Bonjour Paris!

After two lovely, tolerable flights - the first from Seattle to Iceland (7 hours with a 55-minute layover) and the second from Iceland to Paris (3 hours) - we were greeted by light rain and gray skies at our Le Marais district hotel.

We decided to grab a bite to eat, test our French and take a little neighborhood walk before getting in a much-needed power nap.  We stopped at Clik-Clop bistro across the street and ordered Croque Madame, an open-faced ham and cheese melt with a fried egg on top.

It brought a delicious side salad and Christine - throwing all etiquette and caution to the wind - made the scandalous decision to order a cafe creme at 4:00 in the afternoon!  Mon dieu!  This is noted because, typically,  milk-heavy coffee drinks are reserved for early morning consumption.  Also, our Spanish has served us well already.  Being that I cannot stop saying Si! instead of Oui! to every question posed by a french person, we discovered that not only did the waiter at the restaurant speak Spanish, but the salesperson at the coffee shop did, too, and offered me 'una bolsa' for my purchase.  I am loving this and would not mind if all future Paris interactions were to take place in my beloved Spanish, especially considering that - unfortunately - it is confirmed that I will never be trilingual.

A rainy Paris scene - beautiful and quaint no matter what the weather!

Lunch here tomorrow?

Weathered sculpture outside the Hotel de Ville post office