Tag: food

Travel

Kitchenalia Café

Our day started early with a knock on the door from the apartment manager, she was here to try an fix the internet. It’s virtually unusable in this apartment, I’ve been relying on the SIM card I have in the phone. Thank goodness I have 15g of data, but it means uploading video from last nights ride is not an option.

I’m not really a fan of this part of Paris, it was a last minute compromise given what happened to the one we booked, but I can’t complain to hard, it’s still Paris and only a short ride on the metro from the really nice areas. It’s not that much better here than it is between Gare Du Nord and Gare du Est IMHO

I did grab a Starbucks first thing in case I had the same issue as yesterday, however I need not have worried as I found a rateable coffee (7/10) right near the kitchen shop we visited. This is *the* store to visit in Paris if you are into cooking utensils. After we had looked and shopped here we grabbed coffee next door

Here is the kitchen / cooking store

After here we wandered a bit further away from the Les Halles part of Paris and found some pastry and grocery stores with interesting and wonderful products

It’s amazing the care the French put into displaying and looking after ingredients. It’s no wonder French food is amazing

Tinned Snails, COMPUTER SAYS NO!

We then found a small mall with all sorts of cool shops

There was one with steel letters on display. Of course I let my inner 13 year old out to play a little, bit unfortunately Sharon’s outer teacher took over and made my display slightly more high brow before we left

We are now also the proud owners of the French equivalent of Opal/Oyster cards. It took quite a bit to navigate the French bureaucracy, find someone who spoke English and get some photos printed, but we did it, we have them and no need now for paper tickets. Vive Le France 🇫🇷!! Vive la révolution 🇫🇷 🧀🥐🍷!!!!

After a rest we went up to Montmartre for dinner in a great little restaurant. Of course the food was amazing

Travel

Fraternité Café

Our first full day and first coffees in Paris ! We got into Paris really late last night due to some cancellations and delays with the EuroStar. When we got into Paris we went straight to the hotel and got some sleep. Due to the way Eurostar costs work, a trip in on Saturday morning was way more expensive than getting in late on Friday night. As I’d already booked the apartment to start of Saturday, we just stayed in a hotel close to Gare du Nord station.

Gare do Nord is probably in the shittiest part of central Paris. It has two major train stations right next to each other, Gare du Nord and Gare du Est (North and East station). Something about major rail stations globally, they always seem to be in seedy locations. Not unlike staying right next to Central in Sydney. There are lots of cheap hotels and hostels here, but the one we had was really nice. We were right on the top floor, basically an attic conversion.

After checking out in the late morning we headed across the road to the nearest Boulangerie to get something for breakfast. It was probably the crappiest bakery in the crappiest are of Paris but the croissants were still excellent. I’ve had way worse coffees here in Paris, at least this one was hand made and not just a button push machinejobbie. I’ll give it a 6/10

My bother and sister in law were in Paris this week and we caught up with them before they had to get their train to Brussels for their flight home to Australia.

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Julie and Sharon had a look in Diptyque which is apparently a famous candle shop. I guess selling lumps of nice smelly wax you essentially set on fire for €65 each they would want to be pretty well known and very good. They did have a nice chair for bored husbands to sit on…

Shane and Julie showed us a Boulangerie they discovered which sell the best croissants in Paris, as judged this year. They are only one euro and they are spectacular.

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We had a wander through the Pantheon where you can see tombs of some of the French greats such as Voltaire, Rousseau, Victor Hugo, Émile Zola, Jean Moulin, Louis Braille and Marie Curie, Alexandre Dumas. Quite often not the entire body is kept here. There are urns with hearts and other body parts buried elsewhere. A little odd

 

We had lunch at a little cafe opposite the Luxembourg gardens. I had one of the most delicious club sandwiches I’d ever had. Emma had a gigantic salad and Sharon had a croque monsieur. Shane and Julie shared a sandwich.

 

By this time I had to leave to get the keys to the apartment. It’s not the original one we booked, before we arrived a previous guest had an accident, caused a fire and the apartment was gutted. Maybe they bought one of those €65 candles……

This one was found at short notice. It’s Ok but small. At least it has a lift. Our accomodation last time in Paris was just amazing, unfortunately we will always compare to paris stays to that one.

 

After checking in, I headed back to the hotel we had overnight to pick up our luggage. Even though we decided to travel light the bags seem to have multiplied during the stay in London and navigating the metro with them (plus some of today’s shoe and bag shopping) was going to be difficult so an Uber Van was organised.

Headed out late for dinner, which is where I’m typing up most of this waiting for our meal at a Brasserie on Rue De Rome in the 8th only a few min walk down from our apartment. It’s 9.30pm at night but it’s as light at it in at 6pm in summer at home.

 

Some more pics from today

 

Travel

Ducking in for a Coffee

We all had a bit of a sleep in this morning, we have all changed time zones, Sharon and Emma dramatically and were of course very tired. We did like Elvis and exited the building around 10am and started looking for breakfast. Being central London there isn’t much open around this place on weekends so we headed up towards Liverpool St station to see what we could find.

On the way up we walked past my favourite building in London (The Gherkin) and now that I’m in London, the Obligatory Daily Gherkin returns:-

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I know there is a great restaurant that does breakfast called the Duck and Waffle on the way to Liverpool St Station, but wasn’t sure it was open today and I knew I didn’t comply with their dress code (shorts and trainers) but what the hell, might as well give it a go. Sure enough at the entrance the guy looked me up and down and reminded me of the dress code but said they would make an exception for me today. Of course inside almost every other guy is in shorts and trainers…. Well hey, At the end of the day £50 is £50….. Their entire market today was tourists, everyone taking photos of the spectacular view, selfies etc.

The food here is phenomenal and considering the view you get it’s actually great value. It would have cost us way more to go to the viewing area of the Shard and here we got food in the price. Also it’s a lot closer to the other buildings than the Shard. Coffee is a healthy 7.5/10 and my coffee was free as I ordered a second one, they forgot about it until I reminded them so gave me my coffees for free. 

Here we are and the restaurant is so high it looks down on the Gherkin.

And lets not forget the coffee and food ! Emma had some Waffles, I had Yoghurt with berries and a side order of toast. Sharon had some amazing duck eggs with truffles and mushrooms and a side of crispy bacon.

Kansas is now a zillion miles away Toto….

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Whilst there I decided to take a selfie with the the Gherkin in the background. Emma has christened any selfies with the Gherkin in the background as a “Gherkie”. After breakfast we continued up to Liverpool street for the next adventure of the day,

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