21. Paris - Our neighbourhood

Well, Spring lasted all of seventeen and a half hours and then the rain set in again. But we ventured out between showers to check out a couple of restaurants for future reference.   Pirouette looked good and it's only about 200m away.

Paul has been reading and enjoying Paris by Mouth.  Other foodies might enjoy it, too. 

We made it to the far supermarket, the big one, but when we emerged it was teeming down.  Mr Obstinate is insisting on the thongs despite the trail of water, mud and heaven knows what else they flick half way up his back.  Rather like a BMX without a mudguard, as Adam put it.  

The rain turns the cobble and granite paved footpaths and pedestrian streets to glass for flip-flops and he almost went head over heals a couple of times.  I don't know whether I was more concerned about loosing the two bottles of wine and the fabulous fish soup he was carrying, or not knowing how to call an ambulance if he broke bone rather than glass.

After a fraught walk we finally arrived home resembling drowned rats. Luckily, the baguette remained dry.

Today we walked to the Hotel de Ville (the town hall) to check out their upcoming exhibitions.  They had a nice little show promoting Velib the city's large scale public sharing bicycle program that Paul loves to use when he does the shopping by himself.  I'm hopeless on a bike - no balance or agility left.

After that we walked along the river.  It is muddy and flowing very fast and very high after all the rain.  There were almost white caps as we looked across the Pont au Change towards the Palais de Justice and the Conciegerie.

The Palais de Justice is one of the most evocative buildings in Paris, I think.  The first time I really noticed it was in 2006 - it was being cleaned and the left hand section was completely enveloped in a white shroud with a huge picture of the (then) new iPad on it.  Stunning advertising!

We potted around the flower market on the Ile de la Cité for a while, but flowers are not the same without sunshine.

Along the road behind Notre Dame we took the pedestrian bridge from the Ile de la Cite, the very heart of ancient Paris to the smaller, more residential Ile Saint Loius. This bridge too has been defaced with hundreds of thousands of padlocks.  

The lower path, down by the water, is flooded.

We stayed on the Ile Saint Louis in 2006, right on the water at No. 43 Quai de Bourbon.

This was our apartment building, we were on the second floor.

This was the view.  We took picnic dinners and wine down onto the lower quai, gazing at the  Hotel de Ville on the far bank behind the trees and watching all of the tourist boats and barges that ply the river.

Ile Saint Louis is quaint and interesting with great stories to share, but it is not as well linked to trains and buses as you need it to be if you are going to get around Paris easily. And for some reason, very few of the buildings on the island have lifts.  Not all but most of the apartments that are let short-term to tourists in Paris are third floor and above. I defy most women to lift and manoeuvre a suitcase up a narrow, circular wooden stairway to the third floor or higher. A lift is a necessity in my book.

And just before it rained again, the sun came out long enough to tempt a few out for a drink.  Not us though - I wanted to get home dry and without broken bones.