After a week in Paris, we did not, according to TripAdvisor, hit up the top three main attractions, including the Musée d’Orsay (#1) which was very close to our flat. We crossed #4, Pont Alexandre III, once and also paid a visit to #7, the Louvre, and #8, Jardin Luxembourg. Ten and eleven, Saint-Chapelle and Notre Dame, respectively, were visited. Since Notre Dame was just a few minutes’ walk and across the Seine from our apartment, we visited it several times: for an organ concert, free Sunday tour, the chance to go the towers and be like Quasimodo, and at night.

The Eiffel Tower is #15, and we saw it every day and were in its general vicinity four or five times. My favorite part was seeing it at night when it was lit up with blinking white lights. The Seine, #17, was crossed multiple times every day. On our way to the Louvre, we were crossing Pont Neuf (the Ninth Bridge) and were told to hurry along in our crossing because they were filming a movie and we mere peasants were in the way.

We visited numbers 21 through 23: Arc de Triomphe, the towers of Notre Dame, and Shakespeare and Company Bookstore, one of the few (and the only one we found) English bookstores in the city. We visited it on a whim because it was only a few blocks from our house.

In terms of food, our breakfasts were boiled eggs, oranges (sometimes clementines or bananas), Kellogg’s Special K, cheese, baguettes, and some pastry that Ethan would bring home along with the baguette. Snacks were usually high in sugar, such as ice cream and chocolate bars. We had plenty of variety in our suppers, but I think we were all very excited for that of our first night: we had pizza for the first time in a month! (Morocco is not a pizza country.) And there was vinegar! (You probably don’t know, but I love vinegar. And pizza dipped in vinegar is wonderful.) Later, we would enjoy salads at a vegetarian restaurant, two meals from Subway because we had to have a quick supper, another meal of pizza (that wasn’t as good), and mushroom risotto.

Oh, I’m feeling hungry already…

Ciao!