From Nantes to Paris, and the end of the trip From Nantes to Paris, and the end of the trip July 14, 2023 - From Nantes to Paris, and the end of the tripI let Peter sleep in today because our train was at 1:00, and we didn't have a whole lot going on before then. We had breakfast in the room (the breakfast at the hotel was overpriced) and then wondered about town a bit, and sat and hung out at a coffee shop. We got to the train station early because Peter wanted to play the piano. After a crazy homeless person who was banging on the piano left, he played for about an hour before we had to leave and get on our train. Another kid his age came up and sang along while Peter played.
Getting on the train, and getting the bikes on the train was pretty straightforward. There was only one other person in our compartment, and they were lots of employees around who were helpful with the bikes. Unfortunately our seats were facing away from the direction of travel, which was a little disconcerting. Also many times you couldn't actually see the countryside, because there were so many trees right next to the train tracks. But overall it was very good. I keep on thinking about those two German guys that we met, who said they couldn't get tickets with bikes on a fast train, to get back to Germany, so they were taking a full THREE days to get back to Germany, arriving the third day at 9:00 p.m. at night. Either they were very unlucky, or we were very lucky.
In Paris - biking from the train station (Montparnasse) to the hotel, on the left bank, was supposed to take 22 minutes according to Google maps. Of course it took us much longer, what with trying to figure things out, and work our way through traffic. But overall everything went okay, a little stressful. The hotel is the same brand as we had in Nantes, the Apart City, which has a tiny little kitchenette. It's nothing fancy, but not too far from the neighborhood we were in before, which was reasonable. And I didn't want to spend too long researching the absolute perfect place to spend a few days. We ended up going to Bercy Village again for dinner, and actually had dinner at the exact same place as before, the sushi place.
July 15, 2023 - Saturday, Day 1 in ParisWe had the breakfast buffet here at the hotel, it wasn't really worth it. There was a big monster canister of honey in the breakfast room, but the dispenser was broken. Also just not a lot of selection. We're very close to the Mitterand National Library, so we went there. It's a very strange place, very hard to find the entrance, which is underground. Actually it seems like the whole thing is underground. There are four strange skyscrapers on all four corners of the structure, but I'm not sure if they're occupied. Overall a very surreal impression. There's also the rooms with the actual books, which, believe it or not, you have to pay admission to get into. We were allowed into the children's room just as a special favor, for a few minutes, after I specifically asked, but she said we couldn't stay. I don't think I've ever seen a less welcoming library. Very interesting looking though, kind of a 1970s look.
Then we went on a bike ride along the Seine, towards the center of Paris, the tourist area. That was pretty nice, extremely windy though. We sat down at one of the "beach" areas, with lounge chairs and umbrellas, and a lady came by and asked us to close the umbrella because it was getting so windy. And then, just 15 minutes later, they actually folded up and put away all the chairs as well. We had our picnic there (the usual, baguettes, camembert cheese, tomatoes). We've been using the steak knife that we bought the first day in Paris, it's been very useful for cutting up the baguettes and spreading the cheese. We made a little sheath for it. But even so, I cut myself twice while washing it.
They have all kinds of recreational facilities right along the river, with kids games, chairs, tables etc. Then we got up off the river, and into the Louvre area. It was very, very, crowded with huge lines. I felt no desire to go and actually see the museum, I think you really need to plan it very carefully in order to not be packed like sardines.
Biking towards the Eiffel tower, there was a sudden rainstorm. We hung out under a tree for a while, to avoid the rain, then went to the entryway of a museum for shelter from the rain, where the security guard said we could stay just for a few minutes. Then finally we went to the overhang for a metro station. Then some sunshine, thank goodness. The next stop was the Eiffel tower. We didn't go up, but really enjoyed walking around the human zoo that's at the base of the tower. Which by the way is completely enclosed by a glass fence, unlike the way it was last time we visited, when it was pretty open and you could stand right underneath it. First off, there were gypsies doing the shell game. They had lots of accomplices, some looking for police, some pretending to actually play and winning. And then of course they are some people who really did spend money on guessing where the ball was. Peter was intrigued by the whole thing. Then, only 5 or 10 minutes into their spiel, some lookouts told them the cops were coming, and they disappeared within seconds. And then we saw the same thing, but with another gang, just half an hour later! That group was also dissolved by the police within 5 or 10 minutes.
