Friday on a Velib' and Saturday at the Market

 

Now that the girls are spending a couple of full days at school, I have more freedom to explore.  "La cantine" is far from a hit, but it is the only option.  The girls are still coming home for lunch two days and all day on Wednesday.

 

My friend, Lori, is a brave bicyclist and I am attempting to follow her lead.  Paris was one of the first cities to adopt the massive bike rental systems that now seem to be the rage in many cities.  I have a yearly pass and it is a deal.  It is also possible to use the bikes as a tourist, so pack your bike helmet.

http://en.velib.paris.fr/

 

Lori and I headed to Le Marais because it is one of my favorite parts of town and I needed to pick up some overpriced canned pumpkin at the American store there.  The store is appropriately called Thanksgiving.  We started out at Musée Carnavalet the city museum that covers the history of Paris.  I have visited several times because it is huge and it is free.

I took this photo for Lillian who is Harry Potter crazy. 

 

We wandered through the museum and I did not take a lot of photos.  One of my favorite areas in the museum covers the Revolution.  Of course, this part of the museum was closed for the day.  The area with the dugout canoes was closed until 1:30.  This is very French.  Things are closed all of the time with no explanation and no one seems very worried about it.  I often make my way across town to go somewhere and there will be a sign taped to the door that says something like, "I should be back in about two hours."

We were sad about these areas being closed until we went and ate some falafel and drank some beer.

 

On the way back to our bikes, we saw this lovely window.  Those colorful squares above are different flavors of marshmallows.



 

We jumped on our bikes and headed to the Hotel de Ville  for the exhibit  Paris, Vu Par Hollywood

This regal guy and his friend guarded one of the doors.

 

The exhibit was not great.  If you have actually seen all of the old movies, or are huge movie buff you would probably enjoy it.  I was glad to get inside city hall and gawk.  We had a rainy ride home and I had to use some colorful language with a motorcyclist who got a little too close.

 



Saturday: to market to market to buy 3 pains au chocolat for 2 Euros!  Thanks, Sylvia!

 

 Crepes for lunch!  A great option anytime...especially when your fridge is out of commission.

 Look who bought me some flowers, Sweet Sylvia.

Orchids are the rage here and there are two different stores in our neighborhood that sell nothing but orchids.



Every time I walk into the kitchen and see the door of the fridge open, an alarm goes off in my head.  Friday, our fridge stopped working.  I noticed that the kitchen began smelling of bananas, Yes, all of the frozen bananas waiting to become banana bread were no longer frozen.  The motor of our six month old fridge is dead.  We are very happy that it is under guaranty  We are not so happy that the new motor will not arrive until Wednesday.  If you have any great dinner ideas, please send them my way.