Storypost | 2019.04.15

Paris France boat tour Eiffel Tower strobes
Saturne

Paris France Michelin restaurant Saturne lunch view

After the late night at Moulin Rouge, we slept in until it was time to walk a few blocks to our lunch reservation at Saturne. I'm purposefully keeping the food talk/photos in a separate post, but suffice it to say the lunch was delicious.
Louvre

Paris France Louvre Lime scooter

Since the evening activity was a bike tour, the plan was to get Jessica back to sleep. But I did take us back via a short detour through the Palais Royal and Louvre courtyard. In spite of her frequent Lime/Bird-related ICU patients, I talked Jes into scooting.

Paris France Louvre Lime scooter selfie havoc

When we arrived at the car-free Louvre courtyard, we did a tandem ride. I'm fairly certain scooters will be banned there very soon.
Bike tour


Fit Tire bike tour route.


A few hours later it was time to take the metro down to Grenelle for the Fat Tire bike tour that the Cooleys had recommended. Right away it felt like a great way to see the city - you can move along fairly quickly and have the relative safety (from traffic) of a group.

Paris France Fat Tire bike tour Eiffel Tower

The first stop was the Ecole Militaire. We paused to get a little history, and then moved on to run into a few delays when someone dropped a phone and another person's pedal came off.

Paris France smoke Notre Dame fire 2019

When things got back on track, there was a dark plume of smoke rising directly ahead of us. I asked our guide, Michael, if that was perhaps the direction of the airport, he said he wasn't sure and continued on. At the next stoplight as I was unlocking my phone for a photo, Ryan had sent me the answer.

Paris France Fat Tire bike tour Sainte Clotilde

Soon after, everyone was getting alerts of some form, so we stopped at the nearby St. Clotilde to take stock. After some discussions with the office, our guide decided we'd stop by Les Invalides and head over to the Seine cruise portion of the tour.

Paris France Fat Tire bike tour Invalides smoke Notre Dame fire 2019

Naturally, everyone was distracted by video feeds, fire trucks, and people gazing in the direction of the disaster. We did our best to put that aside and enjoy the city.

Paris France Seine boat tour people gathered watching Notre Dame fire 2019

The cruise was the usual deal - a lap of the important parts of the city, even catching the Eiffel Tower for the few minutes that it flashes its neat strobe lights. Micheal even had a pack full of wine for us.

thumbnail Eiffel tower thumbnail Paris fat tire bike tour thumbnail Paris fat tire bike tour Eiffel tower night thumbnail Paris fat tire bike tour Eiffel tower night
thumbnail Paris cathedral thumbnail Paris fat tire bike tour street panorama

After riding back from the boat dock, we returned our bikes, grabbed some chinese takeout, and caught the metro back to the hotel.



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