Category: Travel

When I visited Paris the last two times, I noticed these grey, almost drab looking bikes everywhere. They were part of the Paris Velib bike sharing scheme, run partly by the city. It had proper docking stations that locked the bikes up when not in use. This was a major success and copied globally. The London “Boris” bikes are a good example of this.

It was very different to the ghastly share system we ended up with in Australia where companies just left shared bikes all over the city without proper docking stations to store them when not in use. They ended up in people’s way and as a surprise to almost no one in Australia, most of them ended up at the bottom of the harbour. It was mentioned that this must be a fault with Australians, I don’t think so as they also have those terrible share systems here in Paris and most of the bikes I saw were just as trashed as the ones at home.

I was determined to try the proper system here in Paris, however I’ve sinced learned the original much loved system has been replaced with a newer one that’s not been as successful as the original and the Parisians are not happy about it. It’s become a major political issue here. And in a city with a history of revolutions the mayor is getting a little worried….. You can read more about the debacle in the links below.

Link one  Link two

None the less I still wanted to try it out so I paid my €5 online for a day pass and started looking for a bike after I’d had my morning coffee. There were a few right near the apartment but I wanted to ride by the river, so looked down that way. I found a bike but then hit a snag getting it unlocked, just as one of the article describes and as it was the only bike left I had to search for another docking area to try another one. A few minutes away I found another place with heaps of bikes, even a rare blue electric one, but alas it had a flat tyre and was thus useless. Another bike was fine, it unlocked ok, and I was off.

Apart from the €5, the first 30min is free, then something like €1 every 30 min after that. I got a text when I’d been using the bike for an hour just reminding me I was paying extra for this. The bike was easy to ride, the brakes worked well and they have three gears you can use. I didn’t take the bike anywhere hilly. I discovered after an hour of riding I’d left my water bottle at the apartment so had to buy one from a bar along the river. €4 for a bottle of water, a bit of idiot tax factored into that…..

The bikes have an inbuilt lock so you can leave them in places temporarily without having to put it back in a docking station.

The share bikes neatly locked up, plus an electric one (a rare sight).

You unlock them buy keying in your account and PIN number on the bike. You can also some how use your metro tap and go card, but that didn’t work for me. This first bike just wouldn’t unlock, so had to find another

An ofo share bike getting the same treatment they do at home.

Paris traffic signals just for bikes. It’s hard to see in this but the light is green

Here is a screenshot of my Strava that shows were I rode

Finally a coffee in Paris that is worthy of its own coffee report. Strada Café. Maybe the French win in the World Cup game over Belgium last night has shone a torch of coffee goodness over the city of light, or maybe I just fluked a good discovery. One of the universes little mysteries I guess.

I left Sharon and Emma at La Foodist this morning whilst they undertook a French baking class (which will earn its own post later). I thus had a few hours to wander and do whatever. I had thought of doing another bike tour but decided against it and would try the Paris bike share, which in its own way started a global revolution on bike sharing.

What is it with the French and revolutions ?

Thought I’d wander up to the river, hire a bike and go for a spin in a relative traffic free safe area. On the way started looking for coffee and breakfast. Only 100m from La Foodist I saw this place, it looked ok but given it was the second one I’d seen in a minute I was inclined to keep moving until I saw the evolution of coffee chalked on the window.

This screamed at me : this place knows coffee! And the fact they had the flat white on the board which is an Australian gift to the world, they must know something (Sorry NZ, I know you beg to differ on this one, but the flat white is ours…)

The coffee was a lovely 9/10, and given this is the first near perfect one I’ve ever had in Paris I’ll give it a 9.5 as a bonus. I’m almost sad I have to leave the cafe now as I probably won’t get back to this one before we leave. But you never know.

Check the photo below they even do proper takeaway coffee in cup sizes I’d see at home.

Given the poor state of coffee in the French Republic I was keen to understand how the beacon of coffee par de excellence came to be. The Barista is from Panama, one of the biggest exporters of coffee beans in the world, so you could say he doesn’t just know coffee, he is coffee. It’s pulsating through his veins.

Happily caffeinated moi :-