Monday July 6th Pont Au Mousson to Paris

It was cooler last night, so we slept comfortably. We walked into town for breakfast. We bought some pastries at a bakery and sat down at a café to enjoy them with coffee. Then we went back to the room to do a little packing and computing. We headed out for another beautiful run along the river. Then we checked out of the hotel and started our drive to Paris.

We went to get gas before we left town and that was a little adventure—finding the right pump and how to pay for it and dispense it.

The road to Paris was nice for the most part. No billboards or shopping centers for the most part. Just countryside and small villages. Some rest stops. Lots of toll plazas. Some fairly bad public art. I listened to a bunch of podcasts to pass the time. As we got 45 minutes, 30 minutes outside of Paris, we were surprised to see no real exurbs, suburbs or sprawl. It was pretty much country and then city.

We met up with the apartment caretaker, Jeremy around 4:30. He showed us around the apartment with it’s funny key, mini fridge, and single unit washer/dryer. We are staying in the 4^th arrondissment, Le Marais. French for The Marsh. It was old marsh land that was now the hottest neighborhood in Paris. Home to the hassidic Jews, gays, and artists. He gave us some local reccomendations and he and his little dog romeo was on his way.

We went to park the car in the underground lot and were shocked to see the rate was 38 Euro for 24 hours—like $60 a day for parking! We vowed to find something better in the morning.

After we loaded in and started some laundry, we set off walking for dinner. We walked past La Place De Vosges, a small urban park and garden. It was too early for dinner at a recommended restaurant, so we headed to the main street nearby and found a place where we saw people eating. We had steak and salad and fries. We were both pretty pooped from the travel, so we headed back home and spent the evening settling in and planning our days ahead. Jon finished planning his trip to London, I found cheaper parking online, and we watched our last episode of The Wire that we had with us on the trip.