Recently returned from 7 nights in Paris. Weather was in the mid-60’s and sunny for the entirety of our stay.
A little background: we live in Greenville, SC, which is the North American home of Michelin Tires. My dad worked for Michelin for 35 years, so I’ve always had an affinity for France.
We are a family of 3 making our 6th trip to Paris since 2008.
As we have done on all other visits, we stayed in an apartment booked through Vacation in Paris (www.vacationinparis.com). This apartment was located in the 7th arrondissement about 50 feet from the intersection of Avenue de la Bourdonnais and Rue St. Dominique. It is a 2-bedroom apartment that we stayed in back in 2008, but it has been stylishly updated.
As for arriving from CDG, as usual I reserved a private shuttle through Shuttle-Inter (www.shuttle-inter.com). 60 euros for the one-way trip from CDG to the apartment and the driver was waiting for us when we exited customs with my name on a sign. I know you can get a taxi just as easily, but I have always preferred this particular mode of transportation for getting to central Paris after a long flight.
We all had Navigo Decouverte passes from our 2019 trip, but instead of loading them with a weekly pass from a machine in a metro station, I was able to avoid that and load weekly passes onto each from my iPhone (with ApplePay) using the IDF Mobilites app from the privacy of our apartment (this worked wonderfully and was super easy to do).
Food: Almost all breakfast croissants, pain au chocolat and lunch sandwiches (jamon and beurre) were purchased from the patisserie/boulangerie around the corner from the apartment (Le Petit Gourmands on Rue St. Dominique).
We spent most of our food money on dinners. We dined in the following restaurants (all with reservations) and all were excellent:
- Le Dome (14th arrondissement)
- Chez Monsieur (8th arrondissement)
- La Fontaine de Mars (7th arrondissement)
- Café Lignac, formerly Café Constant (7th arrondissement)
- Auberge Bressane (7th arrondissement)
Like I stated previously all were excellent, but my 2 favorites were Chez Monsieur and Auberge Bressane.
Activities: This trip was pretty laid back. Did visit the Catacombs for the first time and also visited the Picasso Museum for the first time. Picasso Museum was ½ price as we arrived about an hour before closing.
Rest of our time was spent wandering the city, shopping, and doing what my daughter loves the most, sitting and watching people (and Petanque) in the Jardin du Luxembourg.
Being American, we were required to have a negative Covid-19 test in order to return home. We were all able to get tested at a pharmacy around the corner from the apartment on Rue St. Dominique. The process was easy, cost 20 euros each and we had the negative results in 15 minutes.
All-in-all, this was a great trip. Not a lot of rushing around, just soaking up all that Paris has to offer. Can’t wait to return for the 7th time sometime in the future.