This morning we decided to head to the Les Marais neighborhood in Paris.  Marais is the place Parisians keep for themselves, for they say it’s the best. The finest architecture, fun, nice and cheap bars, eccentric and hip crowd, great food and amazing fashion stores. Within this district, there are a blend of a lot of different communities – Chinese, Jewish and LGBT. It has many narrow cobblestone streets, and is both quaint and trendy at the same time.

We took two Metros to get there, and got off at the Hotel de Ville. Which is not actually a hotel. It has been the headquarters of the municipality of Paris since 1357. It serves multiple functions, housing the local administration and the Mayor of Paris. We were thinking about going in, there was a Made in Paris exhibit, but decided to head to the Centre Pompidou, since it opened at 11. We honestly hadn’t done any research on this building and therefore, were a little shocked when we saw how huge it was, with this industrial looking architecture. It was unlike any other building we’d seen in Paris so far. This museum houses Europe’s largest collection of modern art, approximately 100,000 pieces.

We took an escalator up to the sixth floor to see the Rene Magritte exhibit. Yes an escalator that runs through tubes on the outside of the building. After walking through the exhibit, mom and I decided surrealism isn’t our thing. But there were quite a lot of people there.  We went next to the museums modern art floors, and were impressed with the paintings by Matisse, Chagall, Picasso, Pollack, Dubuffet, Kandinsky, Rouault, Kupka and so many more.  We really only stayed at the museum for a little over 2 hours; we hadn’t planned on spending the day there.

So we walked the streets of Marais, saw more chocolate boutiques, found the famous falafel restaurant, meandered through the Jewish area (saw kosher pizza) and were getting hungry, so we stopped at Schwartz. Yes, in Paris, we ate at a NY Jewish Deli. Mom had pastrami on rye and like NY, the sandwich was both delicious and too huge to eat all of it.  We now have leftovers. My friend Sarah suggested multiple,places for us to stop, but feeling full and tired we decided to head back to the apt, knowing we had more adventures this evening. On the way to the Metro, we passed Holocaust Museum, saw the street where Izreal, was on…yes the spelling is right. It’s a spice market with every spice imaginable.

We’re really getting a handle on the Metro system, and thank Thomas daily for this app we’ve been using. Next trip to Paris, we are definitely staying in Marais.

When we got home, we chilled for about an hour before hitting the road again. We had 5pm tickets for the Eiffel Tower, and then dinner at Jules Verne at 7pm. While walking to the Metro, just a block from our apt, we saw our first protest. We wondered why so many cops were hanging around. A few had riot shields, but everything looked under control. They were right in front of the Metro entrance, so we went to another entrance. Later we learned that they were part of the world-wide rallies planned for today to protest the Chinese government’s reported demolition of a Buddhist academy in Tibet. Demonstrators say it’s the latest example of Beijing’s religious crackdown in the autonomous region.

We took the Metro two stops to the Trocodera. From here we had a beautiful view of the Eiffel Tower. We passed many men selling souvenirs, and others conning tourists out of their money as they tried to guess which cup the ball was under. As we were getting ready to cross the Seine, it started to rain. Fortunately both of us packed umbrellas. This was the first time during the day that we got caught in the rain, and are feeling very fortunate about that.

We had to wait a bit before we could access the elevator in the Eiffel Tower. To get to the top, you have to take two different lifts. The first one is more like a tram, took us up to the second floor.  The second is just an elevator that takes you to the summit. Fortunately it stopped raining and we could see all of Paris. We saw many of the places we’d visited, and even where our apt is located. It was cold and windy outside though…low 50s. The whole trip, up and down with lines was only a little over an hour. One thing on the bucket list checked off.

When we reached the bottom, we had 45 min to kill before dinner. The elevator to Jules Verne is a private one, only fits 6 people at a time, and doesn’t start running until exactly 7pm. Now we were cold, damp and hungry, and ready to be warm inside. The two couples in front of us were from Virginia and North Carolina. We had a lovely table, with a wonderful view, and were the first ones seated. We ate so much food. It was a five course meal, but it was more like 7 courses. We had:

• Cheese puff
• Croisssnt
• Marinated sea breen with citrus
• Preserved duck foie grass confit with walnuts and tossted brioche
• Pan seared sea scallop with pumpkin and chestnuts
• Sea bass with black figs or veal medallions with wild mushrooms
• Tender granny smith apple and sorbet
• Six sided Chocolate covered cake  with a crispy bottom, and a chocolate liquid top,  macaroons, marshmellows, ice cream and chocolate pieces

By 9:15 we were entering a food coma. Tired, full and achy, we were ready to go back to the apt. Now I’m not sure I mentioned this, but we live right around the corner from The Crazy Horse, which is a burlesque show. Rather than walking home from dinner, we decided to take a cab. Knowing the Crazy Horse is well known, we asked him to take us there. He was quite surprised by our request, but obliged. Home at last.