Month: March 2026

Paris 4

Paris 4, January 2026

Our final day in this lovely part of a lovely city (sad face). The rain we experienced yesterday morning had blown over and though it was cloudy and more was forecast, we entered the day with hope for a walk before heading to Gare du Nord for the train back to London and on to St Leonards.

After breakfasting in the hotel, packing up and farewelling our small but perfectly formed room we headed out the door for our final stroll up and down the hill that is Montmartre. There are so many different options to take, narrow cobbled streets and steep steps are everywhere, there is almost no need to repeat a previous walk. I just love a steep narrow cobbled street, or any combination of two of those things, especially when nestled in between tall houses that have seen a lot more history than I have.

Our main objective today was to visit the Musée de Montmartre. On the second floor is a recreation of the studio and home of the artist Suzanne Valadon, who lived in the building with her husband and son from 1912.

Valadon was well known in Montmartre, as a model (for Renoir among others), a muse, a lover and eventually as the great artist she was.

We didn’t know too much about her life or art until I read a Substack essay just before we came here. After a tough childhood in the late 1890s, from early life in rural France to desperate poverty in Paris, she lived an amazing and full life. Starting as an acrobat and street performer and then artist’s model when Montmartre was almost the centre of the artistic world, with so many (today anyway) well known artists living in this small enclave. Artists like Renoir, Toulouse-Lautrec (who named her Suzanne), Van Gough, Degas, Utrillo (her husband) and Picasso all lived in the area at the same time.

We were interested to see some of her work.

We arrived at the museum a little early and were bemused at the couple of people waiting outside to go in, especially after the size of the queue at the LVF On Monday which had hundreds of people. I preferred this one to be fair.

The museum was OK, there wasn’t a lot to see that particularly interested me until we got to the Valadon rooms. These few small rooms have been designed to represent what life was like for her one hundred or so years ago.

Her paintings adorn some of the walls in this tiny apartment.

The studio was fabulous, with wonderful light and deep shadows. I love looking at how creative people work(ed), it’s slightly less interesting now, with so much work done on computers; often with ginormous monitors. Perhaps I should recreate a classic ‘creative’ space and that would inspire me to be a better writer, photographer or something else. Maybe not, I’m not so big on clutter.

Then, merde!

It was time to collect our bags and walk back down the hill of Montmartre to get the metro to Gare du Nord, the Eurostar to St Pancras, the Northern Line Tube to London Bridge and the train back to St Leonards and home.

I LOVED Montmartre 🙂

Paris 3

Paris 3, January 2026

As expected, the day dawned with rain outside the window, not too heavy but not too light either. Enough to dampen the sound of the street outside our first-floor window waking up and obscure the window of the yet to be open record shop opposite. There was no pre-breakfast walk this morning, or even a particular rush to get out of the door.

We had tickets booked for 11am at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs to visit the ‘100 years of art deco’ exhibition. We walked in the rain to the nearby Abbesses Metro station, taking in cobbled streets of Montmartre we hadn’t set on before.  The seats on the platform of Abbesses station, and some of the others we had seen on the green line, were very chic. So Paris, some might say. The Metro has been very easy to use, other than the very narrow barriers making life difficult for someone with a wide backpack – like me.

We arrived before the museum opened and sheltered for a while over coffee in a Starbucks over the road. Their coffee is still too milky for my more austere taste. With a couple of minutes before opening, we crossed back over and joined the short, but growing queue.

The exhibition was interesting, I was hoping for more architecture, and it was quite small, the focus being more on art deco era jewellery and homeware rather than buildings. The clue was in the name of the museum ‘decorative arts’. I enjoyed it nonetheless, especially the travel posters, some of which would look great on my wall.

The museum was next door to the much better known Louvre. Last time I was in in Paris we queued for ages to get in and it was very busy. I think it’s even busier now, but not on a rainy Tuesday in March.  While there were a few people about, and there has been plenty of selective photography and cropping in the edit, I was surprised (pleasantly) how deserted it all was at not far off midday. Pro tip; go to Paris in the rain.

We had no intention of going into the Louvre, we’ve both been before, and nor did we have any intention of going into Notre-Dame either, though that was our next destination.

Walking along an almost deserted Seine riverbank in the rain was very enjoyable, Paris, as so many people have said, is a beautiful city. As it wasn’t bombed in the Second World War, the city wasn’t subjected to the random building work that has plagued London ever since. Central Paris has largely retained its mid-1800s Hausmann design to great effect.

The rain started to fall more heavily as we walked over Pont Neuf to Île de la Cité, one of two islands in the River Seine and the location of Notre-Dame. In need of a wee, a sit down, a drink and some lunch we found a café to take shelter in just off the main square by that most famous cathedral.

