Weekend in Paris with family Roemmele

We spent a lovely weekend in Paris.

My friend Mary was over from the US for a couple of weeks with her family. So Doug and I went up to Paris for a couple of days to meet up with them. Mary and I have known each other since before we were born - our parents met in antenatal classes.

Weren't we cute :)

We all stayed at the Westin right in the center of town

Close to the Louvre

Lovely drink by the Seine in the sunshine

Sunset on the Siene

Notre Dame

Doug and I went out for Thai food. We have found an Indian not far from us now so we have our fix of Indian food (home made is nice but not the same...) but there is not a Thai, and it is a lot of effort to cook at home I find. It was YUMMY and I would thoroughly recommend the restaurant

We had a nice beer in an Irish pub too. Strange to chose that in Paris, but we have a lot of French beer so we fancied a change.

Singing in the rain!

The whole family

People have gone mad on the tradition of putting locks on things. I think they do it in Venice a lot too.

Taking a boat trip on the Siene

Mary and me with the Eiffel tower

We went to the Market Puce (flea market) up in the north. Really fun with a great variety of stuff.

This shop sold lots of copper

This is a Futuro house. I love them. Very rare though. 

A lion! It appeared to be real

Then Mary and the guys had to go back home and Doug and I stayed on a further day and a half to see and eat a bit more of Paris

First stop - Versailles.

We turned up and there was an ENORMOUS queue, perhaps 3 hours so I went and did some investigating and found a tour of some private rooms that we could join that would leave us in the Chateau to see the rest of it ourselves. 10 euros each. Bargain! 

The rooms we saw on the tour had been used by the family whereas the rooms open to the public now were also more public then - but only accessible to noble people (and servants) of course.

This is a famous and amazing clock. Bit ugly!

Apparently the queen bought lots of things from Versailles that was auctioned off some time ago. She has the rest of this set.

The Royal Opera House. It has recently been restored. They have performances there now and we hope to go one day. I can imagine it might not be very cheap...

View out on to the gardens. I remember the gardens a lot more than the palace from a visit with my parents when I was perhaps 7

After the tour we went through the public rooms. They were much more opulent (and crowded)

The hall of mirrors

We had dinner in a super posh restaurant because we wanted Pekin Crispy Duck. We were a bit suspicious of the sauce to go in the pancakes as it apparently had peanut butter in it. Delicious though!

Just before we left we popped in to the Orangery and saw lots of Monet and other impressionists.

Hopefully they won't sue for me posting this pic here.

Fun was had by all and we were tired but happy when we got the train home (we were meant to take the train up there too but strikes got in the way)