September 6, 2019 - Day 5 - Paris

Day 5 - Paris

This was our last day in Paris and we wanted to revisit the shops along Avenue V Des Champs Elysees and sample croissants and coffee at sidewalk cafes. 

We started out with a taxi to the Disney Store on Champs Elysees and purchased some wonderful Disney products that were not available at Disneyland. 

Then we enjoyed croissants and coffee at one of  the many sidewalk cafes and then on to more and more stores. Bill’s backpack was overflowing as well as my shopping bag.  The next thing on our agenda was another tax ride to the Bateaux Mouches boat tour for a one hour and 10 minute scenic ride on the Seine River where we saw Notre-Dame, the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre  and other sites from a different prospective. 

Our last taxi ride of the day was  to the Pont des Arts (bridge of love padlocks) where we placed our padlock on the bridge and tossed the key in the river as is the custom  for a “romantic gesture of eternal love”.  That being done we relaxed and enjoyed the ride back to our hotel.  On the way up to the room I got a couple of beers for us to enjoy before a much needed late afternoon nap.  We had dinner at a local restaurant that advertised  “English spoken here” where we had American style hamburgers and frits.

Notes on Paris:  It is a very expensive city to visit.  The round trip taxi ride to the tourist area is $40.00.  It was probably about 4 miles each way.  Our hamburger dinner cost $30.00.  Our daily croissants and coffee were $25.00 every time we indulged.  The traffic was worse here than in any city we’d ever visited, including China and Japan.  The streets here were originally built for horses and now they occupy buses, cars, motorbikes, scooters and pedestrians everywhere.  I would not want to be a taxi driver in this city!  The law is different for roundabouts here.  Cars entering a roundabout have the right of way where it is just the opposite in America.