Paris, the City of Light – and LOVE! Yes, it is very cliché to go to Paris for an anniversary, we are well aware. However, there has to be a reason so many lovebirds go there, right? And there absolutely is! But let me recap…
Friday evening, 18th of November, we hopped on a train to take us from Frankfurt to Paris. And for once Deutsche Bahn didn’t disappoint, as we were pretty much right on time. We took the direct train to Gare de l’Est, which took us around 4 hours. Our hotel was situated right at the train station, so super convenient to get to and from, and I couldn’t recommend it any more highly. All the staff were really nice and helpful, the hotel itself very modern and pretty new looking, and even though it is right next to the train station, it’s super quiet. If you want to check it out for your next visit in Paris, you can find it here.
Saturday started with a lovely breakfast at the hotel. We hadn’t booked it initially, but decided to eat there since the buffet looked really good. You got to choose between your classic french breakfast items like croissants or pain au chocolat, as well as everything else anyone could ever want: bread, yoghurt, fruit, coffee… you name it. Afterwards we went on a guided tour trough Montmartre with Aitana, who is hands down one of the best guides I have ever had (and I have done A LOT of guided city tours, haha). We started at Sacré-Coeur, worked our way up to Saint-Pierre’s-Church and to Place du Tetre, were you can get your portrait drawn by one of the many street artists. We later returned to the plaza to get our own Paris-souvenir: a watercolor painting of the Eiffel Tower in winter. Just couldn’t be bothered to sit for 30 minutes to have my portrait drawn, and also where would I put that? Resuming our tour, we went to La Maison Rose (see below). A restaurant famous for 1) being pink and 2) having housed a lot of famous painters. Picasso might ring a bell..
From there we went to the bust of Dalida, an Italian singer from Egypt that was very famous in France – talk about globalization. Fun fact: it is because of her there are glass pyramids in front of the Louvre.
We continued walking through Montmartre, which is such a cute part of Paris. Lots of little independent shops, cafés and restaurants, and everything is decorated so beautifully. 10/10 Instagram-worthy. Also it isn’t nearly as crowded as the Champs-Élysées, and food and drinks are a little more affordable (although still pretty expensive).
After the tour, we simply strolled through Paris, walked by the Eiffel Tower (if you want to go, think about booking a ticket in advance, as the queues are crazy), braved the masses in the shopping district and ended up having dinner at a cute little restaurant. We actually tried froglegs (wouldn’t do it again) and french onion soup.
Sunday we had a rather leisurely start – breakfast at the hotel again, then off to the Louvre, as the weather wasn’t great. We did book our tickets in advance, as again, you might end up waiting 4 hours to get in. Schedule in enough time to visit here, there are so many paintings, statues etc. that it would take 39 days to look at them all. The most famous of them all is of course, La Joconde – The Mona Lisa. If you want to take a picture or selfie with her, you have to line up again. However, I don’t think you should spend your time waiting like that. You can still see her very well from the side of the room, and on either end of the exit there’s a little explanation to the painting.
The last thing on our to do-list was to get a crepe, so we ended up at La Crêperie, located right by the Panthéon. The service there was super quick, the restaurant nicely designed and the food really yummy. I would absolutely go there again.
And just like that our Paris weekend getaway was over… We did have such a lovely time though, and although we both had been to Paris before, we didn’t remember it to be as beautiful as it is. Paris is definitely a city for everybody, since there is so so much to do. And, as a bonus, all of the french people we encountered spoke English perfectly, which can’t be said for every french city.
Let me know your favorite weekend destinations in the comments!
Lots of love,
Lena
Disclaimer: this post is not sponsored.