Parisian Plans

With a momentous trip like this, of course we had to make our days chock-full of Parisian goodies! With only really 5 days to see the city, each day was bound to be busy. Just in case anyone is curious or checking, here's our itinerary for our trip! 


Day 1 – Sunday, Sept. 11^th
- Arrive in Paris - Settle into apartment
- Eat dinner ~6-7 PM- Sunset at 8:15!!

- Explore neighborhood
- Eiffel Tower at nighttime – sparkling lights for 5 min every hour on the hour

Day 2 – Monday, Sept. 12^th
- Eiffel Tower (daily 9:30-11:45 PM)
- Lunch
- Bateaux Parisian River Cruise           
- Louvre (pictures) à Jardin des Tuileries à
            Laduree  à Arc de Triomphe (daily 10 AM – 11 PM)
- Dinner

Day 3 – Tuesday, Sept. 13^th
- Hotel de Ville
- Sainte Chapelle (daily 9:30 AM – 6 PM)
- Towers of Notre Dame (daily 10 AM – 6:30 PM)
- Lunch
- Musee d’Orsay (Tues- Sun 9:30 – 5:30 PM)
- Musee de l’Orangerie
- Grand Palais

- Dinner

Day 4 – Wednesday, Sept. 14^th
- Opera Garnier Tour @11:30
- Lunch
- Musee Grevin (M-F 10 AM - 6:30 PM)
- O Chateau Wine Tasting @3 PM
- Musee de Louvre (Daily 9 AM – 6 PM except Tuesdays)
- Basilique Sacre Couer and Place du Tertre
- Dinner

Day 5 – Thursday, Sept. 15^th
Versailles (daily 9 AM – 6:30 PM except Mondays)

Day 6 – Friday, Sept. 16^th
- Galeries Lafayette, Au Printemp, etc
- Pantheon (daily 10 AM – 6:30 PM)
- Jardin du Luxembourg
- Montparnasse Tower (daily 9:30 AM - 11:30 PM)
- lovely last dinner! And lovely last club night?

Day 7 – Saturday, Sept. 17^th
- Au Revoir, Paris!

Paris Countdown - T- 6 days!

After much anticipation, we are in the final week! Excited is such a bland word... the fires of my anticipation are BLAZING! I'm excited to see the Eiffel Tower and walk along the Seine, take in all the gorgeous architecture and (maybe) hot French people (guys and girls, I won't discriminate!). However, I'm most excited for the food... but the fact that I don't know any French makes it a little difficult. I'd rather know if I'm ordering calf brain or a steak. So... time to bone up on French foodie vocabulary!

Bone up just sounds so wrong.

another big fan of french cooking, remy from ratatouille! love this movie.

Some good links!

- http://french.about.com/od/vocabulary/a/menu.htm - this teaches you how to read a French menu and recognize some common French dishes (and some not so common ones). I already know I'll be asking for le menu, sil vous plait! And une carafe d'eau.

- http://french.about.com/od/vocabulary/a/food.htm - I like this because it really familiarizes you with all the types of fruit, meat, nuts whatever you might see on a menu. Also, the links have sound! So you know you're saying it sorta, almost, totally not like a native.

- http://www.davidlebovitz.com/paris/ - this is a blog written by a pastry chef from the US, who now lives in Paris. Who better than a chef to know about food in Paris?! I'm pretty sure a lot of the restaurants mentioned may be out of our price range but I loved reading about them and also spent a lot of time clicking around the links at the bottom, which are on a variety of useful topics in regards to Paris, food and otherwise. Dining Tips in Paris was a very practical guide of how to deal with dining in Paris, which I have to admit does have me a bit intimidated.

In addition to normal food, I'm really anticipating the French patisseries! Hopefully I'll come back with a favorite one. French pastries and chocolates, can't really go wrong there!