We both had French onion soup (or onion soup as they call it in France), loaded with cheese and bread – perfect wet weather food and delicious. Sometimes the tourist places deliver exactly what you want.

The weather hadn’t improved while we ate so we decided to cross back to the ‘mainland’, walk through the Latin Quarter to the Pantheon and then get the Metro back to the hotel.

I had fond memories of the Latin Quarter from 2012 but was disappointed today. It was possibly the weather, possibly tiredness, but it seemed to be less interesting than I recalled.

The Pantheon was great under a dark grey sky.

On the way back to the hotel we had one of those classic train moments that just never seem to actually happen in real life. At Sèvres – Babylone station Eleanor had got on the train and I waited to allow an old couple to get on first; they took so long the doors closed and I was left standing on the platform!

Luckily, there is decent mobile connectivity on the Metro so we arranged to meet at the station where we needed to change lines. We both found it quite amusing, fortunately.

After an afternoon rest we walked around Montmartre, I had a date with a record shop which was loosely on the way to where we planned to go for dinner ( It wasn’t really). It was a great shop with a good collection of second-hand records and a friendly vibe; I bought a couple of LPs as I couldn’t help myself, I will go back next time we stay here and spend a bit more time.

We’d found a vegan restaurant online and while we were the only customers during the time we were there the food and wine were fantastic; another great evening meal.  Amusingly, Tuesday night seemed to be local running club night on the hills and steps of Montmartre; as we ate our food, we watched groups and individual runners pounding up the hill to Sacre Coeur and back down again. We decided to join them in a slow walk after our meal. There are plenty if hills to walk off that lovely dinner.

Sacre Coeur was magnificent all lit up with white spotlights and the zipping and zapping of the runners, many with headlights, made for an enjoyable time on the top of the hill.

Walking back towards our hotel we spotted the Eiffel Tower in the distance.

Another fabulous, albeit wet, day in this fabulous city.

Paris 2

Paris, January 2026
First things first. The French, or at least the Parisians, do say ‘Voilà’, and they seem to say it a lot. I liked that. Secondly, all those stories about Parisians being rude to tourists, particularly the English, are, of course, complete pants, admittedly, these seem to be old stories. Everyone was very friendly.


We stayed in a hotel named after the writer Marcel Aymé. To be perfectly honest, prior to Eleanor booking the hotel I’d never heard of him. He was a prolific writer, though English translations are rare. He was born in Burgundy in 1902, moving to Paris in 1923 where he discovered a love and talent for writing, publishing his first novel in 1926. He lived most of his life in Montmartre. His most famous short story is Le passe-muraille or “The Walker-Through-Walls”. He died in 1967. He was also very cool.


We had a lot planned for today, the only day of the three days we have in Paris where rain isn’t forecast, so walking these lovely historic streets was in order. We started early, squeezing 40 minutes around Montmartre before breakfast in the hotel. The sculpture of ‘The walker through walls’ just round the corner was our first stop.


We had a lovely walk around the area. We/I should do more morning-before-breakfast walks when on holiday; it was so peaceful and as everyone who does photography knows, the light at the beginning and end of the day is usually the best.


One of the things I like about Montmartre, a location typical to the ones we try to stay in, is the mix of residential and tourist places. Seeing the residents going about their early morning, kids to school, walking to the station, grabbing coffee and breakfast on the way, just enhances the feel of a place. It’s as close to living somewhere as can be experienced in a few days.


We also got a great view towards the Eifel Tower, something that was impossible with the low cloud last night. I get an absolute thrill out of seeing such iconic things. I know it’s a cliché to love the view of the tower over Parisian rooftops, but hey. It’s fucking cool.


Way back when we first discussed coming to Paris, we timed the trip so we could see the Gerhard Richter exhibition at the Louis Vuitton Foundation (LVF). We used the metro to get as close to the gallery as possible, though were surprised to find that the map’s recommended way took us through a bit of forest.


I was expecting to be walking through something open and grassy, like a London royal park. It was a little creepy walking through straggly trees not really knowing where we were going; especially to something as fancy as the LVF; which is an amazing building, and coming from the direction we did, completely out of place.


Gerhard Richter was born in Germany in 1932 and has been called ‘the world’s best living painter’. He is constantly changing, moving through a wide range of abstract styles over his career and this exhibition was vast, with so many impressive works, some of them huge; like ‘The Stroke (on red)’. Up close, this 20-metre long painting made from tiny individual brush strokes is stunning. It must have taken weeks to paint.


He had a period of very clinical, clean and brightly coloured works as well a ‘grey’ period.


I took a lot of photos in the exhibition; Richter was prolific and an artistic shapeshifter and with such a variety of work there was a lot I liked and a lot that didn’t appeal at all. I particularly liked his photo-realistic paintings, both from an early and late in his career.


