Completed 11/24 - BURN IT ALL (well not the Disneyland part) - a June 2024 TR for Paris and Disneyland Paris

[Araminta18]

OMG-that chandelier is stunning!

It's so pretty! And that's not even a good photo of it. The Disneyland Hotel lobby is such a nice place...more pics to come!

 

[Araminta18]

First Palace of the Trip - Wed June 5, 2024 (part 1)​

I really thought that with the jet lag we'd sleep super well, but for whatever reason, we didn't. We did leave the windows open - it was warm during the day but got nicely cool at night. Paris summer weather is weird y'all!

We got up and got ready for the day, and then headed down to breakfast at the hotel. It was a nice spread - fruit and breads and cheeses and pastries, and oatmeals and an egg station!

I got an omelet, and of course had to start with a croissant. It was really good! No better way to start the day than with French pastries.

After breakfast, Trevor headed off to work and I hopped on to the Metro and headed to the Luxembourg Gardens. Honestly, you're gonna hear me say it again and again but the Paris public transit was fantastic - lots of trains, going wherever you want to go. Use the CityMapper app - it's super useful for navigation.

The day looked a bit cloudy but it was actually really nice - the clouds were moving quickly with the nice breeze. I didn't know a lot about the Luxembourg Gardens, so really was just planning to kind of wander around, and enjoy not being at work and just relax. It was really pretty, and super green. And lots of statues, all of women! That was kind of cool -


All the statues honor famous women and queens.

And then I made it to the palace with the pond behind it:


They have little boats you can rent and sail on the pond, which was super fun to watch.

Beyond the pond were more of the gardens with statues and greens and such. And a bunch of nice chairs just out for anyone to use, so I sat down and just enjoyed being there for a while. It was really nice - quiet but not too quiet, and so fun to watch the kids play with the boats in the pond.

After a while, I got up and kept exploring around. I found the Medici Fountain/grotto:

But it wasn't running so a bit less impressive.

The big palace in the gardens is the home of the French Senate, so I didn't go in there, but I did wander around the front a bit, and look in several little bookshops nearby. I didn't end up buying anything, but I did enjoy just wandering and looking around. I found more of the 8-bit art!

I saw a bunch of these when I was in Paris and 2022 and Trevor really liked looking for them, so I took some pictures for him.

I also saw an ad on a bus for Les Miserables and got so excited because how cool would it be to see Les Miserables in Paris?!

But it wasn't coming until Nov/Dec. Womp womp.

 

[Araminta18]

So Many Treats - Wed June 5, 2024 (part 2)​

I went back into the gardens and found the replica of the original model of the Statue of Liberty:

A bit smaller than I remember? Just kidding!

Then I was hungry. Time for food! There was a place I wanted to try that had chocolate mousse: Chocolat Chapon

I've never eaten it like ice cream, but it was delicious. I also went to the Poilane bakery and got some breads and pastries and things to take back to Trevor, and at another little shop (Maison Thevenin) got myself a quiche and a pastry and a sandwich. After all my food shopping, I headed back to the hotel to take a nap. When I got to the metro station by the hotel (the Opera station), look what I saw!

Fun, location appropriate decorations.

Anyways, back in the room - my lunch/snacks!

Onion quiche!

raspberry tarte on pound cake as the base. pound cake is a better choice for the base than the traditional shortbread - delish.

I also got a chicken sandwich but apparently forgot to take a picture. All of it was really good - I have such fear of not going to the best bakery or whathaveyou but really all of it is good.

After lunch and taking a nap, I wanted to head up to the Sacre Coeur area - Trevor and I had done a pastry and chocolate tour back in 2022 and I wanted to get some of the treats we'd gotten then, so off I went! I made a mistake though - at the metro station there I decided to take the stairs up to the surface instead of the elevator and GUYS. There were 187 steps. Not gonna lie I was absolutely huffing and puffing at the top.

So what did I do? Immediately went to a pastry shop and bought treats.

Les Choupettes de ChouChou - they're filled with cream and SO good. I bought like 8.

Then I went to the ice cream shop where we had olive oil flavored ice cream, which was AMAZING, hoping to get that again - Une Glace a Paris. They didn't have that flavor, so I got:

smoked chocolate, and rhubarb. It very much tasted of the smoke, which wasn't my favorite, but otherwise it was delicious - I like interesting flavors of ice cream apparently.

They have chairs outside the front of the shop, so I sat down and enjoyed the atmosphere and my ice cream. I saw this fun little statue and when I went to look closer -

It's a water fountain! The water falls down from the center and you stick your water bottle under. The French are so extra.

Ok, a couple more pastry shops - Pain Pain, for a couple of the best eclairs I've ever had in my life:

They're so rich and buttery...delicious. As I was in the line to checkout though, I saw that they had chou pastries (unfilled) so of course I got several of those.

