Before leaving Australia, we bought Eurorail passes online for our travel from London to Paris and throughout Europe. There were some routes that we couldn’t use the pass on and so had to buy our tickets individually, and you have to pay separately for seat reservations usually, but overall it provided great savings. Tickets for 5 of us (3 youth, 2 adult) worked out to be $5800 including reservations for 8 days travel in 2 months. We could have travelled cheaper of course if we chose to go second class or without reservations but we were glad we paid the extra and had the certainty of good seats in first class comfort.
First class sounds like a luxury but it was worth it. Second class on European high speed trains is pretty good but first class is a lot more comfortable, especially if you are travelling long distances.
We left our apartment in Bloomsbury early on Saturday morning – 5 of us, each with a suitcase and backpack – and walked the short distance to Holborn station. From there it was an easy tube ride to Kings Cross St Pancras where we walked 5 minutes to the international St Pancras station. With all our bags, it sounded like a difficult trip but it was easy in London to manouevre our bags around with great escalators and plenty of stations. It wasn’t as easy in Europe unfortunately but the London underground is very good.
Once the staff at the Eurostar desk realised we had Eurorail passes, we were through in minutes and on the train.
I can’t praise the Eurostar experience enough. We had a bubbly hostess to look after us all the way to Paris – it was as if she was there just for us although she did look after some other people too.
She helped us find places for all our luggage, fed us great food and regularly checked to see if we needed anything. Before we knew it, we were in Paris.
staying in the latin quarter
I had researched all the arrondissements of Paris and had decided to stay in the Latin Quarter being a short walk from Notre Dame and the perfect location for accessing all the major attractions. The area has a bohemian feel – just like Bloomsbury, it used to be a place for writers, art and learning and is full of bookshops and charming cafes and restaurants. It has a lively nightlife and is delightfully quaint with its medieval cobbled streets. It is also close to the beautiful St-Germain-des-Pres district which again is full of wonderful cafes and restaurants.
After arriving at Gare du Nord, we caught the metro to Saint-Michel-Notre-Dame. We didn’t bother getting Travel Passes or Paris Cards like we did in London as when I added up the costs of where we were going, it didn’t seem worth it. Instead we just walked through Paris or bought metro tickets. You can buy a ‘carnet’ of tickets in Paris which is essentially a book of tickets that you can share between you. You can buy these at any railway station although I did hear that you could also buy them on the Eurostar if you wanted to plan ahead.
Getting to our metro station was easy and it was only a few minutes’ walk to our hotel, Hotel Henri IV Rive Gauche. It was only 3 stars on Booking.com but it was in the most perfect location and was quite lovely.
When we arrived at the hotel, I used my best French to advise the stylish lady on reception as to who we were. I had spent three months learning enough French, Italian and German to cover basic communication in each country from making reservations to ordering food and asking directions. I already knew some French from my schooldays and had learnt some Italian the year before but it did sometimes get confusing going from one language to another. German was particularly hard but it was really worth learning. My pronunciation was quite good (Google really helped to learn pronunciations!) which sometimes got me in difficulty as the person I was speaking to would assume I knew the language and would chatter back in their language – usually very fast and more often than not, I was out of my depth. My attempts to speak their language were always appreciated though so I highly recommend you make the effort.
My initial contribution to the French language was simply “Bonjour. Je m’appelle Barbara Ketley. J’ai un reservation per deux chambres”. Simply my name and the fact that I had booked two rooms. The manager knew fluent English of course so the rest of our conversation was easy but at least I tried!
After we checked in we excitedly headed towards Notre Dame. We were just a few minutes’ walk from the Seine in a fabulous spot right in the heart of restaurants and cafes. I can honestly say we were all so excited to be in Paris. Even during the day, it is magical.
A point to note when dressing for Paris – everyone is so stylish! There is an easy dress sense in Paris – it all seems so effortless from the way they wear their berets to the way they wrap their scarves. I was glad I brought my parka with a furry hood because everyone there seemed to have a furry hood! Of course, my parka was only from Kmart and wasn’t quite the designer brand that seemed to be everywhere in Paris but it had fur and was wonderfully warm!
trying to climb notre dame
We headed over the Seine towards Notre Dame Cathedral hoping to have an early afternoon visit. We had bought our tickets online but I had read that you need to date stamp your ticket before you can enter. We were blown away by the sight of Notre Dame as we crossed the square in front of it that was filled with photographers, all of whom seemed to be as much in awe of this amazing building as we were.
We found our way around to the left side of the cathedral and joined the queue for entry to climb the tower. It was around 2pm and we thought we had a good chance of getting in that afternoon. The cathedral guard soon quashed our hopes however. Establishing that we hadn’t dated our tickets in the machine, he told us that the machine was now closed and we would need to come back the next day. What we didn’t realise was that there is a machine as soon as you turn the corner of the cathedral near the side entrance for the tower climb and you need to put your tickets through and select a time of entry. As demand is so high, it stops allowing tickets to be stamped quite early. The guard suggested we come back at 9am the next day.
