Just wanted to briefly share our experience.
We stayed 7 nights at the Hotel d'Orsay in the 7th, one block from Orsay Musuem. Nice, clean, very friendly English speaking staff. Not in a "neighborhood" like Marais or Rue Cler - but very central I thought to main sights, and excellent Metro/RER access,, that we used often to get us back when our tootsies were too tired to hoof it back.
We tried a few of RS recs for restaurants:
Au Bougnante on Ile de la Cite - DELISH!
Café le Flore - for the experience - but it is pricey - 19E for a sandwich
Le Fumoir - just for un café crème one morning - very nice ambience
Bistrot du Forum (in Reims) - excellent entrée/plat for 16E - great place for dinner or lunch we had lunch.
Other great places:
Cafe des Ministeres Bistro de la Mer (7th near Invalides)- seafood restaurant - very nice, quiet. upper price range - spent 100E total for dinner
Restaurant CINQ-MARS (7th near Orsay Museum) - crazy good terrine, mussels, lamb chops and warm fruit crisp - again about 100E
Le Solferino - café/brasserie a block from our hotel ate twice - lunch and a late snack - reasonably priced, good food.
Brasserie Le Borbon - (7th near Invalides -next to Café des Ministeres) - went here when we saw Café was closed - again, delicious food entrée/plat was about 25E
Café de la Comedie - near Louvre and Le Fumoir - plat was 15E - I had beef bourguignon, husband had Cassoulet - really good traditional French fare
In addition to the Louvre, Orsay, Saint Chapelle, Notre Dame, Invalides, Orangerie, hiking up the Arc, and strolling the parks and neighborhoods we:
went up the Eiffel Tower at 9:30PM - woke up at 2:30AM EST 60 days before to get tickets to the top - it was awesome.
Saw a show at the Moulin Rouge - was impressed, way classier than I thought. Very talented dancers, actors and gymnasts all formed part of a very elaborate, I thought, tasteful show.
Did RS Montmatre, Historical Paris and Louvre tour/walk - highly recommend.
Versailles - get here early and book the private tour - worth more than the 7E per person. Of note - only 2 fountains will be running if you choose to go on Tuesday or weekend.
Reims - an awesome and EASY day trip. The cathedral is beautiful and with a lot less people than ND in Paris, the town itself is very nice. Note - cathedral is being restored - main Rose window cannot be seen and the Roman gate is also being restored - covered in scaffolding - bummer! Toured the Martel champagne caves - loved it. Emmanuel was excellent!
Did a Paris Walks tour - Left Bank Writers - excellent!
Did Seine river cruise ( gift from my parents) - so lovely to see Paris lit up - I bet an open air cruise would actually be better for the sites, but the dinner itself was delicious. We booked Bateux Parisien.
I think that's it - nothing disappointed! Paris is divine and can't wait to go back. Thank you Rick Steve's your book was invaluable!!!! And thank you to the regular contributors as well - your advice and suggestions were invaluable as well.