December 30th - Last Day in Paris

On Friday 30th December, we enjoyed our last day in Paris.  We decided, in wisdom, to take the Paris Underground, as opposed to the car, but the kids quite enjoy the train...

We headed off to our ''Meeting the French at Work' visit at a local Bakery/Patisserie, Au Grand Richelieu.  The Bakery itself is the oldest bakery in Paris and we learnt that in order for someone to buy a bakery, they must have a qualification and also 7 years experience.  It was also interesting to learn that in France, while pretty much everyone and anyone strikes from time to time, it is illegal for bakers to strike ever!  The French sure do like their baguettes!!!!!

Claude Esnault has been running the bakery for 42 years and was more than happy to share some of his craft with us.  We shared the tour with a family from Boston, and we all had a go of rolling a croissant and also scoring our own baguettes.

Claude with this Baguette Rolling Machine

Pheonix scoring his baguette

Sequoia's turn

Sequoia rolling a croissant

Baking away

Yum!!!!!!

Parisien Sequoia

 We were given each the baguette that we helped make and also a croissant and we were on our way....first stop the Louvre....

We ended up skipping the massive line to go inside the Museum and opted instead for a leisurely stroll down the Champs Elysee...however all three of us appreciated the awesome archetecture and also the sculptures that are exhibited throughout the grounds.

Notice the Ferris Wheel in the background????  So did we :-)  Of course we jumped on and enjoyed the awesome views....

Down the Champs Elysee

Eiffel Tower from the Ferris Wheel

 We enjoyed a stroll down the Champs Elysee where they had Christmas Market stalls all still set up, and then made our way to the foot of the Eiffel Tower once again....

Pheonix really enjoyed his time playing in the snow at the snowshoe place on Wednesday that he really wanted to spend some more time there.  I got the chance to enjoy a delicious mug of steaming gluwein (mulled spiced wine), and Pheonix spent some time making me a special gift...

For you Mum xxx

We then set off for our boat trip down the Seine....

The boat company was running quite behind schedule so even though we had paid to go on the boat that had been currently boarding, someone made an executive decision and just cut off the line even though the boat was barely full - we got to witness some of that famous French passion (a local went pretty wild with anger), which kept us fairly entertained until the next boat docked....

Our cruise down the Siene, was worth the wait...
I'll just post a few of the pics we took....it was quite wet and we were inside the boat (yay cause it was freezing outside!!!) so between the water-spotted windows and the window-flash, only a few of the pics turned out.

...but I am sure that you get the drift...lol
One thing that these photos will never be able to communicate is just how freezing it was!

Our homestay family were really lovely to us, but one thing I have learnt is, next time, we will go for the English-speaking family and I will know what questions to ask before signing up.

It really was quite awkward....Sequoia, Pheonix and I slept in the three children's room, who slept in their parent's room and Leila and Omar slept on the couches in the loungeroom.  The two younger children didn't seem to mind so much, but I got the distinct feeling the older child really resented us being in his space.  I keep telling myself that the children really would benefit from the money that we paid the family to stay with them, but it was just....awkward.

Maybe it is just me, but to me homestay is a little bit of a culture-exchange and I chose this family because meals are included and in hindsight, I had envisioned us all breaking bread together and muddling through the language thing around the table.  Alas, Sequoia, Pheonix and I were relegated to the tiny breakfast table in the kitchen all on our lonesome....

Also silly me expected that, included in the homestay, the three of us would each be given a towel.  I had left quite a bit of our stuff we were travelling with back in Germany at Andrew's and I will admit that I only had the one travelling towel with us (left in Germany, of course, as between hotels, family and friends, I never expected to have to use our own (bag-space was at a premium!!!).

On the first night we were there, I asked Leila for a towel before I went in to have my shower.  I'm not sure what happened, but before I realised, Leila had a big cupboard over the washer half unpacked and duly pulled out one towel (I must admit that it was a nice towel), handed it to me and then promptly packed everything back into the cupboard...

I didn't have the heart to ask for towels for the kids.

So, the three of us got to share the one towel for the 4 days we were in Paris.  I know, ewww!  I ended up paying Leila some money on the 3rd day, while we were out at Disneyland, to put a small load through the washer for me.  Unfortunately, the machine I thought was the dryer was not a dryer (still haven't worked out what exactly it was for!) and that third night the three of us got to share a slightly damp single towel off the clothes rack....hmmm

Here are the kids in our room just before we left...

I got to sleep on a trundle bed, which is currently out of shot.