Monday, September 15, 2014

We fly; I sleep; I wake; they don't serve coffee. What they serve is beyond my comprehension, for it is worse than my parent's coffee, always available from the percolator left atop the wood stove, topped up alternately with water and ground coffee throughout the day.

We land ahead of time, which I now note is listed as 1315, which I had gotten in my head as 3:15, so instead of traveling by Metro in peak hour, I'll be home before the rush-crush starts.

Terminal 3 is about the size of the facility in Cranbroook BC. We exit via front and back, so it turns out that my seat 15K is about the worst place to be.

Industrial action at CDG ***OR*** Air Transat is too cheap to pay docking fees; we fall down some stairs from the plane to a bus and wait ten minutes to see if anyone else is coming; they aren't. We are last at the customs-snake and then walk 500 metres to the SNCF.

I have to buy 3 Mars Bars to get change for the photo for my Navigo Pass, and the photo machine refuses to take my €5 bill. The procedure is lengthy with about 15 announcements of dos and don’ts. Armed with my sheet of 5 photos and no scissors or pen-knife I present myself at the counter and the charming lady understands my French, even though I am possibly the one hundredth person who has stumbled through "Je n'ai pas les scissors" since the start of her shift this morning.

For €34 plus the price of a photo and three Mars bars, say €40 or $cdn60 I am Ready To Roll!

I miss the train by 1 minute, but there's another train in 14 minutes. I take a bite of raw carrot and a nibble of Gruyere that I've been hoarding since boarding on Saturday night. The train arrives, we all pile on, and I think the announcement that this is non-stop to Gare du Nord is made after the train has pulled out of the station; bad luck if you are already aboard!

17 minutes after the train leaves CDG, we are pulling OUT of downtown Paris. Such speed, such efficiency; so different from hopping on the TTC's 192 bus and crawling through each terminal, fighting traffic on Highway 427 and Dundas Street, transferring to the Bloor-Danforth line and so on.

(Note that I have paid $60 for a week’s travel in the Île de France, about twice the cost of a SINGLE ONE-WAY ticket on the 25-minute UP-Express in Toronto)

I disembark south of Paris at Denfert-Rochereau and hop on the Etoile-Nation train and while we roll to Dugommier I contemplate that for the past six months I have been fantasizing about being in Paris, fantasizing about negotiating matters with people who don't speak English. Reality arrives, this is no longer fantasy, I'm here and will need to ask directions, ask if my room is truly reserved and paid for. This scares me just a little. I am here and must swim. I'm as happy as a pig in shit!

I have my 5-zone 7-day Transilien network pass and the Quatier Bercy hotel is exactly what I wanted. I asked for the Parisian equivalent of Microtel – cheap, clean, simple, and I've got exactly that – a bed, a bath and shower, some closet space, and electric jug (Yippee!) in rooms behind the courtyard of a hotel that lies behind the courtyard that protects us from the street.

I shower and change my clothes. I wander the quarter and find that dinner in cafes doesn't start until 7 p.m. Why didn't I know that? I guess when I was here before I didn't think of eating until eight o'clock or even later. I browse through a supermarket and find that meat and vegetables and fruit and dairy (my main purchases at home) are roughly the same price. I buy a packet of raisors jetables in a pharmacy. I got that right! The pharmacies are just that – dispensers of medical stuff, a small shop, not like the drugstores of Canada which now double as supermarkets and clothing warehouses.

Tired as I am I elect to check out Montrouge via the Metro lines 8 and 4 but when I land at Montrouge my heart is not in it. I'm too tired.

I take a ham/cheese sandwich at a cafe and make for home via lines 4 and 8 and as I reach the hotel and think of asking for the hotel's 240v adapter for my net-book power block, I realize that I've left my jacket and the power block at the cafe. Aaaaargh!

I make a cup of tea and fall asleep around 7 p.m., to wake at 11 p.m.

Here I sit, typing on my little Acer netbook ...

