The Latin Quarter - Best Place in Paris
By Susan Gerle
Paris is one of the most beautiful and romantic cities in the world. The
history and architecture and the shopping is too much to absorb in just a few
days. The only thing I’d change on the next visit is to make Paris my
destination, rather than a small part of a European vacation.
My friends and I traveled to Paris by train from Switzerland. The train station in Paris was bright, busy,
hectic, and even musical with small groups of musicians playing in different
cafes situated around the station. The
view outside surrounding the square was a mixture of old and new architecture.
We took time to have fresh French croissants at one of the cafes before
getting a taxi to our hotel. The price
for transportation was reasonable and the taxi driver very friendly even though
he had very little English. But that was
okay because we had very little French! I
think that was one of the things that made a difference in our experience. We were obviously taken by what we were
seeing and really wanted the input from the locals no matter where we went.
On the first trip there we made reservations to stay at a small “pension”
in the Latin quarter of the city. A
friend of mine from Vancouver, Canada was going to join us at the hotel. He had lived in Paris as a student and knew
his way around the Latin quarter very well.
The tiny hotel was a 6-floor walk-up.
A small entrance and foyer was crowded with luggage from people checking
in and out and the reception area only a window cut in the wall. A young woman spoke rapid French but switched
quickly to fluent English when she heard my poor attempt at the local language. It turned out she was a transplanted native
of New York City!
We got our room and began the journey up the tiny spiral staircase to
the forth floor. The first day was agony
but after a week of doing the stairs half a dozen times a day, we were in
pretty good shape! Our room was small
but comfortable. After getting settled,
we connected with my other friend and he took us to a local market, just around
the corner. There we bought some red
wine and cheese before heading off in another direction for croissants. That would be part of our staple diet for the
next few days.
The nice thing about staying in the Latin Quarter is it is so close to
many of the well-known landmarks, like the Louvre and Notre Dame. It is also close for catching a Hop-On/
Hop-Off double decker bus, which took us easily to other famous structures like
the Eiffel Tower or the Arch De Triumph or the Paris Opera House. A 2-day pass is extremely reasonable and we
used it from early in the morning until after dark.