So light and airy and buttery and covered in sugar...yummy.

 

[Araminta18]

Bouillon Pigalle - Wed June 5, 2024 (part 3)​

I'd also stopped at one last place - Au levain d'antan - and got more baguettes and chou pastries.


I realize this is probably too many pastry pictures, but....two more.

These are the chou pastries from the first shop, filled with cream. I got plain ones, chocolate ones, and raspberry ones -

Raspberry glitter on the pastry! Crazy.

Anyways. yes. Lots of pastries - if you go to Paris, eat all the things. As I started to head back to the metro to go back to the hotel, I ran into a bunch of street buskers, including a flautist. Kind of fun to watch, though definitely a super touristy area.

Back at the hotel I took a bunch of pictures of the treats (obviously ) and then Trevor got back from work, and it was time to head out to dinner! We were going to Bouillon Pigalle - I'd seen it recommended as good French food without being super pricy, and so figured hey, let's try it.

We walked up to it - it was a little less than a mile and we had the time, so might as well wander around and let Trevor get to see the city a bit, since he'd been cooped up at work all day. Paris streets are pretty, so it was a nice walk - and Trevor liked spotting the 8 bit art.

Bouillon Pigalle is a known tourist spot (maybe trap...not sure ), so there was definitely a line. But we had a reservation, so we got seated right away. The tables were suuuuuuper close together, but that was kind of part of the fun?

Anyways, I ordered the French onion soup:

This was yummy - very cheesy and I like cheese, so it worked.

Trevor got the fresh fish rillettes with Espelette peppers - it basically looked like tuna fish salad, though probably not tuna. And the peppers gave it a nice little tang.

I didn't like it, but Trevor did.

Then for mains, I got the Leek, goat's cheese, and bacon pie:


For some reason I assumed this would be like a quiche, but it was not. I didn't really taste the leeks, and I couldn't taste the bacon at all (unless their version of bacon is different from ours ), but the goat cheese was good with it. I wouldn't order this again, but it was interesting to try.

Trevor got the steak with fries and pepper sauce:

This was good, especially the fries. The steak had been butterflied or something so that it was really thing, so it ended up being a bit tough. But the flavor was delicious.

We ended up passing on desserts, cause well you saw my pastry haul. We did order a lemonade to drink but that turned out to be sprite so...oops.

We were very full, so we decided to walk back to the hotel, and to do so by way of one of Paris's most famous landmarks:

The Moulin Rouge! A bit sad with it being under construction so the windmill was down, but still cool to see.

We had a nice leisurely walk back to the hotel, stopping in at one convenience shop for Trevor to see if they had any fun sodas for him. Trevor likes fun soda flavors and they did have a couple, so he grabbed a few. We made it back to the hotel by 11:15ish, and had some of the pastries before going to bed, very full.

Fun with metrics:
Steps walked: 28,581 steps (12.4 miles)
(the metrics section is gonna be a bit boring til we go to Disney )

 

[alohamom]

I realize this is probably too many pastry pictures,

NEVER TOO MANY, YUM!

 

[Araminta18]

NEVER TOO MANY, YUM!

ok good...there will be more

 

[dizneedoll]

Yeah, there’s no such thing as too many pastry pics! They all looked so yummy!

 

[Araminta18]

Yeah, there’s no such thing as too many pastry pics! They all looked so yummy!

I 100% agree! it just seemed like a lot when I was putting them together. Glad to hear I'm in good company with folks who like all the pastry pictures!

 

[Araminta18]

Tiffany Wanders - Thursday, June 6, 2024 (part 1)​

This morning was exciting - we got woken up at like 4 am by our room phone, cause work needed to get a hold of Trevor and his cell was on silent. So he had to get up and go take care of that, while I went back to sleep. Benefits of it being my vacation but work for him!

We had slept again with the windows open so as soon as it got light, we were woken up again, so I I figured I may as well get up and go get breakfast. Trevor had to get up and get ready for his actual shift.

Yummy omelet! There were pastries of course too but apparently I just took a picture of the omelet.

Guys seriously, I could get used to having a lovely full breakfast just waiting for me every morning, with no prep or clean up needed...Amazing.

I didn't really have a whole lot planned for today - I wanted to wander over and see the Centre Pompidou, though I wasn't sure if I wanted to go inside (modern art isn't my favorite), and figured I'd start there and see how the day went. But when I was back up at the room after breakfast to get ready for the day, I ended up taking a nap. Oops! I slept until about 10:45. It was really nice, actually! Normally I'd have every day planned out but after having done Paris by myself in 2022 and seeing the Louvre and Musee D'Orsay and all the things, I was keeping it a bit more "go with the flow".

