We caught the Eurostar train to Paris this morning. It was a fairly easy experience – easier than I had imagined. And the train is a very smooth and scenic ride through the English countryside and into France. The food on the train was very “French” AND they were serving wine and champagne before noon!
We arrived in Paris around 1:30pm, gathered our luggage, found our driver and made our way to the Hotel Luxembourg Parc. This is a quaint 4-star hotel in the Left Bank overlooking the spectacular Luxembourg Gardens. This will be our home in Paris for the next few days.
Once settled in, we decided to explore the area around our hotel. We are in the Saint Germaine des Pres area of Paris – lots of shops, museums, parks, and cafes within walking distance. Just across the street is one of the most famous parks in all of Paris – Jardin du Luxembourg and the Palais de Luxembourg. We decided to start our adventure there – and it was definitely the right decision.
The park is large and hundreds (if not thousands) of Parisians were enjoying their afternoon here. It is filled with foot paths, statuary, fountains, and more. Men were sitting around playing chess; children were riding ponies; college students were reading books by the fountains. It was amazing to see so many people relaxing and taking advantage of the beauty of this place.
As we left Luxembourg Gardens, we walked onto Boulevard St-Michel – one of the main boulevards through Paris. Everywhere you look there are shops and cafes, statues and monuments. We took our time strolling the street and then noticed the sign for the Pantheon. As the tour books says, “The Pantheon resonates with importance, perhaps due to the ghostly rumblings of the dozens of famous bodies that can be found in its crypt.” It took 32 years to build, ordered by Louis XV as a monument of gratitude to Paris’ patron saint (St. Genevieve) for seeing him through a serious injury.
As we looked down the street, we caught a very unexpected view of the Eiffel Tower! That’s a trip for tomorrow but the Paris skyline is beautiful.
Just behind the Pantheon is another spectacular structure – St. Etienne-du-Mont. We took a few minutes to walk through the church remembering that it is also a living church where daily prayer and worship take place.
We were starving so we decided to find some food and head back to the hotel. Unfortunately, hardly anyone here speaks English and 99% of the restaurant menus are in French. It’s kind of a guessing game as to what you might order and what you might get. We chose to play it safe and found a bakery of sorts where we could actually POINT at the food we wanted to eat – good choice!