Thanks Mitch. Without knowing it, you got us to walk over to The Latin Quarter, and we enjoyed today's outing very much! An article you gave us from Bottom Line, "The Best Outdoor Markets in Europe", touted the market on Rue Mouffetard in The Latin Quarter as one of the 5 best in Paris. It has the best atmosphere and is "the perfect place to soak up Parisian ambiance," and is open Tuesday to Sunday. So, with our trusty maps in hand, we ventured out on this cool S...

Whenever we're far from home we're in the mood to try new things. One new thing we learned about was from a TV commercial we've seen many times. Here's a little snippet stolen from a googled article: The latest iPhone commercials, featuring actors Samuel L. Jackson, John Malkovich and Zooey Deschanel, are entertaining enough — if you enjoy watching people talking to themselves. In an ad called "Date Night," Jackson tells Siri, which plays the part of his pers...

Lance Armstrong. We've seen him biking down The Champs Elysees at a leisurely pace, smiling with a glass of champagne in hand, and wrapping up 7 victories in Le Tour De France. Of course, now our memories are tarnished because he has been stripped of all 7 championships due to doping. But our 5-year-old memories of the magnificent Avenue des Champs-Elysees have only been tarnished a little bit by the fact that it is now scattered with a few more low-end stores...

Today we ventured a little farther from home, and took the Metro to Paris' largest department store, Galeries La Fayette. It's really three buildings on three corners of an intersection on Blvd. Haussmann. The largest building was for women's fashion, jewlry, cosmetics & perfumes, and children's clothing. The ground floor was spectacular, with each brand having its own boutique. There was a boutique for each brand of designer purse, and the most popular h...

Much like last year's quest for the best gelato in Florence, this year we're searching for the best French onion soup, or as they call it here, soupe a l'oignon gratinee. When we visited Paris 5 years ago, we stumbled on a little cafe, Le Kleber,on Avenue Kleber near the Arc De Triomphe and the Champs Elysees. The onion soup was the best ever, other-worldly, and to-die-for! It had the right mix of carmelized onions, beef broth, wine, herbs (especially thyme), cro...