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Paris in Winter: A Photo Walk with Bob Burgess
by Bob Burgess
 There
is no bad time to visit Paris, but we like it in the winter. My
13-year-old son, Joe, and I have gone to Paris, and once to London,
every February for 5 years, now. We don't go for long, just 4-5 days
over a school holiday so he doesn't miss more than maybe one day of
classes. Joe gets the assignments from his teachers in advance and does
them on the plane. We arrive guilt free and early, around 7 in the
morning. Getting from the airport into town can be expensive;
especially by taxi, but there are other ways. One way to get to and
from the airport is via PariShuttle. They are dependable, promise to make no more than 3 stops, and are a lot cheaper than a cab.
If you have taken the overnight flight, you
will have the whole day ahead of you, but you will be tired, so you
might want to plan on a nap as the first order of business.
In the winter, the weather can be a factor
and you may need a little luck but we have never been unable to do what
we expected. Computer weather pages like The Weather Underground helped us know what to expect and seem fairly accurate.
Now for the good stuff.
In winter, Paris seems to turn back to the
days of old black and white photographs of bare trees, open spaces,
people in long dark overcoats and steaming glass-enclosed cafes. It can
be surreal.
Our favorite walks are the Luxembourg
Gardens where there is a wonderful, warm spot for tea or a sandwich
called Le Buvette des Marionnettes (this is pretty much the only place
I saw open in the Gardens in winter), the Tuileries, the Montparnasse
Cemetery, all punctuated by stops at La Maison du Chocolat for the most mind-boggling cup of hot chocolate ever, bar none, no question.
We stayed at the Relais Bosquet Hotel in the 7th
and around the corner from rue Cler. If you visit one street in Paris,
make it rue Cler, a microcosm of French street shops and life. The
hotel, however, is very quiet with large rooms and baths and loves to
see you in the winter. Very nice people are on hand and there are
several fine bakeries near-by for breakfast if you choose not to have
theirs.
Another fine spot to stay at is the
Hôtel Henri IV Rive Gauche. This one has a small kitchenette in
some of the rooms and is on a cul-de-sac and, therefore, very, very
quiet.
In winter, there are few lines for the museums. We have just walked into the Musée d'Orsay as well as into the amazing Musée Marmottan.
It contains or so they say the world's largest and most important
collection of paintings by Claude Monet, notably the famous "Impression
Soleil Levant", and also many paintings of his friends: Boudin,
Gauguin, Morisot, Renoir, Pissarro and Sisley.
On the corner of the Place de la Concorde and the Tuilerie Gardens lies the Jeu de Paumes Museum.
This easy to miss building used to house the Impressionist collection
now on display at the Musée d'Orsay mostly in storage due to the
lack of space. Now there are special exhibitions of more modern and
contemporary art.
What else do we like? For lunch, LO Sushi on rue de Berri just off the Champs Élysées:
Address: 8, rue de Berri Paris 75008
Specialty: Japanese / Sushi
Phone: +33 1 45 62 01 00
District: 8th
Metro: George V, Franklin D. Roosevelt
A great long bar with comfortable stools and
a conveyor belt that carries small plates of different, inspired things
along. Pick what you want and the bill is totaled by the number (and
color) of the plates you have chosen.
It should go without saying that all of the
normal things hold even more charm in the winter due to the lack of
tourists. By this I mean the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, you know, the
usual.
I hope this might add a little to your trip
as I encourage you to try out the fares and availability of winter
travel in Europe.
Bon Voyage et Bon Courage.
Recent Trip
I have returned from another winter's tale
in France. On the Paris leg we discovered a couple of different
extremes in afternoon delights.
Strange as it may seem, a great, happening
place for lunch or dinner is the catwalk cafe inside the Renault
Showroom on the Champs ElysÈe. Not cheap, nothing is anymore,
but excellent food and you get to see perfectly maintained examples of
vintage Renault automobiles. The cars change from time to time but they
are all stunning in their timeless artfulness. This is absolutely worth
a trip even without the meal.
Another place we spent some time in was Les Jardins des Plantes.
Although we just walked around and enjoyed the stark beauty of the
place in February, there is a zoo (6.00 € entry fee), a small
maze, an astonishing array of plants, trees and flowers just waiting to
burst out in warmer weather.
We spent 2 days in Normandy as part of this
trip and ended up in Paris. Normandy is another story and one that
deserves to be told. A 2.5-hour drive from Paris, the beauty, history
and friendliness of the area is a reminder of the quiet civility that
people can achieve.
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