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!