Another day, another strike.

Today was day one of a French transportation strike. Yes, we hit it at the perfect time no metro or buses running and no taxis to be found. Since we knew of the impending strike we planned our dayaccordingly, a trip to the Marais. We awoke a bit late due to a few to many drinks last night bysome and had our breakfast. Side note about breakfast, it has been quite the affair. I make cafetea and run to the pâtisserie for croissants (have I mentioned how much I love doingthat?), the boys make omelettes, we slice up some tomatoes, cheese and fruit, throw downsome Nutella and jam then proceed to have quite a feast. The only drawback is that we neverget out of the apartment before 10:30 - 11:00. However, they are lovely meals but back to the story. So we finally get going and wander down to the Marais. This area is traditionally the Jewish quarter, has many small shops and some great falafels. We hit the shops for about an hour, I found a new scarf (my goal is two) then regrouped at the Musee Carnevalet. We took a look at the history of Paris, with a special stop at the Mucha room for MW. From there we got some falafels to go and wandered to the Place de Vosges to sit. From there we went towards the Louvre to find a gelato shop that MW had read about. They had fantastic gelato then we had some cafe to warm up. From there we continued to the Louve and a stroll through the Tuilleries garden. Our goal was to get to the Musee L'Orangerie where, after 6 years, they finally have the huge Monet lily pad paintings on display in their new building. Here was our first big strike interference, they were closing the museum at 5pm instead of 7pm. It was 4:50, so we couldn't go in. We shall try again tomorrow. Anyway we decided to try to get on the Metro. About half of the trains on the main line were running and when one pulled in it was jam packed. Sardines were more comfortable. So we decided to try a different line, after hiking through the station we got to the platform and the sign said 81 minutes to the next train. We believed that must be a mistake so we waited about ten minutes. Meanwhile, they were making some announcements that I couldn't quite catch, finally I asked someone that was leaving the platform after hearing it. She said that it would be an hour for the next train. Wow. We decided to walk. We zigzagged across town towards the apartment. We tried another metro line and it was just as bad. So back to the street. It was actually quite entertaining. The traffic was barely moving except for the mopeds and bicycles snaking their way through the lines of cars. We saw many near accidents but nothing serious. Finally, an hour plus later we got back to the apartment. Mom did a great job, she was with us the entire day and was still upright. After a few aperatifs and a well earned rest, we ventured out for dinner. It wasn't too far from us and was recommended by the owners of our apartment. The food was good and the atmosphere tres Parisien. A great end to another adventure in Paris.

Thanks for reading.