Day 2 Paris

Saturday I wake up early and am ready to get out and see the city in all of it's glory. We had no pastries so we made due with some of the cake that we didn't eat the night before, this with a cup of hot tea and the view was a nice way to get the day started.  We grab a bus and head to Saint Chappel and the Citi Isle.

The early morning view

 Saint Chappel

 Notre Dame and it's anniversary viewing platform.

 Wow what a line to get in.

 I loved Reims N.D. much better probably because it wasn't as crowded and you could enjoy the beauty of it. We were surprised to see several windows in the alcoves open allowing sun to hit some of the paintings. Then there was the thick dust on most of the wood moldings sure that doesn't help with aging.

 We paid to go into the treasury wing and it was the best part of Notre Dame in our opinion.

Some of the bling in the treasury wing.

 

 Cathedral interior

 Lunch at Esmeralda behind Notre Dame was a pleasant way to spend a warm sunny afternoon. It was fun to watch the waiters move the tables exactly where they wanted them and then people would come along and move them an inch, then the waiters would really give us all a show by chastising them and moving the table back to the exact spot. I had a goat cheese and salmon crepe that was pretty good. We enjoyed it here so much we ended up with a 3 Heineken lunch while we enjoyed the free music being played on the bridge going to Isle St. Louis to serenade us, it was lovely.

                                  

We then walked around the back of N.D. and it's gardens.

The Love Locks...to anybody considering defacing this bridge I only have one thing to say...Really....Why

Some of the popular gargoyles.

As we were walking around we came across St. Micheal Fountain. Finished up by doing a little souvenir shopping then back to the apartment to get ready for dinner at Spring restaurant.

In front of our apartment is the taxi que for Gare Montparnasse so we jumped in a taxi to head out for dinner at Spring restaurant. This was the craziest driver we had the entire trip. I thought it was a fun trip though Mark thought differently. Spring sits on a one way road and the driver came in the opposite direction and dropped us off to walk the few feet to the door. Poor Mark thought that we were just being dumped off in an ally and almost didn't get out of the taxi. until I guaranteed him that this was the correct place and I had seen it on google street view. It was funny.

I made reservations online for Spring prior to leaving the US and am so glad I did. They offer a 7 course meal for 79eu each and it would be our high end meal of the trip. The meal is a set menu and you have no choice it is what the chef sends out to you. They ask upon making your reservations and then prior to your meal if there are any allergies or things in particular that you don't care for. We both said no and were up for anything.

I wished they had offered a wine pairing with the meal but they didn't so we opted for a great wine from Beaune to go with our meal. Look for a detailed write up of this meal on our 2 fat foodies blog in the future. The food was exceptional and I highly recommend Spring.

 Funny that I have no food allergies that I am aware of but I ended up breaking out in a few hives a couple of courses into the meal. Oh well that didn't stop me from enjoying our meal.

We had a 500eu note and they excepted it without complaint for payment, I was worried that we were never going to get rid of that 500, from what I've read about the French not wanting to give change, but no worries. We had them call us a taxi for an uneventful trip back to the apartment with a great night time view of the Louvre Pyramid. I would have loved to take a scenic night time taxi ride around the sights but I wanted to get back to the apartment to take some Benadryl to stop the itching.