New Year’s Day 1-1-26

Greetings from Deb. We had such a quiet day today that there wasn’t much for Warren to write about so I’m taking the opportunity to both give him a little break and to answer some questions I’ve gotten from “viewers”.

A description of our little “Apero Lunch”: pate de campagne/ three wonderful cheeses/ grapes/ cherry tomatoes/ lovely heritage apples (Jazz)/ mixed olives/ celeriac salad/ a baguette and butter/ apricot raspberry tart/ and a bottle of champers from a maker new to us. Just a bunch of little bites with dandy flavors.

We are staying in a little AirBNB in the Canal St. Martin area of Paris. It’s an area that has been gentrifying for a while and has some fun little shops and trendy restaurants. Our third floor apartment is a one bedroom of about 500 sq ft total, about 1/2 the Guffey cabin or maybe smaller. It’s been recently totally renovated so is modern, clean and warm. Lots of street noise but virtually no noise from other building tenets.    

Has a small kitchen with all necessary accoutrements should I want to cook (who would want to cook in Paris while on vacation??) Nice shower, great hot water, good washer, an elevator - all the conveniences we prefer. The owner is, we think - not having met her, is a young woman with a taste for books and art. Our kind of person.

And there are nice shops on the street below. A cheese shop run by a charming young couple. A good butcher with dandy rillettes. A boulangerie with a pretty young baker who’s utterly bewitched Warren. A “bazaar” where, if they don’t have it, you don’t really need it. A nearby Franprix which is a convenient general grocery store. A pleasant wine shop. All in all, convenient and pleasant shopping.

The apartment is located close to both Gare de l’Est and Gare du Nord train stations which are also Metro and bus stations so it’s great for getting around. We have Navigo cards which can be charged for about $35 a week and gives unlimited travel within the greater metro Paris area, and will allow us to get the fast train out to the airport. We find that we are using more trips than the cost of the card, but even if we weren’t, it’s great to not have to be counting up trips and worrying if you have enough trips left. We’re primarily using the busses because we love getting to see the city as we get around. I always forget how beautiful the Parisian architecture is. There’s always something new to see, even if you’ve been on a bus line many times before.

But people have asked about the negatives we’ve experienced on this trip, and, as you’d expect on a 90 day trip, there have been some. Not a huge number but some.

For one thing, we’ve had more trouble with websites than ever before. So many museums and other attractions require online booking, (some not even allowing on-site purchases) and then - lo and behold - there are issues with their sites. We speculate that the spate of recent world-wide hacking has inspired tighter security which has some unexpected downsides. For example, the Musee d’Orsay site gets me right to checkout and then goes into an error message death spiral. Their email tech support was totally useless. Another example, the Graphic Arts Department of the Louvre bounces all my emails because despite multiple variations, its site is convinced I’m a spammer. I’m actually writing in French, but I’ve tried English, too, - all to no effect. It’s very frustrating. And I’m not the only sufferer. When I went on the web to troubleshoot, I found rafts of other folks similarly afflicted.

Warren, a former IT professional, was almost driven to drink by the current Eurail website. At one point only the gracious forgiveness of a Eurostar conductor saved us from a hefty fine for not validating a ticket in advance.

So those have been frustrating negatives. I guess the only other thing I can bring to mind is that the crowds are much bigger than any we remember. Part of the reason we have travelled in the winter was to avoid the high season crowds, but that isn’t working anymore. The crowds outside Musee d’Orsay looked like summertime crowds to us.

And we have seen some changes to Paris that we mourn. Our favorite seafood restaurant - gone. Our favorite department store, BHV, on its last legs and consorting with the despicable Shein. Our beloved cheese shop, Ferme de Chloe, in the 19th arr.- gone. But change is inevitable so we suck it up and explore new options, but think pleasantly of the old friends. We persevere.

So, looking both forward and backward like Janus, we start the new year. Happy 2026 to you!