We booked a LEGAL apartment for Christmas week on boulevard Beaumarchais in the 3rd arr., and looks like it's across the street from the 11th. The nearest Metro station is Saint-Sebastien-Froissart but also appears almost as close to Chemin Vert.
We'd wanted to rent an apartment in the heart of Le Marais, but for various reasons too detailed to bore you with, this is the closest we could get to the heart of the Marais while still having everything we need in an apartment that is available for our exact travel dates. I did an exhaustive search through numerous reputable companies.
We are hoping to be able walk to as much as possible, to stroll the streets to soak in the ambiance, eat and drink in little cafes, and so on. This will be my wife and me with our two teenagers. I realize we will use the Metro to get to many of the classic tourist venues in town, but we were also hoping to "live" somewhere with some charm of its own and, like I said, to be able to comfortably walk around those neighborhoods as part of our enjoyment. We are hoping to not be too far from the charming cliche of Paris we have been dreaming of. (And being able to walk to the river would be/would have been very nice, too.)
So, with this little you know about me, and especially our desire to have been more in the heart of the Marais and nearer the river, are we still in a location that will satisfy us, or should I prepare for a bit of a letdown? These may seem silly questions to those who know the area, but this is the sort of question I can't answer for myself from guidebooks and Google Earth.
Thank you very much for any guidance you can offer.