Paris... Again! (Part 1)

I just had to pop in and say hello as we've just got back from another week in Paris.  First of all, I must tell you that I've been so ill.  On the Thursday before we left, one of the residents at work (I work in a care home) was extremely ill, with a chest infection and I ended up packing her off to hospital.  Because I spent a couple of hours with her I just seemed to breathe her germs in.  At first I thought I just had a sore throat, but it wouldn't go away.  I ended up going to the walk-in centre, where I was given antibiotics for an ear infection and a throat infection.

So you can imagine how I felt on Monday morning as I got up at 4.15, got dressed and got a taxi to the airport.  Did I mention that I'm scared witless of flying?  You probably do it all the time, right?  Actually it's not flying I'm scared of, it's turbulence!  And turbulence there was, so I clung on to John for dear life until it was over.  Of course the flight made my ears hurt even more, but still.
Because, before you know it, we were in Charles de Gaulle airport, and made our way down to the RER.  I'd really like to thank Jill at http://www.gigisfrenchwindow.blogspot.co.uk/ as she did a brilliant post about how to get into Paris from the airport and after reading this I found the whole thing a doddle.
We got out at Chatalet and walked up and down a bit.  It took a while to get through to John that you can't just wander around and hope for the best, so eventually he got the map out and we found Notre Dame.  Don't forget, we came here in June, so we know roughly where we are.  Actually we know very much where we are, said hello to the Old Dear, crossed over the Seine and began our mega walk to our hotel. 
Actually it was miles, past the Eiffel Tower and still going, past the Pont de Grenelle and the Radio France building (and the Petit Liberte) and finally we are there.  Thank goodness we only had small suitcases on wheels.

We checked into our very nice rooms and just collapsed and went to sleep, both of us utterly exhausted!  It was quite a relief to find it was such a nice hotel after staying in a grotty Campanile last time.
Have I told you that I've been having french lessons for about 8 weeks?  I'm really enjoying it.  That's partly why I haven't done any art work, because I've been totally concentrating on learning french.  And I'm very glad, because it really paid off.  I had no problems ordering things in restaurants, asking for directions etc.  I'm so pleased.
We went out to dinner to a nearby restaurant where John had steak and I had Normandy chicken, which had a mushroom sauce on it.  We had a glass of wine each (the one and only time as I'm on antibiotics) and I had an awesome chocolate mousse for pudding.
I was just so glad to have arrived, in my favourite, favourite place. 
More again soon
Jane xx