Paris 08 Ancien - Quartier Faubourg-Saint-Antoine

The arrival into Gare du Nord was very underwhelming but reasonably efficient. We caught a taxi to our apartment. The driver spoke good English but wanted to charge us €55 as "the meter wasn't working" and we had to cross the river. When I queried this with him, he quickly dropped the tariff to €40 as we didn't need to cross the river (bother passengers who have Google maps on their phone!) Tariff was still expensive but from now on we can walk and catch the metro.

Our apartment in Bastile is the owners home. So we are in "suburbia" but will get a good taste for everyday life. The best thing is it has a piano which Leah has wasted no time getting to know🥰.

Once we arrived at our apartment block 3 flights of sloping wooden stairs provided a good cardiac workout!!

The best way to get to sample the culture is to walk the streets and eat like the locals do. Most people we have run into either speak english or enough english to compensate for our minimalist french vocab.Read more