Paris - the bus, cafe culture, and a few stores

Travel is nothing without your aviators.  

So we'd hop on and ride the tour buses, hop off, walk around, take lots of pictures, eat at outdoor cafes every few hours, shop some.  I adore eating outside in french cafes and bistros.

Outdoor eating abounds in Paris.

At one cafe (okay, maybe at a few cafes) I had a croque-monsieur, which is a hot ham and cheese sandwich.  Steven had a croque-madame, which is the same sandwich but served with a fried or poached egg on top.  It was yummy and I suggest you try one soon if you haven't already!

Croque-monsieur

Croque-madame

We stopped at so many cafes during each day.  That's what you do in Paris!  We met a cool older couple at one, where I struck up conversation in French.  Fanciful meeting them, they were so nice.  What was great is that he wanted to practice his English, and me with my French, so it was a perfect afternoon helping each other out with language lessons!

Its all about the people watching, observing.

Cafe. Check out the man in suit on a bike, I just love that.

We ate a croque-monsieur and croque-madame here. Pretty good.

We went to some shops like Monoprix and Galeries Lafayette.  Monoprix is like the French version of Target, but a lot smaller.  Cute and helpful store that we had to frequent for odds and ends ... and a few fashion accessories for moi.  I really did not understand sizing charts in France, it was a struggle.  And Galeries Layefette is not just a shop, it's like the largest department store ever.  Well, the flagship store that we visited is 10 stories, for one store alone!  Learn more about it here.  It was a little too intense for us, so we bailed after a little while.  But if I had had some spending money and a lot of time, I would have definitely liked to have done some damage in there!

Monoprix, a store you'll want to keep in mind.

The picture above is of one of the Galeries Lafayette.  But the photo features, The Montparnasse Tower, which was built in 1973 and was one of the first tall skyscrapers in Paris.  It looked quite out of place with the main part of Paris!

We also checked out Habitat, a home furnishings store originating out of London I believe.  It was cool.  Reminded me of a mix between West Elm and Ikea, but it had some different takes and more flair.  I'm glad I ran into it because I've come across their website when looking for furniture for my clients.  I just wonder what the freight would be like!

Oh, another pit stop.

Just hanging on the streets of Paris.

Nice day to enjoy the sun and city.