A quick trip to Paris

I took a quick trip to Paris for some meetings... I love Paris. I've been lots of times and it never loses it's romance.

On the first night, we go for a meal with some friends. It;s very nice to be integrating with local france... It;s a very nice bottle of wine, but we have early meetings, so it's an early night, without seeing much paris.

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After a day of meetings, beside the pompidou centre...








..... its a social dinner in an unremarkable restaurant followed by (expensive)unremarkable beer in an unremarkable bar. There's so many of these little bars in Paris. I call them "Amelie bars", the atmosphere in them is very far from my preferred drinking environment.... so to bed without seeing much more Paris....

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Friday, and another day of meetings. This time, we have the evening to ourselves, so we head off to my favourite restaurant:



Vin de Pyrenees is a restaurant I discovered by accident the first time I came to Paris. I was visiting the street where Jim Morrison died, and by the time we found it, we were really really hungry and tried to get into a little restaurant beside Jim's flat.

The maitre d' was the usual parisian surly when I asked if he spoke english.... I then told him I was Scottish and he welcomed us in..

It was one of those places where you have a candle lit dinner for two but on long tables with benches, so we had to step over other patron's knees to get to our table - or more correctly our bit of the table. The food was wonderful....

I finally found it again, a few trip sto paris ago, and it's changed owners a few times, but the food is at least as good, or possibly better.

We survive the sticky weather by having a rose before we get stuck into some Cote De Boeff....



Satiated, we head off back to the hotel with a meander round the Marais....















FInally I got to see some of Paris. The Marais is always great, and tonight is no exception... it's dark, but there's so much light, and its the middle of the summer, so everything iss bathed ina beautiful glow that(coupled with the protein overdose), makes everything seem absolutely beautiful.

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We have a half day of meetings, and then I head back up to Amsterdam. My trip is entertained by Lego Star wars:



It;s great to combine star wars with lego.... and you feel like you're 8 yrs old...

...back in Amsterdam, I head straight to the pub to meet The Kiwi for drinks... I'm shattered, but the weather is good, the beer is cold, and a summer of travelling has just begun...




Bon nuit...

Paris to Brussels

The day of the conference is very long and boring, not helped by the fact that there is a star wars exhibition on(But closed on a monday), which tempts me with childhood enthusiasm to go up and sit in an X-wing:










It's away from the centre of paris, so gives me the opportunity to see another area, but generally it is a long day of meetings. We're even too tired to find a decent restaurant at night and eat somewhere near our hotel...... It's an early night before we get up early to drive to Brussels for a lunch meeting... It seems like less than a fortnight since I was last here.. Luckily we are soon out of Brussels and heading back to Amsterdam with Camp Freddy radio entertaining us..

We are almost across the border when we make a piss stop at what appears to be the most inbred service station:



My boss become obsessed with driving deeper into the surrounding villages in order to see either bestiality or incest..... but really just to have a break from the monotony of the motorway.....

Eventually we give up and get a map out to work out where we are, and how we get back to the motorway...


We are in Oostmalle. Now to someone who knows his belgian beers, a little dutch and rudimentary physics, its not to far a jump to guess that Westmallle is probably to the west of Oostmalle(Oost is dutch for east). Westmalle is a beer...... We are now driving west in search of a Brewery:



On our way to the brewery, we head into a supermarket. We now have a new hobby when heading home from Brussels; heading into flemish supermarkets to buy cheap belgian beer. After purchasing some beers and some glasses, it's off along the road to find the brewery:



Unfortunately, maybe due to the time of year, there is no obvious visitor centre. What I do notice is a sign for trappist abbey cycling routes......

We head back to the Motorway, and travel back to Amsterdam as my brain fires off on possible plans for adventure and mayhem on a Belgian beer cycling tour......
Hmmmm beer:

Winter in Paris

Paris Pont nuef???
Originally uploaded by furbyx4.

........Its 8am its a saturday, it's far too early to be at work, it's cold, I'm hungover, its snowing, the coffee wasn't very good in the hotel, I wish I'd brought a warmer jacket, it's my first time in Paris in the winter(If late February is winter)

I've been to Paris loads of times, a few times for holidays, but mostly for meetings, conferences etc. Its always in the summer, and I always like Paris. I love the joie de vivre(I also can't speak a word of French).

Despite the cold, this was a beautiful crisp morning. A little snow flutters around. Not the brown slush collecting at the side of the road that you get in less classy cities, but romantic wistful snow, that makes you want to write poetry.

Maybe my brain has been affected by lack of sleep, too much work, boring meetings, pointless discussions, cold toes, not enough coffee, too much beer....

Louvre Bum - Paris

Louvre Bum - Paris
Originally uploaded by furbyx4.

In the Louvre again. I prefer the Musee D' Orsay, but I cam here with some good friends and I particularly enjoyed it. We wandered aimlessly, which I think is the way to do it. The first time I pretty much ran round, to make sure that I saw everything

Scarey Church - Paris

Scarey Church - Paris
Originally uploaded by furbyx4.

Paris again, for a conference. This time in July. This was a big scarey gothic church near our hotel. There was also a French steak restaurant just across from it that was pretty damn good.

Paris was a joy as always. Three of us in Paris, so there were a few good beering sessions(Paris is very Expensive!!!), and some very good meals.