We Love Paris!

Today we finally unfortunately had rain but fortunately we planned the morning for the Louvre. Our continental breakfast at the hotel turned out to be a full breakfast with out of this world croissants. After an overwhelming 2 hours in the Louvre, we came out to fairly heavy rain and it was impossible to get a cab to Notre Dame so we decided to take a break to visit Angelina’s Tea Salon on the Rue de Rivoli near the Louvre and it was an excellent detour. We had African Hot Chocolate which was possibly the most delicious thing I have ever tasted and unbelievable pastries. It was the recommendation of Kathy and John’s daughter-in-law Meredith and it was fabulous. Cabs are impossible to find in Paris and we ended up walking to Notre Dame (which we needed after our hot chocolate). We thought it would be a short walk across the Seine down Boulevard St. Germain down to Fragonard Boutique, a wonderful perfume store. It turned out to be about 2 miles which would not have been too bad except for Kathy’s ankle. We finally found the perfume store and it was another great recommendation from Meredith. John and Kathy thought they would get a cab back to the hotel from the store but ended up walking another two miles due to lack of cabs. I dragged Jim to Luxemborg Gardens because the videos from the French class that I am taking (“French in Action”) are filmed there. The rain stopped shortly after lunch and the gardens were beautiful. We decided to try the Metro back to the hotel and I was successful in using my French and we did not get lost and were actually able to change trains. Our cousins Anne Marie and Katie Hynes happened to be in Paris and we met them for dinner at another Rick Steves recommendation, L’Affriole, it was delicious! We did SO much walking today, we almost walked off the African Hot Chocolate. We can’t wait to try out some more of Meredith’s recommendations tomorrow! Unfortunately some more light rain is forecasted for tomorrow.
Wireless Internet connection is great at the hotel (note to my CEWD friends – was even able to connect with VPN and access I: drive from Paris!)