Bienvenue à Paris...

No caption required!

With Paris mostly crippled by strikes, some Eurostar trains were cancelled, so those running were absolutely full, and the already inadequate departure lounge at St Pancras station was extremely overcrowded, or maybe it's like this every day. The train itself was excellent, smooth, comfortable and fast. We expected problems at Gare du Nord with no Metro running, but it was much worse than we expected. We queued for 90 minutes for a taxi (almost as long as the channel crossing), when we finally got into a taxi (dirty and stinking of cigarettes) it became stuck in a traffic jam before we left the station precinct. The strike was not the taxi driver's fault, and nor was the traffic jam, but he was happy to exploit it at our expense. Waiting rate in Paris taxis is about EUR0.80 a minute so, after 40 minutes when we had travelled less than 100m (we kid you not) so we abandoned the taxi and decided to walk. But our fare for that 100m was over EUR30, about AUD50! The driver was hardly surprised when we abandoned him - probably he wondered why we had persisted for so long.

Documentation of a EUR30 taxi fare to travel 100m!

Dragging our heavy bags, the 2.3km trek felt like a long way, but Google maps was invaluable and it was mostly flat or downhill. Away from Gare du Nord, the traffic was still heavy but moving, so we could have taken another taxi, but by then we were on the road. It took us half an hour or so, but our troubles were not yet over. Checking into our hotel at 8:10pm we were told our room was not ready! After the manager endured Mike's anger and Clare's diplomacy, they upgraded us to a suite which just happened to be available. But (see London post) Hilton Hotels have not covered themselves with glory so far this trip.

The Palais du Louvre at dusk, with the iconic pyramid.

Panoramic view of three wings of the Louvre from the centre of the great square.

Beautiful Sainte Chapelle hides within the Palais de Justice.

But Paris is Paris and the city compensates for all manner of ills. We'd still rather the Metro was working, it's hard on the feet having to walk everywhere, and even with very modest objectives, we finish each day exhausted. Actually, the two driverless Metro lines are still running (nos 1 & 14) so we (like everyone else) find ourselves getting as close to our destination as we can on those lines, than walking the rest of the way. And we have even started to figure out the bus routes. The buses are uncomfortably overloaded and the roads are clogged because of the Metro outage, so nothing is going well.

Iconic Paris architecture under a leaden sky.

Surely one of the most beautiful clocks around, at the Palais de Justice.

Walking, walking, up to 20,000 steps, we spent our days revisiting old haunts, including laundromats. Even though we've seen them before, sometimes multiple times, we never tire of them. Paris is such a city. And to rest our weary feet, we found many occasions to pause for a cleansing ale, a crepe, or some other sort of snack.

Crepes on the street provide, if nothing else, a delicious opportunity to sit down after a lot of walking.

Notre Dame is a manifest catastrophe. The magical spire is gone, of course, and so is the roof and many stained glass windows. Ugly temporary protections are in place, and the whole compound is fenced off like the construction site it is. We could see a few workers high up on the cathedral, but the current activity did not seem to be too intense, the holiday season no doubt. A monstrous construction crane was doing occasional lifts. A sad but essential place to visit when in Paris.

Looking so sad, unsteepled Notre Dame Cathedral in the earliest stage of its massive repair job.

The cathedral has a temporary roof, wooden frames to support its flying buttresses and covers where stained glass windows used to be.

We hadn't yet figured out the buses when we set out to a cafe, the O Coffeeshop, co-owned by a very good friend, so we had a couple of k to walk, from the Avenue de Champs Elysees across the 7th (so past the Eiffel Tower) and into the 15 arrondissement. It sits in long street of tranditional French cafes, so you'd wonder about its viability, but when we got there, we were astonished to see a long queue waiting outside. The patrons appeared to be young and trendy, and it's clear that Aussie themed cafes (featuring lamingtons, smashed avocado and Vegemite) can find their niche in Paris! Thanks to Tim and Matthew for treating us like royalty at the crowded O. And there we discovered a #42 bus would take us all the way back to our hotel next to Gare Saint Lazare! The bus was very full, but (benefits of seniority!) we both got seats and enjoyed the scenery on the way home.

Spectacular Russian Orthodox church and school.

When in the 7th Arondissement, the Eiffel Tower can peek at you between buildings.

In a street packed with cafes, the Australian themed O Coffeeshop has a queue waiting at the door.

Under the magnificient dome at Galerie Lafayette's Hausmann store.

No operating metro line goes near Sacre Coeur either but wanted to go there for the buzz of Montmatre and the view. A bit more savvy now, we found that the #95 bus would go most of the way, so we used it. No luck with seats this time. After enjoying the crowds and excitement of the hill, and finding a cafe for a nice lunch, we were happy to walk it off back to our hotel, downhill all the way.

A true cliche maybe, the great Basilica of Sacre Coeur as viewed from Montmatre.

Looking down the steep cobbled streets of Montmatre.

Almost certainly a fake, this Heath Robinson machine nominally used to make hot spiced wine.

Dramatic skyline over Paris from Sacre Coeur.

This busker at Sacre Coeur knows how to hold a crowd. He even sold some CDs.

Walking everywhere across Paris probably got rid of the last of our jet lag, and eventually it was time to head to Rennes to kick off our driving trip of Brittany.

A modern church, Eglise St Andre de l'Europe, but its bells, which were ringing, look like an afterthought.