We arrived at the train station in Vannes, dropped off the rental at Europcar, and caught our train to Rennes where we would change to a train to Paris.\u00c2\u00a0 The train to Rennes was a regional train, all seats were 1st class and I wished airplane seats were as comfortable.\u00c2\u00a0 At Rennes we caught a TGV to Paris and arrived in Paris around 3 PM.\u00c2\u00a0 We walked from the Gare Montparnasse to our Hotel on Rue de Gergovie.\u00c2\u00a0 The hotel was pleasant, newly redone, new comfortable beds, flat screen tvs, but alas we were on the third floor (French so really 4th floor) and they had no elevator.\u00c2\u00a0 It was coming, hopefully by December!\u00c2\u00a0 We deposited our bags and grabbed the metro to the Champs Elysees.\u00c2\u00a0 After window shopping and shopping for Kimberly, we strolled up toward the Arc de Triomphe.\u00c2\u00a0 Walking back, we noticed the sidewalk packed with people, people in uniforms, groups of young people standing at attention, a band, people carrying regimental banners, and elderly folks wearing tricolor sashes with badges on them sanding next to wifes, children, grandchildren etc.\u00c2\u00a0 The young people in uniform marched to a side street to start the formation.\u00c2\u00a0 On the Champs Elysee sidewalk across from the side street the band was hitting a note or two.\u00c2\u00a0 Out of nowhere, police cars arrived and blocked the\u00c2\u00a0 street leading up to the Arc de Triomphe.\u00c2\u00a0 First the band, then the group carrying floral arrangements and regimental banners, then the young people in uniform and finally the rest of the crowd all marched up the Champs Elysees to the Arc de Triomphe and laid the flower arrangements to honor those who have lost their lives in war.\u00c2\u00a0 Glenn found out from one of the participants that this happens only once a year, that every regiment has at least one representative to carry its banner to honor their fallen comrades.\u00c2\u00a0 And, we stumbled into it!<\/p>\n
We found a caf\u00c3\u00a9 to have a drink called L\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Alsace and devised a plan to find a restaurant for dinner.\u00c2\u00a0 After our brief pause, we hopped the Metro back to Montparnasse and strolled Boulevard Montparnasse looking for a place to find steak.\u00c2\u00a0 By this time we were afraid to try fish in Paris after all that beautiful fresh seafood in Brittany.\u00c2\u00a0 We stumbled on Relais d\u00e2\u20ac\u2122Entrecote and decided to give it a try. Funny thing \u00e2\u20ac\u201c no choice.\u00c2\u00a0 Everybody had a salad, steak came rare, medium rare, or medium, and mounds of frites.\u00c2\u00a0 Our delightful waitress did say we could choose our dessert.\u00c2\u00a0 She recommended a wine from the owner of the restaurant\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s winery.\u00c2\u00a0 It was tasty and we finished it pretty quickly and ordered another bottle of a different wine.\u00c2\u00a0 Jut as we got down to about 60% of our plates being eaten, our server came back with more steak and more frites!\u00c2\u00a0 There was no way to be a member of the clean plate club here!\u00c2\u00a0 As for dessert, we passed!<\/p>\n
We walked back to the hotel, realizing we needed to leave for the RER station by 8:15 or 8:30.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
We arrived at the train station in Vannes, dropped off the rental at Europcar, and caught our train to Rennes where we would change to a train to Paris.\u00c2\u00a0 The train to Rennes was a regional train, all seats were … Continue reading