Technically Monday is our anniversary, but the party began Sunday morning. An early start from Kingham to Oxford, then a train into London's Paddington Station and a London Taxi to St. Pancras International Station and then the Eurostar through the Chunnel to Paris. A Paris Taxi to the beautiful Marriott Champs Elysees. Here's the lobby...
Here's the glass roof above the lobby. Our room has 16' high ceilings and is actually on two levels; the entry area and bathroom on one level and then you step up several steps into the bedroom suite itself with 16' tall windows cover one entire wall. Here's the glass roof above the lobby below...
We walked a block or two around the hotel passing every expensive store you can name from Luis Vitton, Gucci, Cartier and 1000 others. We came across this quaint Lebanese restaurant seen below which has been a consistent Michelin award winner. Dinner was superb!
When you step out onto the street in front of our hotel and look right standing at the curb, here's the view...
A 10 minute cab ride took us to the Eiffel tower...
It's DRAMATICALLY bigger than I would have thought from photos. We PLANNED to go up in the elevator to the top. Ummm.... no. One of the elevators is broken indefinitely and the FIRST AVAILABLE TICKET to ride to the top was for June 20th!! YIKES!! PLAN AHEAD NEXT TIME!!
These guys are EVERYWHERE with hands always in firing position. Only their finger needs to move 1/2" to the trigger and they're ready to rock and roll! They taking security SERIOUSLY around here.
Footnote- next weekend is Queen Elizabeth's 60th year of reign Jubilee and then of course the Olympics are coming to London in August. The entire city is being readied at the highest security level for terrorism. We talked with a commercial pilot at some length the other day and he said the entire London area is now a no-fly zone and will remain so until after the Olympics in the fall. Failure to file a full flight plan (even if you're in a Cessna flying VFR) and failure to authenticate properly means getting shot down by the surface to air missiles which have been placed strategically throughout the city; on the roof of Buckingham Palace, etc. There are Typhoon jets constantly circling at the ready and everything in London is on hair-trigger alert. MANY London streets are already being shut down for security purposes and our London cabby yesterday said it's already becoming a nightmare to navigate through the city and will only get worse throughout the summer. We live in strange times...
At the foot of the bridge in front of the Eiffel tower we had a quick crepe au chocolat' and then jumped on a large tour boat for a cruise of the Seine near sunset- passing 22 of the 23 bridges.
The occasional descriptions from the guide were all in French so we don't now most of what we saw- but it was ALL magnificent! LOL! This is the Grand Palais built from 1897-1900.
Sculpture and statuary is EVERYWHERE in Paris; on the streets, on the bridges, on the buildings. Breathtaking...
You can see the Grand Palais again in the distance with the evening light through the glass as we moved further down the Seine.
A close-up of just one of 1000 buildings along the Seine with the amazing sculptures...
People were EVERYWHERE! 1000's and 1000's and 1000's of tourists walking, talking, taking photos. And 1000's of locals sitting along both sides of the Seine with blankets and bottles of wine just enjoying a summer Sunday evening.
Notre Dame Cathedral looked amazing from the River below. It sits on an island in the middle of the Seine.
Just some high dollar real estate for those who want to look out of their living room onto the Seine.
More detail of Notre Dame...
As you can see, the buttresses were mind-blowing as we moved further downstream looking back...
This is dramatically zoomed in. This is the top 15' or so of a sculpture along the river that stands perhaps 75' high in all...
Two more views back at Notre Dame...
Every single bridge is unique- and each is a work of art...
Sunset brought everything to live with that wonderful golden glow...
Another sculpture on one of the bridge faces. Amazing...
And yet another. Just grabbed this shooting upward as we passed beneath this magnificent bridge...
You can see yet another unique bridge style as we return to the Eiffel tower...
This is the exact type of boat we were on, sitting below the tower. We went on past it, turned around and came back to dock and by then this boat was on it's way. The boats fill every 30 minutes and there must be 100 or more boats on the river at any moment from 20 different tour companies.
Arriving back at our hotel we came into the lobby and sat in a balcony coffee area overlooking the Champs Elysees. You can see the Marriott also has an outdoor bistro on the street below. The lobby balcony is actually atop a Sephora store as you can see in the signage...
Jane had a cup of coffee and their dessert sampler while I enjoyed a Pastis- one of several French drinks that all taste like anise.
They say that Paris is the city that never sleeps. We now know that's absolutely true! The streets were VIBRANTLY alive all night long beneath our window with laughter, shouting, honking, sirens and the roaring engines of exotic automobiles; Lamborghinis, Ferraris, Aston Martons and Porsches. It actually never stopped even at 4:00 and 5:00 in the morning on a Sunday night. And BECAUSE nobody on the streets ever goes to bed, those who are staying in hotels nearby don't get much sleep either. LOL! But that's another story. Today marks the beginning of our 42nd year and we'll celebrate at the Louvre.
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