Another thing we saw was men - they looked like maybe Pakistani - selling beer and wine in buckets with ice. There were tons of them. The interesting part was that they had taken over this big huge recycle bin to store their equipment, we saw one of them opening up the locked part, and putting bags of beer and wine in. And we also saw them storing their beer and wine in a drainage tunnel! Very strange. I wonder if they were paying off the police, because they wern't being discrete at all.
Also there were loads and loads of Africans, selling those little Eiffel tower statues. There were so many of them, it's hard to see how they could actually make a profit. Just as we were leaving the Eiffel Tower area, there was a huge police raid. Three police vans drove up and lots of police ran out and chased the Africans, who bagged up their big white cloths full of trinkets very quickly and ran away.
That was the most remarkable part of the day. Then we returned home along what was supposed to be a really good, separate bike path, but was actually very mediocre, and not always separate, along the Boulevard Jordan. We stopped for coffee for me and a pastry for Peter.
The other interesting thing that happened was as we were stopping in front of a supermarket, discussing whether we should go get some groceries now, or later, an American guy started talking with us. He was on an electric city rental bike, that stopped working because he didn't have an internet connection. He asked if we could set up a hotspot for him, and I did. He was able to get it working again and was very thankful. The plan was to go out for dinner, but there's really not very many good restaurants here, so we ended up just eating in the room.
July 16, 2023 - Sunday, Day 2 in Paris
I had done some research online for good bike trails around Paris and one site said that the Paris highline - very similar to the one in New York City, basically a converted elevated train track - was a great bike ride. So we went there, stopping at Gare de Lyon on the way, where there was supposed to be a public piano for Peter. (There was, but it was locked up for maintenance). Anyway the article recommending that particular bike trail was 100% wrong, there was a steep staircase leading up to it, bikes were completely forbidden, it was really narrow, and overall completely impossible to bike there.
However it was a nice walk. Then we went to the Bois de Vincennes, a gigantic forest park very close by. We spent a long time hanging out, Peter was feeding pigeons and tried to release one of the pigeons from a fishing line which was tangled around its legs. Unsuccessfully, though.
We had lunch at a Sri Lankan Buddhist temple, which was selling food as a fundraiser for repair of the temple. Good food, and interesting place. It seemed quite run down - not just needing repairs, but needing TLC.
Then we biked around to the other lake in the park. Peter was doing all the navigation, which was fine by me, I've done enough navigation to last me for quite some time now. It's not as intimidating to bike around on the streets anymore, it's almost a little bit enjoyable, though still a little stressful.
We rested at the hotel a bit, and then went to the Monoprix, which is another location where they have a public piano (we found all of these from a website with worldwide public pianos). The air conditioning in some of these stores is really bad - mostly non-existent, or just set very weak. Especially if it's humid, inside spaces can feel really stuffy. The "climate emergency" is very much top of mind here, there's usually something climate related every day, on the news.
On the way home I stopped and watched the dancing taking place at the huge boardwalk type area, that's close to the Mitterand library. There were two very large separated groups, and a bunch of other small groups, where people were dancing to music, mostly salsa. Very interesting. I wonder if it was government sponsored?
July 17, 2023 - Monday, last day in ParisThis morning, we hung out, Peter slept in, then we had coffee at the cafe up the street a little bit, while waiting for our bikes to be picked up at noon. Overall the bike rental has worked out extremely well, the drop-off and pick-up of the bikes was seamless, and the bike quality was good. I'm so, so, glad that I didn't end up taking those folding bikes. Those would have been far less efficient, and far less fun to ride. After the bikes were gone, we took the metro for the first time since getting to France. It wasn't all that difficult to figure out how to get tickets, and how to get where we wanted to go. The stations are kept pretty dark though, I'm not sure why unless it's to save energy, which is probably the case. It's like they've gone back in time in terms of energy usage. Also don't get me started on the toilets here. They really cannot handle getting rid of excrement without manually needing to use the toilet brush. Almost every single time.
We ended up mostly just wandering around, we had a few targets - the Shakespeare book shop, the Champs Elysee. But mostly we just wandered around the really really touristy areas of Paris. We wanted to go to the Shakespeare English language bookstore because supposedly there's a public piano there, and Peter wanted to play, but there was actually a line to get in! So that was a no-go.
For lunch, we stopped at a very touristy place and I had a beef rice dish, Thai style. The spices were great, however the meat was so insanely tough that I only ate about a quarter of it. Plus, the guy asked for a tip - first time it's happened in France, it's normally not done. I actually gave him 2 euros. I wonder if he asks people that are obviously French for a tip. Bet he doesn't.
