As I type this, it’s lunchtime in the office. I’m feeling rather tired after a long weekend.

So, on Friday, Yuko’s cousin arrived from Japan, and we met up with him in London. That made it nice and easier for us to hop onto the Eurostar on the Saturday morning to head off towards Paris for the weekend.

Impressions of Paris.

  • RER Line A from Gare du Nord towards the centre of town is bloody awful! Full of lots of dodgy looking characters.
  • The centre of Paris is very beautiful, and a tour along the Seine is well worth the money. Sure, London has it’s famous landmarks, but the buildings next to them are sometimes rather drab. It seemed the whole of the central part of Paris was very historic and pretty looking. Imagine a big version of Bath!
  • Reviews on American websites about food service being really slow, and waiters being rude are exaggerated based on our experience there. One place we went into had a waiter with a slightly snooty demeanour, but he certainly wasn’t rude to us despite my very bad French.
  • Whilst pre-booking a restaurant online seemed a good idea, as it was going to be busy for the weekend, it wasn’t really necessary. The place we booked at for Saturday night was OK, but the not great food. Waitress was very friendly and helpful though. The second night, we ignored our booking and found another place.
  • Paris makes London seem cheap. I suspect that’s because I can sort of find my way around London and know what I’m looking for there. On Sunday night though, we ate very well, and very (relatively speaking) cheaply at a French-Algerian place near the hotel in the La Defence region.
  • We really liked the 5th Arrondissement part of Paris. Rue Mouffetard was great, and we got some plonk from the wineshop there.
  • The l’Arc de Triomphe is a lot cheaper to climb, takes less time to queue for, and still provides a great view of the city. Don’t bother with climbing the Eiffel Tower we reckon.

Would just me and Yuko go there again. Probably not… though the idea of a little wine tour somewhere else in France sounds tempting.

Yesterday, having arrived back in Cardiff on Monday night, we spent the day up in Herefordshire. With the great weather, it was rather interesting to go on a tour of the Westons Cider factory. We went up to that part of the world to show Yuko’s cousin some countryside. We also popped into get some lunchtime snacks from Handmade Scotch Egg company since we were in the right part of the world. Normally, they come to Cardiff Riverside Market every 3rd Sunday of the month… but we’ll be in London this Sunday.

Anyway, suppose I should do some work now. Yuko and cousin are wandering St. Fagans at the moment. Lucky them!