Sexy Pompiers and Gigantic Tiramisu

Now that my location has been revealed -- and it is indeed Paris, not Blackpool -- let me tell you a little about what we're doing here. Dave and I both thought a short break away from home would do us some good. After Olga's decline and death, we needed an escape. So in the midst of my grief I bought a couple of Eurostar tickets and made some reservations.

Looking at the receipt later, I saw that I paid about £720 for these tickets, which seems insane to me. I didn't even realize it at the time. Fortunately we're staying in an inexpensive hotel -- the Hotel Flore in Montmartre -- that has long been a favorite of mine, so that balances everything out.

We got here Monday afternoon and wandered up to the Place du Tertre for some cafe-sitting and people-watching. The place was mobbed with tourists, as you could see in my photos yesterday. But I love this part of town, its scenic streets and steep stairs, and we had a good time.

Yesterday morning I got up early and went back to Sacre Coeur, and it was a much better experience. There was virtually no one around, the sun was shining, and I bought an almond croissant and some coffee and ate sitting on the steps overlooking the city. A group of hunky guys wearing matching running clothes went by (top photo) and I realized they were members of the Paris Fire Brigade. I suddenly felt in desperate need of resuscitation but sadly they were too busy exercising to notice.

After walking along Rue des Abbesses and peeking inside a neighborhood church, I came back to the hotel, collected Dave (who was sleeping in) and we made our way to the cafe above, where we had coffee and croissants beneath the shady locust trees along Rue Caulaincourt. Then we headed into town to see some sights on the Ile de Cité.

I wanted to see the newly refurbished Cathédrale Notre Dame, and Dave wanted to take another look at Saint Chapelle, which he visited with a school group but was unable to see well because of renovations and unruly students. We did Saint Chapelle first -- and it was indeed beautiful with its acres of stained-glass windows depicting scenes from the Bible. (It's still under renovation, though.)

Notre Dame was remarkable (above). You'd never know there was a fire. Some of the walls and ceilings look fresher than they did, but not jarringly so, and the windows and the art are intact and displayed as usual. I'm sure there are differences that people intimately familiar with the building would notice but I was just happy to once again see the rose window I photographed back in 2013.

Here's another view. Pretty amazing restoration!

We had omelettes and wine in a cafe across the street (as you can see there's still scaffolding on the exterior of Notre Dame). This cafe is one that my father photographed on his own trip to Paris as a college student in 1957:

It was much quieter then! (And it had a different name.) Dave insisted I show our waiter this photo. "She's not going to care!" I said, knowing that French waiters are notoriously busy and somewhat curt, but I tried anyway -- and indeed, she did not care.

We walked over to the Left Bank and had a coffee in a cafe with a view of a busy roundabout on the Boulevard Saint Germain. I ordered a tiramisu that proved to be as big as a baby's head. I couldn't begin to eat it all.

Afterwards we went back to the room for a rest. I did some blog reading. I know I'm behind on responding to comments but let me just say THANK  YOU to those of you who identified my mysterious moth on Monday as a common footman! I'm so glad to know what it is.

Last night we had a bit of a fiasco. Soon after booking this trip, while still in London, Dave made a dinner reservation at a restaurant he'd read about online called Benoit. When we checked the location yesterday on Google Maps, I simply typed in Benoit and showed the results to Dave, who agreed that was our restaurant. So we hopped on the Metro and made our way there, arriving just in time for our 7 p.m. reservation. The place was completely dead, and when I said we had a reservation the host simply gestured to the acres of empty tables and told us to sit anywhere. We sat and looked at the menu, and Dave said, "Is this the right restaurant?"

And sure enough, it wasn't. We were expected at a different restaurant Benoit a mile away. So Dave and I bid our host a hasty adieu, explaining we were in the wrong place, and once again hopped on the Metro. We got to the correct Benoit a half-hour late but they seated us and we had a fine dinner and a good laugh.

Back to London today!