Our trip was long and yet our excitement of our destination made it all much easier to bare!
Our first day in Paris and we are already in love with this beautiful city!
We stepped foot on those cobbled streets of Le Marais, which is where we are staying, and instantly understood the magic of this place.
This particular area of Paris is filled with ornate shop fronts, cobbled streets, more 'boulangeries' than we could keep count of and a lovely old church which rings its bell every hour. This is where we parked ourselves to enjoy a salad baguette while we waited to check in (just quietly - awesome!!) A dozen young families were also there with their kids - it was such a lovely picture, and the familiar birds all brought back so many memories for me.
Restaurants line the streets of Le Marais all not lacking in atmosphere and delicious menus, and all with a guaranteed dozen odd Frenchmen and women sitting sipping espressos or 'vins' and filling their lungs with smoke.
It really is quite shocking how many people smoke here, we concluded this is what keeps them all so thin! That and all the cycling. We took up the hire bikes on our first afternoon which was so fun - getting to know our surroundings, seeing that notre dame is just down the road, um WOW!! we then cycled up one side of the Seine and thoroughly enjoyed, well everything our eyes could take in! What a beautiful place buzzing with atmosphere everywhere you look.
We then parked our bikes and took a stroll through some more streets in the area we were just soon awe of the all the beauty, the buildings, the trees, the river, bridges, lanterns lining ever street-the list goes on. Such a great place for a people watcher and observer like me -so much to enjoy and learn!
We saw the wonderful 'place des Vosges' an amazing square with a lovely park in its centre. This is where victor Hugo lived! We also experienced street opera, yep, not just a guy with a guitar but a guy with a killer soprano!
We then stopped for dinner at a local bar and had a simple yet delicious meal as we were soo tired and jet lagged but we made it awake until it was a semi normal time to sleep 7:30pm:)
We slept with big smiles on our faces as we went back over our day- if this was day one - what more would we enjoy tomorrow!