Then we walked around the Champs Elysee. Interesting, packed with tourist, also lots of Americans. It used to be interesting and different to hear Americans speaking, because there were almost none. We actually stopped to chat with an American couple traveling with their grandson on July 4th in Orleans, because we hadn't heard any Americans in weeks. But it's very different here in Paris.
Overall a LOT of walking today, tiring but enjoyable, really packed touristy areas, interesting and not too hard to take the metro. The weather was perfect, not too hot, a pleasantly cloudy sky. July 18, 2023 - Tuesday, flying back to the USTook a cab (called by the hotel) to the airport. The only things of note on the flight back were:
Some final thoughts on the tripWell, we're back home now. It seems like events and occurances were coming our way at a mile a minute while we were traveling - we'd see so many new and interesting things every day, and have cool experiences - but now, it's more about starting work again, going through photos and polishing up my trip notes, connecting with people, and starting to do some cooking again. I still have all the projects ideas I wrote down while traveling, I haven't really started on anything big, though. In terms of things I should have done differently, I can think of a few. First, less focus on picking out clothing that's extremely lightweight and easy-care. Instead, pick items I like better, even if they're more hassle. Taking more than one pair of shorts would have been a good idea. And also - white sneakers, though they looked nice, do NOT stay white. I felt a little grubby sometimes, when I wanted to feel chic. I probably should have brought a battery pack, just for safety. As it is, I ended up stressing out quite a bit about running out of battery for my phone, and always turned on airplane mode during the day, to preserve battery. Though maybe it's not such a bad thing that I didn't use the phone much while biking, except for navigation. Still, having an emergency source of power would probably have been a good idea. Less stress, anyway. One of the things I enjoyed most about the trip was talking to people. I was pretty good at trying to start conversations with people, and I think I succeeded much, much, better than in Austria. Partly, I think, it's that French people are more outgoing. But another factor may be that I just didn't like to speak German. Since I was previously fluent in German, and when I went to Austria I was no longer fluent, I think I just didn't like to hear myself speaking stumbling German with lots of grammatical errors. And maybe I was hesitant to talk to people for that reason. Renting the bikes worked out really well. Delivery was not a problem, and the pick-up worked fine too. We frequently zipped past other travelers - probably mostly because we were traveling very, very, lightly. In Austria, we almost never passed anyone, we were usually the ones being passed. Probably our bikes were not as good, and also Peter was younger. I specifically remember the couple with folding bikes, very heavily laden, I think it was on the way to Gien. Wow, they were slow. I was, again, thankful to not have brought the folding bikes. The bike seat did work out fine - there were definitely a few days where I was extremely sore in some spots, but then when that guy from Portland adjusted it a bit for me, that was no longer a major problem. It did seem easier to find a place to stay in Austria. Either there's many more options in Austria - that could be - or perhaps there's more hotels, and bed and breakfasts that list their rooms on Booking.com. Towards the end of the trip, I figured out what I should be doing. And that was, figuring out where I wanted to stay for the night, and going into Google Maps, searching for hotels (which also shows campgrounds, and bed and breakfasts) and just calling to see what's available. Had I done that from the get-go, things would probably have been easier. I'm satisfied that I didn't book everything in advance. Some people on shorter trips did (the older gentleman traveling with his grandson and grandson's friend), but being flexible made it possible to take rest days, to take long days and then short days, to do the warm showers visit - all those things that you can't possibly know ahead of time. The canal section (the section from Paris to Briare) was so very different from the Loire section. The canal section, first off, was SO much quieter, with almost no tourists. I could probably count the number of bike tourists on one hand, in the whole section. Whereas on the Loire, there were loads. Just completely different. Also on the Loire, the trail was actually not nearly as good as on the canal. The trail was much older, and there wasn't as much dedicated trail, lots of times it was just re-purposed roads, or roads that were shared with cars. We saw very few young tourists, the backpacker types, on bikes. Most everyone that was traveling on bikes was older, like 60+. I don't know why, it could be a very cheap trip if you stayed in campgrounds. Maybe younger people just don't know about it? Or they want to stay in cities? It was a real shocker to read in the news that just 2 days after we left Montargis, there were riots where 62 storefronts were damaged or destroyed. We left on the June 27th, and the riots occured the night of June 29th. What a shame. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
