I turned 30 in August! In the EU, COVID-19 is under control enough to open borders to most countries, so we decided to go to Paris for my birthday. I’m usually the kind of tourist with a packed itinerary. We’re talking google-maps-ing walking directions to optimize speed between stops. But we slowed down a bit with this trip. We spent 5 days in Paris, and I’m really happy with our low-key, mosey speed. I also talk a lot, so I’m splitting this into two parts.
Where we stayed for our 5 days in Paris:
We are pretty avid AirBnB users. It’s not worth it to pay the premium cost for a room we want to spend as little time in as possible. If a hotel is more convenient to tourist locations, we’ll spring for one. But for this trip, an Airbnb fit just right.
We stayed in a cute little studio in Montmartre. Located at the top of the building, it had two tiny little balconies and some great city views. It wasn’t luxurious – it seriously has the smallest shower known to mankind. But it was a perfect launchpad for our adventures in Paris.
The view from our Airbnb studio in Montmartre.
Another advantage to Airbnb is having a kitchen. Part of our budget strategy for travel is to plan to cook for ourselves for several meals. I know it sounds like blasphemy to cook for oneself in the land of incredible food, but skipping a couple lunches out makes a world of difference on cost. Also, it gave us an opportunity to explore a foreign grocery store!
Montmartre is an awesome neighborhood. It was originally outside the walled city of Paris and became a hub for more elicit recreations. The Moulin Rouge was about a 20-minute walk from our apartment, and there’s a functioning winery just uphill of it. (Back in the day, wine brought inside the city walls was taxed heavily, so people went outside the walls to drink.) Our apartment was just around the corner from Sacré-Cœur, a gorgeous church sitting on the highest hill in Paris. This hill is the site of old gypsum mines, where Plaster of Paris came from!
Now for the actual itinerary!
Saturday – Day 1
We took the train from Berlin. It was long – about 8.5 hours – but we aren’t comfortable flying yet, given COVID-19. And besides, the train system in Europe is incredible.
We arrived about 4pm at Gare de l’Est, one of the main train stations in the city. After a quick 20-minute walk, we found our Airbnb (and ended up schlepping our suitcases up the wrong staircase, then back down and up the right staircase…oops).
We deliberate plan nothing on a travel day, so we settled in at the Airbnb and then went around the corner to a restaurant for dinner (L’Eté en Pente Douce). We planned to eat and wander the neighborhood a bit. Unfortunately, our dinner table was wobbly and I dumped an entire glass of wine in my lap. So instead, we enjoyed our food (seriously – my “salad” involved a huge chunk of goat cheese!) and headed back to the Airbnb to scrub my pants off. Zack grabbed a bottle of wine at the corner store downstairs, and we had a glass before bed.
Just…so much goat cheese.
Sunday – Day 2
My birthday! I wanted a chill day, not hurried, no swollen feet or hangry decisions. Just chill.
That, and Impressionist art!
So. We slept in some and then headed to the Musée d’Orsay. The Paris metro system is excellent and we used it all week. At Rick Steves’ suggestion, we bought a couple discounted 10-packs of one-way tickets. On our walk from the Metro to the museum, we grabbed silly food from a touristy café. We arrived quite a bit ahead of our timed ticket slot, so we walked along the Seine toward the Eiffel Tower.
After observing the tower from below, we wandered back toward the museum and ate at Café Le Buisson d’Argent. Then, into the museum.
Musée d’Orsay was originally built as a train station to handle the influx of visitors for Paris’ 1900 World’s Fair. Now, it houses an impressive collection of Impressionist and post-Impressionist art, as well as being a gorgeous building to wander through.
We spent a couple hours soaking in some of my favorite artists’ work, then went back to the Airbnb to nap (highly recommended in any vacation), shower, and get dressed for dinner.
For dinner, we went to Le Murat and had some incredible French-Thai fusion food. I didn’t take any pictures of our food because we were the ONLY PEOPLE IN THE RESTAURANT. Between COVID restricting tourist season, the normal quiet that is August in Europe, and the UEFA Championship game (Bayern vs. Paris), restaurants were pretty quiet that night.
Monday – Day 2
A day of walking tours. We used Rick Steves’ walking tours (one from his book and one on his app), and I will always recommend them. It’s such a good way to supplement a city walk.
But first: brunch. We went to The Hardware Société Paris, run by a friendly Australian man who was happy to accommodate our English speaking.
Burrata, poached eggs, and roasted carrots for me. 
French toast with raspberries, mint, and coconut for Zack.
Then, up the hill to tour Sacré-Cœur (free to go in, 5 Euros to go up for the view from the top) and get some great views of the city.
After that, we loosely followed Rick Steves’ Montmartre walking tour, seeing the neighborhood through the lens of the Impressionist movement – including where Picasso, Degas, and Toulouse-Lautrec lived! Ending at the Moulin Rouge, we then walked back to the apartment for grocery shopping and our daily nap.
After the nap, we embarked on a second walking tour, seeing Notre Dame and the surrounding area. Notre Dame is still closed after the fire in April 2019, and many of the other spots on the tour were closed by the time we got to them, so it was a pretty quick walk.
We were hungry by that point, so we stopped for some crepes and wine before heading home.
Tuesday – Day 3
I love musicals and fancy buildings, so on Tuesday we headed to the Palais Garnier, the setting for Phantom of the Opera and the most thoroughly fancy building I think I’ve ever been in. The audio tour was informative, if geared toward children. Fun fact: in Phantom of the Opera, a huge plot point involves a river running under the opera house, and as it turns out, there’s LITERALLY A BODY OF WATER UNDER THE REAL-LIFE OPERA HOUSE. And the tour casually dropped that fact into the audio tour mid-sentence. Why was it not a major point in the tour?! It’s crazy! When they dug the foundation, they found an aquifer and had to contain it so the building wouldn’t sink, so there’s a lake under the opera house!
After touring the operahouse, we wandered through Jardin des Tuileries and then up the Champs-Élysées to the Arc de Triomphe, with more views of the Eiffel Tower from the top.
A quick note about our trip: we were planning on spending five days in Paris and then training to the French Riviera for our honeymoon, but at this point, Paris and the Riviera were both put on Germany’s COVID-19 Travel Advisory list (required COVID test upon return and quarantine until negative test result), so we had to make a decision about whether to continue our trip or not. We made our decision to head home while we were at the top of the Arc. Ultimately, we feel we made the right choice, but the rest of our trip was a bit colored by the disappointment that our honeymoon was cancelled…again.
For dinner, we went to Sacrée Fleur, which was up the street from our apartment. The most amenable Frenchman runs it and he speaks absolutely no English. I got steak and Zack got prawns and washing those down with a bottle of good wine made for the right way to come to terms with cutting our trip short.
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