We were a bit disappointed but decided to go inside the cathedral instead. The queue was huge but it moved relatively fast. We were in within 15 minutes.
I love the gothic architecture of Notre Dame. It is over 800 years old, although it took 200 years to complete. It was started in 1163 but wasn’t completed until 1345. (A sad note 2 years on in 2019 after the fire that ravaged Notre Dame, we are very grateful to have had the privilege of seeing this wonderful building at its finest).
It is interesting to note that this stunning building was actually in danger of being demolished at one point because it was in total disrepair but Napoleon saved the building and was crowned Emperor inside in 1804.
We were quite surprised that we weren’t stopped from taking photos in Notre Dame so we were able to capture some of the magnificent gothic arches and stained glass windows. In Westminster Abbey, photography was strictly banned so I was a little cautious at first but everyone was blatantly taking photos so I joined them.
The good thing about the tickets we bought online for Paris was that most of them were dated for a season and not for a specific day. Only the ticket for Notre Dame needed to be dated prior to entry and although we had intended on visiting on day one in Paris, the ticket was still valid for any other day during our stay. We actually didn’t use all our tickets however so unless you want to skip the queue, you could simply buy your tickets when you arrive.
the louvre
After Notre Dame, we headed off to the Louvre. The boys aren’t great art lovers but Karl and I are and we weren’t going to miss this iconic museum. I had been many years ago but second time round it was better, even if it was a bit rushed as the boys didn’t want to hang around for too long.
Apparently the Louvre is the largest museum in the world. It is housed in the Louvre Palace which was originally built as a fortress in the late 12th century under Philip II. You can see remnants of the fortress in the basement of the museum although we didn’t get to see it on our trip. Louis XIV moved his household to Versailles in 1682 and since then, it has primarily been a museum. It is home to some of the most famous masterpieces in the world including the Mona Lisa, Venus de Milo, the Raft of Medusa and The Winged Victory of Samothrace.
Our skip the line tickets bought online worked well for us at the Louvre. The queues were long but we were able to skip through to the security line which went through very fast. The glass pyramid of the Louvre is simply stunning and is huge and open inside. We did find the men on the desks in the Louvre terribly snooty and rude but we had a lovely lady eventually take our tickets and give us our guides and audio.
The Louvre is one of those places that you could simply appreciate for the building let alone the magnificent artifacts. However, we didn’t have much time so we specifically chose where we wanted to go and headed through ignoring the temptation to stop along the way.
We made our way to the front of the crowd around the Mona Lisa quite easily. I have found that if you just move with purpose, people let you through and we had a front row viewing. It is important however not to hog the best spots for too long – take a look, pause for a few minutes, take your pics and go.
The Mona Lisa is of course quite small. It is well protected behind glass but that doesn’t stop you getting a great view. The glass isn’t great photos unfortunately (at least on my mobile) but it is one of those masterpieces that you have to see if you go to Paris.
After seeing the Mona Lisa, we made our way through to see other key masterpieces, as well as the Egyptian collection which was extensive and well worth seeing. We probably spent an hour and a half there but if you didn’t have three boys in tow, you could easily spend the whole afternoon wandering around – even longer if you had the time and the interest.
After our visit to the Louvre, we were hungry and were looking forward to a vin rouge or a biere so we stopped off at Café Le Corona which is not far from Pont Neuf. It was a very welcome stop after our big day even though the food and service wasn’t amazing. I felt the waiter was quite derisive of my attempts to order in French although I know that I was quite accurate. The one thing I did learn in each language was how to order drinks and food!
We decided to have a quick snack with some toasted sandwiches and paninis but ended up staying way too long. I got the feeling that the waiter was treating us like dumb tourists and trying to extract as much from us as possible by constant attention and suggestions for more to eat and drink. It didn’t feel sincere to me but it worked. The food was heavy and by the time we left we were quite full – which unfortunately meant we weren’t all ready for dinner when we went out in the evening.
Still we enjoyed our time in the café as we were thrilled to be in Paris.
We went back to our hotel and had a rest until it was time to go out for dinner. We wandered around looking for a restaurant for a long time with no-one quite being able to agree on where to eat. Nick wasn’t hungry and didn’t want French food, Sam, Karl and I wanted snails and frogs’ legs, and Alex was as accommodating as ever and was willing to go anywhere.
We ended up at Le Petit Hostellerie, a French restaurant that served fixed price 3 course meals with various choices per course. It wasn’t exactly a la carte but we at outside in a lovely, bustling area with lots of ambience and we got our frogs’ legs and snails. It was a wonderful soaking up the atmosphere of Paris as we dined outside and watched the locals and tourists enjoy a Saturday night out.