I can’t say it was my favourite work, but a special mention has to go to his 1983 work ‘Candle’ which is best known as the cover of Sonic Youth’s 1988 album ‘Daydream Nation’, one of my favourite records.


We left the LVF after a tasty lunch in the (expensive) restaurant and walked to the Arc de Triumph. We’d both been up it before so decided to keep on going down towards the river Seine and the Eiffel Tower.


There is nothing I can say that will add to the many thousands (millions?) of references made to this wonderful piece of late 19th century engineering. It is impressive, I and the hundreds of people queuing to make their way up to the viewing platform, will attest to that.


We took a slow meander back to a metro station before heading back to the hotel. It had been a good day.

Paris 1

Paris, January 2026
Ah Paris, how much do I love thee? Quite a lot, it seems. We’d planned this trip a few months ago when Eleanor spotted that there was a Gerhard Richter exhibition at the Louis Vuitton Foundation that coincided with the 13th anniversary of our first date. I can’t believe we’ve been together that long; the time has passed in a blur.

We’d been talking about visiting Paris for ages. We’ve both been before, but not since we’ve been together. I have a bit of a fascination with the 1968 student uprisings, and the many others that have taken place here, as well as the city’s long association with art and writing. And, well, it’s just a cool place to visit. Mid‑January seemed like a decent time to go too, as I’m not really a peak‑tourist‑season kind of guy.

We decided to stay in Montmartre, one of the old centres with fantastic steep, narrow cobbled streets – always a favourite of mine, as well as its historic artistic links. Eleanor found a great hotel named after the writer Marcel Aymé; more on him in the next post.

We took the Eurostar from St Pancras (I wish it would run from Stratford International – it was supposed to, as it’s only 15 minutes from home) at a reasonable time in the morning, arriving in Paris in the early afternoon. As I’d booked early enough, the Economy Plus option wasn’t much more than basic economy, and I’m sure we easily ate and drank the difference. Eurostar terminates at Gare du Nord, and it’s not the station I remember; it was clean, not madly busy, and much easier to navigate than I expected. Paris was the first European city I visited on my 2012 travels, and I felt much more confident than I did back then. Perhaps it was just confidence that made things seem easier? Anyway, we used the Metro and found our hotel with no hassle at all.


The ‘fantastic, steep cobbled streets’ didn’t disappoint. It’s Sunday and there are quite a few tourists about, especially at the top of the ‘Mont’, where the fabulous Sacré‑Cœur Basilica (Sacred Heart) towers over its surroundings.


We had a gentle (as gentle as is possible on steep cobbled streets) stroll with no plan in mind other than absorbing the atmosphere and spotting places we might want to check out when it’s less busy.


Surrounded by eating establishments mainly frequented by tourists, the former abbey square, the Place du Tertre, was opened to the public as Montmartre’s village square in 1635. From the late 18th century, it became a renowned hangout for painters and other artists, with many famous names setting up their easels here over the years. Many of the major figures in the French and European art world in the late 1800s and early 1900s lived or worked around here: Picasso, Dalí, Renoir, Degas, Valadon (more on her later), van Gogh, and Matisse among the big names. You can still get your portrait painted here, even on a rainy Sunday afternoon.


As expected, the area around Sacré‑Cœur and the steps down from the church entrance was very busy, even on a damp Sunday afternoon. We had no intention of going into the church on this trip, so we just stopped to take the obligatory photo from the top of the steps, looking south over the city of Paris. Which reminds me: I was geographically discombobulated on this trip. Eleanor may say that this is my usual state, but it’s embedded in my head that the view over the city is to the north, and this really messed me up the whole time we were away.


We walked down the steps and on to Boulevard de Clichy, where we passed the famous Moulin Rouge. I knew that historically this was Paris’s red‑light district, and part of the reason it attracted so many bohemian and artistic types in its heyday a hundred or so years ago. I’d walked past the Moulin Rouge when I was here in 2012. What I wasn’t expecting was that it’s still very much the red‑light district: sex shop after strip club after sex shop all along Boulevard de Clichy, all brightly lit in the early evening gloom.


As the light disappeared we headed back up the hill and stopped for a negroni (then another) in a small bar that seemed the least touristy – though of course there is no such thing in this corner of Paris. We’ve really got into negronis recently, moving on from our previous favourite, the Old Fashioned. These were good ones; hence staying for a second.


Later that evening we had a fabulous meal at Le Maître, a small modern French restaurant that we’d booked a while back. The food was very good, as was the vibe of the place. We always research and book one meal before leaving home – not always on the first night, but tonight was our 13th anniversary, and a special meal to celebrate was in order.

It wasn’t raining when we wobbled out of the restaurant with full bellies, so we took a slow walk back to the hotel; taking in a few more of those lovely cobbled streets. Roll on tomorrow!