Paris Christmas!

Well, we did finally arrive in Paris, albeit 9 hours later than anticipated! Our Easyjet morning flight was cancelled due to the unbelievable snowstorms across Northern Europe. Thousands of people were left stranded at airports in some cases for days, in fact there are still people at Charles de Gaulle airport who didn't make it home for Christmas day! So we feel very lucky to have got here at all...and when we arrived it was snowing, about 0 degrees but absolutely beautiful.

So I got my wish for a white Christmas!

Our flat in the Latin Quarter is small and 'bohemian', it needed a darn good clean, but what an amazing location, right in the heart of the restaurant district, every kind of culinary delight you can think of from traditional French cuisine to sushi! The streets are narrow and cobbled, many little specialty shops and a wonderful boulangerie-patisserie where we buy our morning croissants. 

From our front door.

One way to entice customers in!

From the fourth floor window of our flat we can watch the almost constant flow of people, some stopping to peruse the restaurant menu boards, others just enjoying the Latin Quarter experience.

                                                                                       We woke on Christmas Eve day to more snow, so rugged up (long johns, leg warmers, scarves, hats, gloves, warm socks....) and set off to explore. First stop was Notre Dame, only two minutes from our front door, an iconic French landmark and very beautiful. The money that must have been spent to build it makes the eyes water!

There was a midnight Noel carol service advertised so we decided to come back and join the festivities.

 There were hundreds of people at the midnight service. The acoustics inside were amazing, the 'carols' sounded more like Gregorian chants but were very beautiful. The gendarmes were out in force, some carrying automatic rifles, all bags were checked before entering. The French have become very security conscious recently after a number of terrorist threats. Still, although a little imposing to be 'bonsoired' by a gun toting policeman, better to be safe than sorry!

Our next adventure was the metro and the purchase of a 10 ticket (billet) deal for 12 euro. I had my rather bad version of "Can we please have 10 tickets for the metro" in French at the ready, but, as has happened often since we have been here,before I open my mouth to practice my french, the 'helpful' person behind the counter speaks to me in English! Oh well, we usually get a "merci" in at the end anyway! The metro is very efficient, trains running every couple of minutes so within 10 minutes we were looking up at the Eiffel Tower through the snow, and what an imposing sight! We thought we'd take advantage of the small number of visitors and head up the Tower, but before we could find the ticket office the signs were out stating that it was closed due to snow. Christmas Day was forecast to be fine so we decided that it was worth a shot, and it was. The day was fine and clear with a wind chill factor of -5 to -7!!! The snow was still a factor so we were only able to go up to the first floor, but the views were amazing. There was a small skating ring, restaurants, a shop selling 'ice cream' (not sure why??) and the usual souvenir store.

Peggy's 'arty' photography?!

View looking up the centre of the Tower

Smile...it's Christmas Day and you're on the Eiffel Tower!

View from the first floor.

It's now 1.30 in the morning and looking out the window of the flat there are still some restaurants open and a few people on the street. I guess it's true that 'the city never sleeps'. Tomorrow it's the Musee D'Orsay and a Monet exhibition (amongst a great many other things) and perhaps a dinner and Moulin Rouge show, it's tough but someone has to do it!