Paris

Since we have both been to Paris a few times before, and it is a city we are likely to visit again, we did not feel any pressure to see a lot of the tourist sights while in Paris. The things we were most looking forward to in Paris were visiting A's French "sister" G, who lived with A's family for a year, having a fancy dinner at a nice restaurant in Paris that G and her fiancé R gave us for a wedding gift, and relaxing in our first luxury hotel of the trip, The Park Hyatt Paris Vendôme.

We successfully navigated the Paris Metro to get to our hotel and promptly got pickpocketed while walking up the stairs of the Opera Metro station carrying our luggage. Luckily, C had made use of the zippered secret pockets on his travel pants so his iPhone and money were not in the right front pocket the guy managed to get his hand in and we didn't lose anything.

With our adrenaline running a little higher and a good lesson learned, we walked the half a block to the Park Hyatt Paris Vendôme. We always feel a bit like impostors arriving at a top luxury hotel via public transportation, lugging our own bags.

At check-in they let us know they had an Executive Suite for us but that they were still putting the finishing touches on the room so it wouldn't be ready for a few minutes. We were a little early for check-in at 1:45, so a short wait seemed reasonable. Around 2:30, after checking in again and finding out "they just have to inventory the mini-bar" we decided C should run out and buy sandwiches since we had not had lunch yet, and surely the room would be ready when he got back.

C returned with our sandwiches to find A still sitting in the lobby cafe. Despite feeling a bit like gypsies in the palace, we tucked into our sandwiches right there. After an hour waiting for our room it seemed justifiable to eat our lunch there even though there was food service where we were sitting (where we could have ordered exorbitantly expensive sandwiches).

The front of the hotel

At 3 we inquired at the front desk again and this time a supervisor seemed appropriately concerned that we had been told our room would be ready in a few minutes and we had now been waiting an hour and 15 min. She offered us complimentary coffee and water and seemed to be trying to expedite getting our room.

We finally got into our room around 3:45, after waiting a full 2 hours. The room was amazing and worth the wait (more on the room in the next post) but it sure did not feel like luxury hotel service to be left waiting in the lobby for two hours. We have since heard from others that this is a common occurrence at this hotel.
It just would have been nice to know up front it would take 2 hrs, since then we would have checked our bags and gone out to lunch and to walk around Paris for a couple hours. We did appreciate the goodwill coffee though and the rest of the stay was flawless.

Shortly after we got to the room there was a knock on the door to deliver a bottle of Champagne, macarons, and a welcome note from the GM.

With a few hours until our fancy dinner reservation we went for a run through the Tuileries and around the Louvre. Running is not my favorite activity but with a setting like that you almost forget you are running and just enjoy the atmosphere.

G had made us a reservation at R Cafe, near La Madeleine, which was a pleasant walk from Place Vendôme. The dinner was delicious, and included Champagne, 3 courses, a bottle of wine, and coffee "with its little friends" as the menu said.

The next morning we had breakfast in the restaurant, which is not something we would normally splurge on at 49 Euros each, but as Diamond level members of Hyatt's Loyalty Program, Gold Passport, breakfast was included.  To our surprise, when we looked over after being seated in the restaurant, we recognized one of the people at the table next to us.  He was a fellow frequent traveler we had met at a behind-the-scenes tour of SFO airport last year.  It was fun to talk travel with him and his companions (also flyertalkers) over breakfast.

With a couple hours until we needed to catch our train to go meet G and R (A's family's AFS student and her fiance), and after noticing our room had 28 clothes hangers, we decided to try to wash our clothes again.  This time, we went to a laundromat that was only a few blocks from the hotel.  For 4 Euros, this was way better than washing the clothes in the sink.

 To reach G and R's place in Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines we walked to the RER C line and took the SARA train to the end - a 45 min ride.  It was beautiful weather so we walked around their town and the nearby park before going to see their new apartment.

We decided to cook dinner at home so G and R took us to the huge supermarket near their apartment and we bought the ingredients for Raclette - a traditional dish from the Alps region that consists of melting Raclette cheese on little trays under a special burner and then spooning the melted, gooey cheese over cooked potatoes and assorted charcuteries.  G loves the little sour gherkin pickles, so we had to have lots of those too!  We had a really fun time and had to take the very last train back to central Paris.

R and G setting up for Raclette

For our final morning in Paris we had arranged to have our complimentary breakfast as room service.  We booked room service for 11am anticipating making a Champagne brunch of it with our bottle of Champagne we had been given by the hotel.  Before our brunch, we took another run along the right bank of the Seine past the Louvre, Notre Dame, and Ile St. Louis.

Shortly after our return, this arrived:

We had one "American breakfast" which consisted of 2 poached eggs on toast, sauteed mushrooms, bacon, fruit salad, yogurt, a basket of breads and pastries, OJ and coffee.  We also ordered one Eggs Benedict with truffle hollandaise and a hot chocolate.  With the addition of our Champagne this was certainly the most amazing room service I have ever had, and it was the first time C had ever had room service.  (I tried to tell C that it's not this glamorous when I order room service when traveling for work when I have too much work to do to stop for dinner, but I'm not sure he buys it.)

After a leisurely brunch and relaxing afternoon in our suite, we packed up and headed back to Gare du Nord to catch the Thalys train back to Brussels.