Sarah: How was your trip?

Wow! Thanks for askin'!

I had a lovely lovely time. The sky was gray most of the time, but it didn't rain too much - just drizzled - and it was actually warmer there all week than it was back home (in Richmond, VA).

We (bf& I) walked lots and lots (mostly in the Latin Quarter), ate lots of pastries, drank lots of espressos & chocolat chauds, met my sister's French boyfriend, hung out outside of cafes, went to a rock show at Nouveau Casino, went to Guinness Tavern (near our hotel) to see a funny cover band, rode the metro a lot & the bus a tiny bit, went to see a movie at REX theatre (Un Femme De Menage - wasn't that good but it was still fun seeing a french movie in the theatre without subtitles)...

Famous places visited include (and please excuse all the misspellings): the Louvre (but not for very long), Versailles, Arc De Triomphe, Champs Elysees, Tour Eiffel (did not go up, but watched as the lights got turned on at dusk), Centre Pompidou (my favorite - we spent almost an entire day in there), Sacre Coeur in Montmartre... took a boat ride around the Seine...

We stayed at Hotel Bellevue et Chariot D'or which I found on Eurocheapo.com (in the Marais region) and it was great for the price. Our room was on the small side, but the hotel itself was really neat - velvet wall coverings and dark hallways and an amazing lobby area... When in our hotel room, we always had Euro MTV on, but it was funny cuz it was all in German.

Eating was fun. Pastries were all very delicious. Being vegetarian, we ended up eating Lebanese, Italian, and Indian food, but everything we had was great. We also managed to make it to 2 strictly vegetarian restaurants (one near Rue de Rosiers - the name escapes me now, and the other was called Aquarius - I believe that one is a chain) and that was VERY exciting for me because for once I felt like I could order anything on the menu. Nice variety. The only meal we regretted was at a Mexican restaurant. It didn't taste like real Mexican food AT ALL. IT was kind of gross actually. But one not-so-great meal out of a week's worth isn't bad.

We took lots of pix. Actually, my bf took a lot more pix than I did, so most of our photos are of me in front of famous monuments. ha ha. But anyway, I saved our all ticket stubs for a scrap book.

What else? I didn't buy much when I was there. Just a gently worn skirt at one of those nice second hand shops, a silly pic of a cat wearing lingerie that I got by the Seine, a couple of postcards, and some dark chocolate.

So, again, thanks for asking.

I'm ready to take questions!

sarah! it sounds wonderful and i am glad you had a great time!
please tell me, how did it 'feel', i would love to go to paris but that is a dream for me right now, so i will have to be content to hear from you what it was like - was it busy / cruisey ( doubt it somehow ) / over-touristy ? what is the sky like? strong or pale? what is the 'air ' like, you know what i mean? not air quality but Air....