Saturday in Paris

It was another grey day with occasional showers but not terribly cold.  But the street market called so we suited up and took off to see what was there.  It's about a 15 minute walk up to Miromesnil and there it all was, spread out before us.  The market is about 5 blocks long with stalls in the street plus a whole line of food shops ~ very Right Bank-y.  The first thing I saw was this!

If I could have found a vase in this space-age apartment I would have bought an arm-load.  And right next door was a little cafe with these colorful tables and chairs out on the street.

Next eye-popping sight was as the patisserie across the street.

This is a little sampler of several of their delicious offerings, tiny bite-sized treats.  I passed, although I was sorely tempted.

We moved on to buy some prepared moussaka at a Greek deli, then some quiche for tomorrow brunch, some greens and fruit.  We passed by this delightful toy store brightly painted and full of beautiful things for children of all ages!  The dad in the photo was lifting up his daughter so she could peek in the window.

This is a typical corner stall for all your fruit needs, including a huge pile of grapes from Italy.

I saw this huge display of hydrangeas in another stall.  They are the strangest color; a sort of bloody rust shade, not the pinkish tone in the photo.  Very fall!

Just outside the market, on an  island in the midst of swirling traffic, sits this carousel.  My theory is that if the tots behave well while Maman or the au pair does the shopping, the reward is a spin in one of the space ships!

We went back laden with our purchases, had a quick lunch of soup and baguette, and headed off for Dehillerin's.  We walked through the Parc to the Monceau metro and finally ended up at the Tuilleries stop (our original destination, Louvre-Rivoli, was closed for repairs).  We walked up the rue Rivoli to rue de Louvre, made a left and walked up to rue Coquilleriers and, le voila!

It being a Saturday, it was mobbed with lookers and buyers in this most famous of Parisian cookware stores.  The store itself is very small and cramped with narrow aisles and shelves crammed with beautiful ~ and VERY expensive ~  wares.   But it is so much fun to inch along and look at the goods, including things I wouldn't have the vaguest idea what to do with once I got them home.  I counted 15 different sizes of ladles ~ FIFTEEN!  The very largest is probably to use with this soup-for-the-city pot (about 3 feet tall).

Both of us were looking for  something specific.  Alex wants one of the traditional French sugar bowls that held paper-wrapped sugar cubes; they're rarely seen in restaurants these days but I think you can still see them in zinc bars in tabacs.  I wanted one of the Dehillerin aprons; all out.  So we came away empty handed but glad we had made the pilgrimage.  Memo to self:  NEVER GO TO DEHILLERIN'S ON A SATURDAY.

It had begun to rain as we walked back to Rue Rivoli.  We took the Palais Royal metro back home, Line 1, direction La Défense to Charles DeGaulle Etoie and then Line 2 direction Nation to Monceau.

For €1.80 (Yikes!  I remember when it was 25 centimes!!) you can go anywhere in this city in relative comfort, except at rush hour when it's sardine time.  The new cars, without the tricky door handles, don't rock and roll along the tracks which always added to the thrill of the ride.  But what a wonderful system they have for moving thousands of people throughout a city with NO street-level  maneuvering necessary!  Imagine.  Oh yes, there's plenty of that with the cars and busses that clog up the city.

Back home through the park on the damp afternoon.  There were lots of families enjoying the cold autumn day, little children so bundled up they could barely walk.  We even saw the ponies plodding their way along the paths with thrilled tots and their terrified parents hovering beside them to avert any possible disaster.

Back home in the late afternoon after a good day of shopping and strolling and marveling over this most wonderful of cities.

The inside courtyard of our apartment has this handsome  building at the back.

On the upper edifice is a big bronze horse head which leads one to believe that at one time it was the stables and the "stable boys" lived upstairs.

So what is its current function?  It's where you put the garbage.  Lo!  How the mighty have fallen.