The rain, the Louvre, the Eiffel Tower and Escargot it must be Paris

For me this day started with another marriage proposal at breakfast.  Not from the wait staff this time but from someone who was also dining in our café.  I declined of course, since I didn’t even know his name!  But was starting to get the hint that if I did want to get married it looked like Paris was my city………….

 With only two and half days in Paris immediately following breakfast we headed to the Paris hop on, hop off sightseeing bus.  The weather was threatening and we were under prepared but optimistic.  Paris is a big city and since we are staying in the Montmartre district we started the bus tour on the yellow line which it seems has lots of history but not a lot of cool stuff to see.  However, after an hour or so we finally made our way to the green line where all of the action is located.  We first hopped off the bus at the Louvre.  Marta has never been to Paris before and she was completely awed by the outside of the Louvre. I can only imagine how amazed she would have been if we had had enough time to actually go into the museum. 

But with our precious little time we hopped back on the bus, passing on Notre Dame and headed on to the Eiffel Tower.  Unfortunately, this is where the rain caught up with us.  No umbrella’s, no rain gear and Marta in a very pretty new outfit she’d just purchased but freezing to death.

We hit the Eiffel Tower and is wasn’t raining at the moment but the winds were up and it was cold.  Once we saw the very long lines for tickets our decision was quickly made to admire it from the ground and try to find a restaurant or something to hide out in. The restaurants were scarce but we did find an outdoor café with an awning so we went for it.   

Nance and I settled down with our beers and Marta went shopping for anything she could find to help……..an umbrella, more clothes, a rain god to pray to.  And then it started, a major downpour……all the tourists in the café huddled in the center but that was of no help at all. We did however meet a great couple from Dallas and had a delightful chat with them as it poured.  Marta made it back proudly displaying her new Paris umbrella and her new Paris Sweatshirt.

When the rain finally subsided we said good-bye to our new friends and started for the bus but Marta wanted to walk along the Seine for a while so we did.   Unfortunately, you could only walk a short way along the river and we were tossed up to the city streets with little idea of how to get to our next bus stop.  Along the way we encountered yet another downpour. This time we ran with the crowd and hung out at the entrance to the d'Orsy Museum while it poured and poured and poured. Using our bus map, an occasional corner street map, a  tourist information stand and every stranger that would talk to us we did finally reach a spot where we could pick up the yellow line.

At this point we definitely needed a break so we found a sweat little café and ordered red wine, French onion soup and escargot.  It was late but we really wanted more escargot so we agreed to pass on the last bus and catch the Metro home instead.   We ordered more wine and more escargot!

Upon leaving the restaurant, once again Marta wanted to walk instead of taking the Metro.  This would have been a great idea if we had known the route to our hotel but we didn’t.  After walking one way and then another, again finding many helpful Parisians who pointed this way or that we finally hailed a taxi and called it a day!