After re-getting up, I headed out for the Centre Pompidou, using the metro, of course. I ended up walking a little ways and ran into this little fountain area - that's the museum directly in front with the red crane thing in front of it.


Lots of cool art and murals, and the fountains looked familiar too -

Anyone ever seen the remake of the movie "Sabrina", from the mid 90s? With Harrison Ford and Julia Ormond? In that movie, Sabrina goes to Paris and does an internship at Vogue, and there's a scene where they do a photoshoot at this fountain! I love that movie, so it was pretty neat to find the actual fountain. Had to take a selfie.

I kept going to look at the museum, but they were doing epic construction in front:

This pic was taken from behind a fence - I couldn't get closer. I thought about going in but again, modern art isn't generally my thing and I just really wasn't feeling it. So I pulled up the map to see what was nearby, and kept walking!

I ran into Chatelet Les Halles, which apparently used to be something but is now just a big mall? They had a lego store that I kind of ran in to, so that was neat. They had an awesome model of Notre Dame:


It was huge! I don't know how to give scale but honestly, it was much bigger than you're thinking.

I kept going and the mall turned into a park, but it was a bit rundown and kind of sketchy, so I kept moving. There was a museum of something at the end of the park, but I wasn't feeling going in. There was this cool piece outside:

I didn't see a plaque or explanation in English, but I thought the rocks growing in the tree were cool.

I kept going and realized I was near another park/palace thing - Palais Royal. It was built for Cardinal Richelieu and was also the home of the Comedie Francaise, and it was free, so I was like "sure!" I walked in kind of through a side door, and into this courtyard area.

Apparently the silver balls in the fountain there were an art installation (more to come ). To my right were the gardens:

Well, sort of gardens - lots of trees! I started exploring a bit.

 

[Araminta18]

Palaces and a Crepe - Thursday, June 6, 2024 (part 2)​

The way it was set up seemed to be buildings all around the outside, and then sand with grassy areas and tree promenades.

And then, I ran into a big fountain area.

More of those chairs (like they had at Luxembourg Gardens) for people to just sit and chill, though you could sit on the fountain itself. It was about 12:30, so I ended up grabbing a chair, dragging it into the shade, and just chilling.

It was one of those days where it was hot in the sun but cold in the shade, so I did a halfsies thing where my legs were in the sun and warm but my upper body was in the shade. And honestly, I just chilled there for a good 90 minutes, reading my book. It was awesome.

After I finished my book, it was about 2:15, and I was getting kind of hungry. So I kept exploring the garden, and ran into these black and white striped columns:

Some of the columns were super tall! Apparently this is a famous instagram thing, but I just stumbled into it - it was fun to look around.

And then I ran into the Comedie Francaise!

Mostly I was excited to see this 'cause The Scarlet Pimpernel is one of my favorite books/movies, and the female lead is an actress in the Comedie Francaise. Yes I'm a nerd. I also looked around their gift shop but didn't end up buying anything.

Coming outside of the Palace/Garden area, I was on a main street right next to the Louvre palace, actually. SO MANY palaces - I'm not saying I would have guillotined the royals and nobility but I kind of understand it.

There was a super cool art piece right by the metro stop.

No idea what it was but I like it.

I honestly just started walking towards the main entrance of the Louvre, looking for a place to eat that looked good. I ended up at a crepe place called Buckwheat. Honestly, I picked it cause I was hungry and it didn't look like there would be a wait, and the google reviews were decent. I got seated right away, and ordered the Prince de Paris crepe: egg, ham, comte cheese, and butter.

It doesn't look like much but it was yummy and hit the spot.

Once I was done, I figured since I was near the Louvre, I may as well go into the Tuileries Gardens and walk around. I walked around a little bit back in 2022, so figured I'd look a bit more now, and see how much I could see/do before I ran into Olympic barricades.

It's another really pretty garden area. I do appreciate all the green spaces and the fountains.

At one point you could see the Place de la Concorde and the Arc de Triomphe there in the distance

I mostly just was strolling through (it's really big) and made my way down to the end near Place de la Concorde, where it was all pretty well barricaded off as they were doing Olympics prep. But the Musée de l'Orangerie was also right there, and this was the one museum I did want to go in - I missed it last time, and I do really like the impressionists, so in I went. The highlight here is the couple of pieces by Money, created especially for this building in this space. Course I realized right after I paid to go in that the 3d exhibit thing they were doing they only run on Fridays and so I was gonna miss it. I decided I didn't care, and kept going in.

That's your preview of the lilies.

 

[Araminta18]

Finally a Museum! - Thursday, June 6, 2024 (part 3)​

Ok, more water lilies!



