A sunny Tuesday in Paris

Paris is a city for walking.  Most of it is flat, all of it is interesting.  While the metro is a fabulous system, and gets you from one side to another brilliantly, with great people watching thrown in, you lose the context of the city.  Coming up for air from a metro station always requires a few moments of re-orientation, turning the map in a few circles to work out which way is up, and then choosing a random direction to walk until the next cross street tells you where you really are.  Forty four years of being told to keep to the left is pretty firmly ingrained in my head.  I was fine crossing roads (only one near miss), but I constantly walked in people's way.

A pre breakfast stroll down to the Jardins de Tuileries and along the Seine... I picked up chestnuts that had fallen from the trees and heard birds chirping in their nests inside the lollipop shaped topiary trees.  It turns out my year seven french extends quite well to buying croissants in a boulangerie, without needing Philip Ledouxe to be present as well.

No trip to Paris is complete without some shopping in the great department stores.  The Galeries Lafayette and Printemps could eat your entire bank account and look around, smiling, for more.  It wasn't the fashion that tempted me, although walking among those racks of designer clothes that I had only ever read about was incredible.  It was, of course, the food sections.  The David Jones food hall multiplied by a million.  From the hand crafted sweets - pink sugar roses anyone? - to the seafood displays, cheese counters, breads, coffee, olives, 5kg jars of nutella...

And then the kitchen ware.  All the Le Creuset you could ask for (interestingly at much the same price as here, so that's a comfort), plus the quirky kitchen gadgets displayed with such great style.

A coffee and a Laduree macaron at the outdoor cafe on top of Printemps provided the view of Paris needed for some orientation.  I can report that the macaron was not nearly as fine as the ones from Dream Cuisine here in Canberra.

The glass dome in Galeries Lafayette is astonishing. Dating from 1912, it now shelters the cosmetics department.  I couldn't leave Paris without a new red lipstick now could I?

From the mid town shops we made our way to the Arc de Triomphe.  As so often happens, someone offered to take our picture... The next hour was spend in conversation with a New Zealander who was in France for flight simulator training, because he is one of three pilots who fly the mail around New Zealand.  In his spare time he grows truffles.  The conversation was diverse and free ranging and fairly spiritual at times - such is the magic of holiday acquaintances.

Up to the 16th for dinner at Terrasse Mirabeau, the restaurant recommended by Canberra based french chef Kim de Poorter (go buy his stuff at the farmer's markets, you won't regret it).  We saw the sun set over Paris from a bridge on the Seine and then ate an amazing meal.

Walked back along the river to the Eiffel Tower.  It sparkles and so did we.