Yes! It's Concorde (not “The Concorde”, as I have learned). I took this shot as I walked down the stairs from the plane to the tarmac, hence the cruddy composure. At least it looks as if it might leave the ground.

And then, since we have to wait in the bus, I take a photo of the grime across the back window. In this shot you can see that the Airfix model is firmly glued to the plastic base.

The terminal at Cranbrook British Columbia; think “Aeroport Charles de Gaulle, Terminal 3, Paris, France”.

Je suis arriveé, if I got that right. Here I am in Dugommier station. Now where is mon hotel?

Ignore the camera timestamp; the camera is jet-lagged.

So far so good; I have found the hotel and two apples. My orange shoulder bag is my luggage for two weeks; I refuse to lug luggage in the form of a suitcase. Since it is a SHoulder bag I might call it SHruggage.

This shot was taken from the doorway.

And this shot was taken from the bathroom doorway. This is a small hotel room, and I haven't seen the others. Remember that in Paris space is premium.

In the far corner is a small writing desk and a translucent plastic chair. Translucent furniture makes the room look less cluttered, larger.

This is the last known photo of my floppy sunhat (see “Montereau”)

The bathroom is amazingly roomy; I guess it is a matter of proportion – we have to use the width of the apartment anyway. What the heck! It has a full-size bathtub with shower, hand basin, toilet.

This room is what I ordered; Think “MicroTel” I told Dan.

Now THIS is classy. I'm going to like this room. A bed with a reading light always gets my vote.

As I exit the hotel, I walk through a courtyard with a Japanese garden; well, lots of very tall bamboo anyway. There are a few plastic chairs where one may sit.

(Movie) Birdsong in the bamboo garden Quartier Bercy

Now this might get confusing: I have left the hotel, walked through bamboo-land, and have turned to face the entrance to the hotel. Behind me, I am about to walk through an archway to the street.

This is a QUIET room; to gain entry from the street, I walk through an archway into a courtyard. Through the bamboo courtyard I enter the hotel front door. After walking through the hotel I emerge into another courtyard; across this courtyard and up the stairs is my apartment. A quiet, very quiet place. Exactly what I ordered.

From Google Maps; here is my path through the street facade building, through the bamboo courtyard, dog-leg through the hotel, across the private courtyard and up the stairs to my (purple blob) room.

The quietest spot in Paris, perhaps.

A view downhill to Dugommier, Daumesnil is behind me. You can see that market-stall frames are in place; that means a street market tomorrow – fresh vegetables, fruit, meat and a pervasive smell of fresh fish all over the place. Yummy!

I realize that Paris has cleaned up its act; stoop-and-scoop is the order of the day; no more pussy-footing around dog turds. I'm glad that has changed.

Trees are being removed, but this being Paris, they don't simply chain-saw the stump, they chainsaw beveled edges to the stump. Artistic or practical, take you pick.

I elected for both.

I'm not sure why I took this extra shot. Fatigued perhaps; it's been a long week, or so it seems; only 36 hours, really.

A contingency shot of the far side of the street. Some of the trees have heat-stroke. But look at the size of the trees; more about that later.

Still walking down to Dugommier. Note the size of the trees. People are streaming towards me (It's day's end and they are going home) in the channel made for pedestrians. Note the concrete bollards that inhibit large vehicular traffic – but not scooters or bicycles.

Don't get on my back about tourist spots; I did them thirty-five years ago. But just to keep y'all happy, here's a shot of the Eiffel Tower. Can you see it?

Look just above the rear corner of the panel van; use zoom if you have to.

The green Martian is a recycling bin. Lot's of them all over the place.

Try to keep your eyes focused on the Eiffel Tower.

You can't, can you? That's our ape-like brains for you, addicted to mammalian faces.

OK. Just for you I have walked across Boulevard de Reuilly and zoomed in. Satisfied?

You are looking along Alleé Vivaldi.