August in Paris

After a nice few days in Brussels, it was time to move on to Paris. We had decided to take a 4 hour Flixbus to Paris as this was the cheapest way to get there. The Flixbus left from Brussels south station at 9.40am. We were taking a local bus to get to the station, however, the bus was delayed by almost 20 minutes meaning we were cutting it close for our Flixbus departure. As soon as the local bus reached the station, we ran for about 10 minutes to reach the Flixbus departure point, thinking that we were going to miss the bus. We arrived at the departure point just after 9.40 and there was no bus there. Certain that we had missed the bus, we checked all the available info to confirm this but could not find anything. We ended up asking a family next to us and they happened to be on the same bus, which they said had not arrived. One hour later and the bus finally arrived to a lot of disgruntled travellers. We were just happy that we hadn’t missed the bus.

Four hours later and we had arrived at Paris Bercy Seine station which was a 20 minute walk from our accomodation. We were a bit early for check in, and we stopped off for coffee along the way. Here we had our first experience of being charged more to sit down for coffee as opposed to taking away or even sitting at the bar. After coffee we made our way to our studio apartment in the 5th arrondisement. It was small but comfortable and in a great location. (H: 5th arrondissement is the Latin Quarter known for the student revolts in 1229 and 1968!)

After relaxing for a few hours, we got dressed and headed out for a walk and dinner. We walked through the neighbouring park Jardin de Plantes. The park was beatiful and was where a lot of the royal animals were kept. We continued walking through the city and eventually found our spot for dinner which a nice restaurant with a terrace. Heather had a fancy version of bangers and mash, and I had a seabass with grilled vegetables. Both were delicious and went well with some French wine.

To finish off the day, we walked to a nearby grocery store and picked up a few things for breakfast, then made our way back to the apartment to rest up for a big day of exploring the next day. -VRead more