We are so very fortunate to be able to spend a large chunk of time here. It affords us the luxury of wandering aimlessly some days, and for taking self-guided walking tours recommended in one of our books or online other days. We've also discovered a website called "Meetup". The idea is to bring people together who have similar interests and let them have fun. We signed up a few weeks ago and are already making friends. Bob has gone on 3 or 4 Photo excursions with the "photo group" and made friends and learned of new parks and places we could visit that would never show up in a guide book. I signed up for French Language, Sketching/Art, and of course, exercise. Unfortunately there hasn't been much activity in my groups until this week. I have gone to two bootcamp classes on the lawn in front of the Eiffel Tower. Pinch me, did I really do this? The instructor is a very amiable Brit, whose wife in his words "brought him kicking and screaming to Paris". He has a very playful approach to conducting bootcamp, which I have really enjoyed.
Today we went on one of the guided walks sponsored by Meetup. It wasn't quite what we expected, but we saw a part of Paris that we would never have visited on our own. The communications about the walk were all in impecable English, but when we arrived, we discovered it was going to be all in French! Oh well, we can walk in any language! There were a number of bilingual folks who would give quick translations of the main points. Besides, Christophe, the guide, was a man of not many words anyway! We pretty much kept moving for a good 2.5 hours and I spent a good deal of time talking with various people as we wandered through a few different neighborhoods, some more scenic than others. Every time I tried to engage in French conversation, the person would quickly revert to English... I think they were trying to tell me something about my French. One lady, who had been married to an English speaking husband laughed when I told her i spoke kindergarten French. Apparently he said the same to her all the time! I tried to tell her in French that we went to Reims for a few days. However when I pronounced it in the French manner, she gave me a funny look. I finally said it was a trip to taste champagne, and she got it. She said that the way I pronounced it sounded like a word used when food went bad! So glad I had THAT conversation.
Here are some photos of our walk. Basically, the neighborhood is built on gypsum, which only allows for 3-4 sotry buildings. There were many narrow passage ways and walkways between homes and apartments, giving it a very different feel than central Paris. The building were mostly built 200 years ago, and were of many different styles, and quite charming. The church had an interesting hisstory. It was originally a German Llutheran Church, but the French government bought them out and gave it to the Russian Orthodox. Which explains the very different styles in one building.
Tomorrow we will go on another walk from Versaiiles all the way back to Paris on the route royalty used to use way back when. We will have Christophe as our guide and I'm sure will meet more interesting people.
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