Friday, February 19, 2010

POST PARIS...

I finally have time to sit down and get my thoughts together about my trip to Paris the weekend before last. The competition, if you recall, was held by the Regional Tourism Committee of Paris Ile-de-France for their campaign Le Nouveau Paris. My entry was posted here and in it I described in detail what my perfect weekend in Paris would be. To have won something (when the last thing you won was a disco dancing competition in 1986) and to have the prize for that something be a weekend in Paris with a friend (when in 1986 the prize was a packet of crisps and a 7" single) - well, I was pretty chuffed really.













Myself and my friend, plus three other bloggers and their respective guests, set off early on the Saturday morning from St. Pancras. We were accompanied by lovely Pauline from We Are Social who looked after us all weekend, along with the also lovely Marjorie from Nouveau-Monde DDB who we met in Paris. We were picked up at the Gare du Nord by a lipstick pink bus (the colour was probably unintentional, but I appreciated it anyway.)


From then on it was a blur of eating, drinking and roaming until we (ok, I) crashed out on the train on Sunday night. There were lots of exhibitions we could have gone to in the afternoons, but since I go to Paris quite often and we didn't have much time, my friend and I took the opportunity to catch up with friends while we were there. So on the cultural side of things Z and I scored nul points, although we did spend about two hours in my favourite Pharmacie (on the corner of rue des Archives, behind BHV), gawping at beauty products which perform functions that simply don't exist in this country (bio lifting sculpting anti-cellulite serum hydration for the bit of skin behind your left ear.) Can't get enough of it.
One other thing I was secretly thrilled about was that when a French person asked me directions to rue St Honore (in French) I somehow managed to give them (in French) and the person, instead of looking confused, thanked me and went in the direction I had told them to go in. This is called progress.


It's always lovely to be in Paris, but what was different this time was that instead of grabbing the odd snack here and there as I usually do, we all went to a lovely restaurant for a proper lunch, then again for dinner. As David pointed out in his post, the gap between lunch and dinner seemed to close further each day. I'm still dreaming about this steak I had at Le Saut du Loup. The food must have had a lasting effect on all of us, because last week I bumped into one of the other bloggers from the trip, Jenny, in Selfridges Food Hall, where we were both buying Pierre Herme macaroons. I haven't caught David or Marc, our other blogging companions, lurking around the macaroon section yet, but it may only be a matter of time.

4 comments:

david the designer said...

I'm afraid it would take more than a macaroon to tempt me into Selfridges, Claire. Though I'm always happy to partake in Paris again, if anyone's offering.

Unknown said...

like the photos...;))
and bravo for the french part!!! ;))

...C you rocked paris i see!

Anonymous said...

that chair+dog picture is sooo Paris! Brilliant.
xxx
Mia

Badaude said...

Oh yeah it's always sooo great when French people ask you directions! I love it, and I always direct them somewhere, even if I'm not sure, just for the joy of it!