Bonjour, Paris!

For this trip, I purchased BahnCards when I bought our train tickets.  They paid for themselves in the first trip!  It was less expensive to buy the cards and get the 25% discount on the tickets than to simply buy the tickets without the discount.  I wish I'd known to do this for our earlier Berlin trip!

After a 4-hour ride on the TGV, we arrived at Paris' Gare L'Est in the early afternoon.  We bought day passes for the Metro and made our way to our hotel, Hotel Residence Foch.  After dropping our bags in our room, we set out to find lunch and the Hard Rock Cafe to pick up our 2-day Paris Passes.  Lunch was bought at a street-side stand on the Avenue la Grande Armee which was lined on one side with white tents occupied by antique and art vendors.  We ate while walking toward the Arc de Triomphe.

After taking a few pictures, we descended into the Metro and made our way to the Hard Rock (Metro line 9, exit at Grands Boulevards).  The hardest part of picking up the passes was getting thru the crowd of tourists in the store.  Nearby were covered alleys with interesting little shops.  One had a pink beret that had Devil Pup written all over it.  Since she'd been asking for one, she got the first souvenir of the trip.

After a bit of wandering in a drizzle, we wandered and saw the Eiffel Tower, L'Ecole Militaire and went back toward the hotel, looking for a place to eat dinner.  We ended up in a brasserie where we enjoyed our first dinner in the City of Lights.  When our meals arrived, Devil Pup, exclaimed, "Bon Appetit!"  After finishing hers, Devil Pup leaned back in her chair, rubbed her tummy and announced, "That was quite a meal...  A good meal, I tell you."  She'd had a hamburger (no bun) and rice.