It wasn't suuuuuper crowded, but more crowded than I expected (or wanted? I maybe just don't like people ). I did enjoy looking at the pieces though, especially in the museum designed just for them.

They had another exhibit about an artist who really only did white - Robert Ryman. I didn't get it at all, but at the end they had a couple additional famous Monet pieces, so that was neat:



I ended my visit by stopping at the gift shop, and ended up buying these cool earrings (well, I think they're cool) that look like water lilies!

It's a bit hard to see, but they have the lily and the lily pads!

From here, I stopped at a chocolate shop nearby - Edwart - and got some chocolates for folks back home and some fancy hot chocolate:

Yum.

I headed back to the hotel to drop off the stuff I'd bought and to relax for a bit. Honestly, I don't remember much, about what I did before Trevor got off work...Oops! But he eventually did get off work and met me at the hotel and we headed down to the Eiffel Tower! We'd booked a night river cruise on the Seine. We got caught in traffic and such and so we ended up missing the 9:30 pm cruise that we'd booked, but thankfully they were not picky and just let us on at 10:30 pm. And we were like the first people there for the 10:30 pm, which was nice cause we got a good seat. And yes, cause it's me, I absolutely was freaking out about being late but it really didn't matter.

We were right at the front of the boat.

Actually, there was one downside - because it was summer, it didn't get dark until late (aka, after 10 pm) and so the Eiffel Tower only sparkles at like 11 and maaaaaaaybe midnight? And because we were on the cruise at 10:30, we'd be down by Notre Dame for the 11 pm Eiffel Tower sparkle. So we missed the sparkle tonight, but we had more chances.

The cruise itself was neat - we were dumb and forgot our jackets 'cause it had been so warm during the day so we were really cold, but it was neat to see it all as it was getting dark.

Alexander the 3rd bridge - the fanciest Parisian bridge!


The Musee D'Orsay!

 

[Araminta18]

Nighttime River Cruise on the Seine - Thursday, June 6, 2024 (part 4)​

View of the Louvre from the Seine:

I love all the bridges in Paris - it's so pretty.

I don't remember what building this is, but it's pretty. Also, the sky is still blue and this picture is time-stamped 10:49 pm so...yea it stays light REALLY late in summer.


Notre Dame! Trevor's first glimpse of Notre Dame! He didn't get a chance to see it back in 2022, so it was one of the main things on his list this time.

The cruise goes from the Eiffel Tower up to Notre Dame and a little bit beyond, and then comes back down the Seine to the Eiffel Tower, taking about an hour. Word to the wise - it gets cold at night! But we really enjoyed it and seeing all the sights, even if we did miss the sparkle at the Eiffel Tower.

Eiffel Tower selfie!


After the cruise, and getting Trevor his first glimpse of Notre Dame , we hopped on the metro and made it back to the hotel. Honestly it was sooooo nice to be staying at a hotel right downtown and so close to a metro station.

Fun with metrics:
Steps walked: 16607 steps (7.4 miles)
(the metrics section is gonna be a bit boring til we go to Disney )

 

[RedK]

Love the pictures - including of pastries. You can never have too many pastries, too many museums, or too many bridges over the Seine!

 

[dizneedoll]

Uh yeah. I reported that. Lol

 

[Araminta18]

Yea me too…and it’s still here

 

[dizneedoll]

Yea me too…and it’s still here

Looks like it's gone now!

 

[Skywatcher1206]

Loving your report! We went to Paris and DLP this year as well (at the end of June) and loved it! We stayed at the Sequoia Lodge for our DLP leg.

 

[VAtink]

I'm not sure how I missed you started a new TR, but I'm here now! Loving it so far, can't wait to read more!

 

[Mom2apirate&princess]

So happy to have found this report. We are doing Paris and DLP next June. Haven’t been there since 2010. Love the TR so far!

 

[Araminta18]

Love the pictures - including of pastries. You can never have too many pastries, too many museums, or too many bridges over the Seine!

Thank you! I 100% agree...as you'll see

Uh yeah. I reported that. Lol

Thank you!!! Not great at all - and this week has been INSANE for me with family stuff so I haven't been able to respond/stay on top of stuff like that

Loving your report! We went to Paris and DLP this year as well (at the end of June) and loved it! We stayed at the Sequoia Lodge for our DLP leg.

Thank you for reading and the nice compliment! Oooh, we've never stayed at Sequoia Lodge - how was it?

I'm not sure how I missed you started a new TR, but I'm here now! Loving it so far, can't wait to read more!

Welcome! I have too many TRs... But glad you're enjoying it!

So happy to have found this report. We are doing Paris and DLP next June. Haven’t been there since 2010. Love the TR so far!

Welcome! I hope you have a great time - DLP and Paris is super fun.