Of course when we did get up we realised it was cold and wet. Undeterred, we got organised to out and planned to walk through Le Marais. Once we got outside we realised that it was very, very wet and very, very cold. At this point we decided to head back to our street and snuggle up in a cafe. There are plenty to choose from, and we picked a lovely organic produce cafe directly across the road from our apartment.
It was full of people having brunch and lots of small children, toddling about. Astrid had a ball chatting to some of the other bubs and even got a hug from a cute little French baby about her size. The menu was full of yummy treats but I decided on the Belgian waffles with fruit and Anto got a breakfast special with a basket of different breads, pain au chocolat, espresso and juice. We had to try some of the yummy Belgian spreads on our food, including a really nice white chocolate one. Astrid was quite happy to eat both waffle and croissant and stole most of the froth off my cappuccino. She got quite a lot of giggles from other cafe patrons as she ran around with chocolate all over her face and hands.
Once we were full of yummy food and coffee, we wandered a couple of doors down and found that there was a Belgian chocolatier that needed investigating. He had an impressive range and was very chatty, so we decided to get a small selection of chocolate to try. We let him choose for us, and so far we haven't been disappointed! We are going to get very fat on this trip :) To go with our chocolate we purchased some of the lovely (and huge raspberries) from the nearby fruit shop. Nightly coffee, chocolate and raspberries are going down well!
Back to the apartment in time for an epic meltdown from a small baby with 2 molars coming through. Luckily we got her off to sleep and she was in somewhat of a better mood upon waking several hours later.
We were itching to get out of the apartment and decided to rug her up and put her in the carrier and go for a walk. Back to our original plan of walking through Le Marais, this time with extra clothes, umbrellas and a waterproofed Astrid. It was quite busy out. Le Marais is pretty much the only shopping district open on a Sunday. We enjoyed walking past the interesting boutiques, cafes, patisseries and chocolate shops. We didn't end up going into many shops. It was quite wet out and we were happy just to window shop.
After a bit of walking around we decided to head back as we were getting wet and cold. We were starting to find our way around without as much reliance on our GPS and were commenting to each other that we were getting so much better and wouldn't need it soon....... only to get hopelessly lost and walk around for about an hour in the wet and cold. Luckily Astrid has fallen asleep in the carrier and was none the wiser. It seems that all the criss-crossing and angled streets mean that if you miss a turn or go down the wrong side street you can easily end up several blocks from where you want to be, very quickly!
In the end we got back to our street and dashed back up to our apartment to get warm and dry and have some dinner. We did manage a few photos of our street, so you can all see what a tough existence we are living!
Even though it was wet and cold you seem to have found an interesting way to fill in the day ... yummy food and walking in the rain.
ReplyDeleteThe shops along the street (or should I say "rue"?) look very inviting on such a gray day.