Saturday Agenda 1

Well I just back to my room and I left 12 hours ago so I would have to say I put in a good days sightseeing.

First thing up was figure out the Metro system which proved pretty easy since the station I went to was a lot less crowded than the one I came in at which is somewhat like Grand Central.

My first stop was the Nation stop. I got there easily. There is a circle and a monument there, like there is at almost every Paris intersection I go to.
I should have mentioned that the street outside my hotel had sprouted a ton of street vendors. I found the same thing at Nation but even more so and a lot more food vendors. Pictures will follow, for the record I took 467 plus 4 avi's, not a bad days work and there is still room on the sd card, I also had to change to a new set of AA batteries (4), which I thoughfully had in my camera bag.

After working around there a while and taking pictures I decided to go to the Bastille and made what might have been my first mistake as I decided to walk it. It was a nice walk though I have been having trouble with my right hip this trip and this didn't help it.

I noticed that they use a lot more scooters and motorcycles here than we do and I have lots of pictures to illustrate this point.

Taking more pictures when I got there I looked at my guide book and decided to take what they describe as the Marais walk. I am using Rick Steves' 2008 which a friend at work gave me along with Paris for dummies which I looked through but didn't bring with me.

The Marais walk is pretty interesting and it starts right at the Bastille.
I went to the Hotel de Sully, Victor Hugo;s House and a large park next it named Place des Vosges. Victor Hugo's required some stairs so I stopped at the park after to ease my hurting hip.

By now my feet were starting to hurt also.

Next stop on the walk was the Carnavalet Museum, since it was on the way and free. Some fascinating stuff about Paris history but once again there were three floors of walking involved.

Next stop was what the guide book called the Jewish Quarter. Not very Jewish except for restaurants but since it was Saturday I didn't much to be open.
I grabbed lunch at a sandwich show of a Turkey on an Onion roll which was pretty good. After I finished I walked down the rest of it and noticed some big crowds. Apparently Falaffel shops are a hot item in this part of Paris.

Since the Jewish museums were closed I decided to skip the Pompidou Center and headed for the river. My feet were hurting more but my hip wasn't getting much worse which is to say it hurt like hell every time I got up.

I took some pictures of the river and wandered over to Notre Dame. There was a big line waiting to get in and the though of walking to the top of the place was not very appealing given the various hurting parts of my body which now included my back.

I hung out outside Notre Dame for a while taking pictures and sitting down.

From there I walked some more since the Louve was really close, well pretty close.
Next post the Louve and beyond, hint more walking.
First I need to find another restaurant and get dinner or maybe the same as last night, I will see what is open but since that would require more walking I may just take the easy way.