An American in Paris for the first time . . .

As I mentioned a couple of posts back, my sister Teri had never been out of the country, had always dreamed of visiting Paris, and after listening to me go on and on about Italy over the years, wanted to see it for herself. Since Sam and I don't need much of an excuse to visit our favorite locations, we offered to act as her personal guides on a whirlwind, two and a half week tour of four cities.

When we left our friend Keith in London, we flew to Paris. We arrived a few days ahead of my sister, so that we could spend some time visiting with Sam's cousin Paul and his girlfriend Eva, who live on the outskirts of the city. Whenever we visit Paul and Eva, they graciously allow us stay in their tiny, but lovely apartment, and although they offered to let Teri stay there, too, it really is too small. Besides, with only four nights in Paris, we wanted Teri to stay in the city center, able to get to most of the sights on foot. With that in mind, we rented a studio apartment in the Marais district, just a few blocks from Notre Dame, and the River Seine.

The apartment was very nice, and unbeknownst to me when I booked it, was located above a gay bar, in a very lively gay neighborhood. Of course, this was not a problem for us, and made for some interesting sights and discoveries -- like the bakery that not only had really delicious breads, but also specialized in a certain shape of bread!

On the day she was to arrive, Sam and I took a train to the airport and waited for her plane to land. Of course, Teri had been traveling for over 15 hours (non-stop flight from LAX, plus the drive from her daughter's house in Big Bear Lake), so she was pretty tired, but we managed to take her out that evening for drinks and a little music at a jazz club we've been to before: the Swan Bar. It was open mike night, with Paul playing bass, and a friend playing piano, while several people took turns singing. It was wonderful!

Over the next three days, we saw all the iconic sights: 

the Eiffel Tower,

(Teri's first view of the tower.)

(View of the City of Lights from the top of the tower.)

the Louvre...

Notre Dame...

a walk through Pere LaChaise Cemetery, with the obligatory 

visit to the grave site of Jim Morrison...

and on the last day, a boat tour on the River Seine.

(You can see interesting things on some of the houseboats.)

(This one has a small version of the Statue of Liberty up front.)

When necessary, we took a couple of cabs, and many more rides on the Metro,

but mostly, we walked, and walked, and walked. Which was good, since we ate LOTS of bread, and other delicious food! While walking we noticed a lot of interesting graffiti and street "art" on the sides of buildings.

And of course, we did a lot of window shopping. We both got a kick out of these sculptures of fat, dancing ladies. We agreed, we could identify with them!

(To view enlarged photos, click on one of them and a viewer will open. Click X to return to the blog. If you are interested in seeing a few more photos from this part of the trip, go to my Flickr page. Also, if you would like to watch the video Sam made of this part of our trip, it has some of the music we heard at the Swan Bar.)