Paris Mardi (Tuesday) July 13

This is the day we had decided to devote to a trip to Giverny, Monet’s house and garden north of Paris just over the Ile de France/Normandy border. John and I had visited it twice and I remember how lovely it was. MaryAnn had never been there. When John & I went, once we took the train and once we drove there in our rental car. This time MaryAnn & I decided to take a tour on a bus as this would be very easy. The tour was scheduled to leave at 1:45 pm and it said that it would take 5 hours. This seemed pretty short to me as the drive was pretty long as I recalled but the tour was recommended in one of our travel books. The tour office was across from the Tulleries garden where the Orangerie Museum is located so we decided to go to that museum in the morning as it has many of Monet’s waterlily paintings.

We walked through the Marai and headed for tour office to pick up our tickets for the tour. The block that the ticket office was in was very crowded with tourists. A gypsy woman carrying a small sleeping child approached me showing me a piece of paper writing on it in English. She said, “Do you speak English?” I was familiar with this type of routine – the woman wants you to concentrate on reading the paper to her while she is busily picking your pocket or purse. I said, “Get away from me” and warned MaryAnn. As the day went on (like later when we were waiting to board the bus) I saw the gypsy plying her trade with numerous unsuspecting tourists. Several times I let the intended victim know what was going on. I also noticed a number of “invalid/handicapped” gypsies begging in the same area. This is the only place in Paris I saw this type of activity.

When we got to the Orangarie we learned that it is closed on Tuesdays!! Very disappointing. Oh well. We walked through the Tulleries which is a beautiful park. At one end/side of it there are a number of rides for children and a huge ferris wheel for all ages. We decided to go on the ferris wheel. Of course both MaryAnn are haunted by childhood fears of being on ferris wheels and having a mean friend start rocking the chair when you are stopped at the top. While the view was awesome and the ride very smooth and professionally run, we were both very quiet during the ride and very ready to get off of it.

We walked through one of the nearby hotels – there are some very fancy ones in this area. Outside of this hotel were a number of limos waiting for a party and numerous African males who were obviously bodyguards. Inside the hotel were about 15 Africans (perhaps an African nation president going for a visit with Sarkosy?).

The Giverny tour was not as wonderful as I had hoped, no fault of Giverny. The tour was conducted by a “nazi” guide. She spent lots of time giving us many, many instructions as to how long we had once we would arrive at Giverny, how to stay with her when we entered, where to take pictures, etc. etc. She also talked for the entire 1 ½ hour drive giving us Monet history (which of course I already knew vastly more since John and I studied Monet over the years). The bus started making a high screeching noise and the driver stopped the bus and got out to inspect it. We were stopped for about 15 minutes during which time the Guide continued her nonstop Monet lesson and never did tell us what was wrong with the bus. When we finally arrived at Giverny it was beautiful (as always) but we were very rushed and could have used at least one more hour there.

When we got back to Paris we headed for a glass of wine at our favorite sidewalk café by the Bastille. We sat down at an empty table and then noticed that our 4 Montreal friends were sitting directly in front of us. We greeted each other like long lost buddies. One of the male Montreal persons was were a very spiffy blue and white striped shirt. While we were talking a pigeon flying over took a very large dump which landed right on the sleeve of his shirt. Yikes. For the second time we said a fond farewell to them and wished them a Bon Journey.

For dinner we went to a small restaurant near our hotel. Our server was a delightful young woman who explained that her “day job” was that she had her own business which had clients who had Provencal businesses – she is an expert with a Master’s degree in French Regions with Provence here specialty (she was from St. Tropez. The dinner was a prix fixe at 18 euros – an excellent value especially because it was delicious. It was also a set dinner – you got a mushroom tarte, roast lamb with veggies, and one of the best desserts of the whole trip – a cherry custard tart. We need to remember this place – Café Musee.