, while we would have preferred it to be a bit warmer, this weather was very conducive to walking around. Last year we visited Rome at the same time of the year and the heat was crushing. Finding a hotel: I did an online search for hotels because expedia was a little pricey. Also the hotel I found on expedia in Rome last year was very unsatisfactory. We booked our hotel from www.digital.france.com. It was 3-stars, 73 euros per night, and it was located in the Latin quarter of Paris which is where we wanted to be. The hotel we chose is Hotel des Arenes. The rooms were small, but the price and the location cannot be beat. But - this is not a luxurious hotel, and the service is not particularly good. However I highly recommend the website digital.france.com for other hotels and good deals, this was an extremely easy booking experience. The website also lists all the hotel amenities such as AC(not common), hairdryer etc. If you have some time before your trip, and its a reasonably long one, you may even consider renting an apartment for a week or two. The same website lists available apartments with detailed room by room photos. Finally, the prices and location details provided by this website were far better than what expedia provides. Latin Quarter For those who may not be familiar with Paris and are thinking about going there, you should really consider staying in the Latin quarter. For reference it is on the Left Bank of the Seine (there is a right bank and a left bank of Paris, the seine river cuts east-west through Paris). The Left Bank is where the intellectuals lived. Paris is divided into arrondissements or areas, and the Latin Quarter is the 5th Arrondissement. This famous neighborhood is where the Sorbonne and Universite de Paris are located. Among tourist locations, the Pantheon is here, and Notre Dame Cathedral is directly across the river. There is also the Luxembourg Gardens, and lots of wonderful neighborhoods to drink coffee, browse in bookshops, shop, and watch people. Getting to Paris from De Gaulle Aiport The easiest way to get into Paris is to take a cab. From the airport to the Latin quarter is about $40. However if you're traveling light and you feel adventurous you might consider the RER. This is the railway service from the airport. The main challenge is to locate the train station in the airport terminal because it is not well marked. Depending on which terminal you come into, you may have to take a shuttle bus to another terminal. However if you ask you're probably going to be able to find it easily. You should at the same time pick up a metro map. The RER will take you to a station from where chances are you have to take a subway to where your hotel is. Again this is not terribly challenging because the subway maps are very well marked. Getting around in Paris The first 4 days we walked everywhere until our legs finally gave out. After that for the rest of the week we took the metro a lot and found it extremely easy to use. We bought 20 tickets at one time which saved us a lot of money. The maps are clearly marked in each subway station - its hard to get lost and if you do you can always take a cab right? There are cabs to be found everywhere as well. Language and people If you speak French then you need not read this. If you don't, we did not have any problems at all communicating, much to our surprise. While the waiters listened patiently as we tried to order in French most times they just replied in English much to our chagrin! Also I think we caught Parisians at a good time - most people we encountered were helpful and considerate. It still might be a good idea, just for the experience, to buy a french phrase book and freshen up that high school french! We bought a small pocket phrase book published by the travel guide company DK which was helpful. Highlights - incomplete Any guidebook will list all the places to see while in Paris so I will not provide a list. Instead I will give some of the highlights of our trip. I plan to continue this section in Part II. Starting the day.. On a typical day we would come out of the hotel and stop in at the charcuterie two stores down and buy our breakfast pastries. Then we would go hunting for the perfect brasserie for that morning cup of expresso, or cafe creme(coffee with cream). Most brasseries will offer a prix fixe (fixed price) breakfast (jus d'orange, croissant, coffee) for 7-12 euros(1 euro=$1 approximately now) but we never tried it because we much preferred buying the delicious pastries displayed in the windows of the bakeries. Paris brasseries are combined tobacco store, bar, and restaurant. Most offer full meals, but one can just stop by for a cup of coffee or a glass of wine and linger for as long as you like. For lunch we generally ordered a prix fixe lunch (usually ran from 7-15 euros for an appetizer, main course, and dessert). You get to choose among a limited number of items. A fixed price menu is also available in most restaurants at dinnertime. Depending on how useful people find this review I will add a second part describing the places we liked best, recommending restaurants and neighborhoods.  |
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