Meanwhile....back in Paris

After my visit to sunny Nice, Paris seems so gray.....  Paris, of course, has the most magnificent architecture and it IS Paris.....but it did seem gray after the yellows, pinks, blues and warmth of Nice.  The contrast was stark when I got off the plane from Nice and all the way into Paris on the bus, it was pouring!  By the time I had changed buses a couple of times and got back to my cozy little studio I was drenched to the bone.
I spent the next couple of days posting my Nice pictures and just hunkering down.  My poor old legs needed a rest after all that climbing around ancient hill towns.

Finally the sun came out, and I decided to go wander around the Marais.

Monday, April 30

The Marais is the old Jewish district.  It has lots of interesting shops, Jewish bakeries, deli's etc.  I was so fascinated by the interesting shops, I forgot to take a lot of pictures.  I was also on the search for an English language book store that I'd heard about in the area.

So this is the Red Wheelbarrow.  It's really a great little English bookstore.  And the owner is a lovely woman.  If any one is interested, the book store is actually for sale.  She said she had several people interested, but in the end....no sale had actually seen completion.

Here's another interesting book store I came across.  The inside was interesting....it looks like it was built in the middle of a street and they just didn't bother to put in a floor....they just used the street as the floor.

Another shop I sought out was one I had read about that said they sold beautiful paper and scented ink.....Ink that smells like flowers.  I found the shop, but it was closed.  I tried to get pictures through the window....with not such good luck.

Another place I read about in all my reading, is a fallafel shop which is supposed to be the busiest one in all of  Paris......and sure enough....it was really busy.  They had  two take out windows...both of which had long lines. Oh, and it smelled fantastic.

The interesting thing is that there was another fallafel shop right across the street which had no line at all....and it smelled just as good.  Goes to show what having mentions in a couple of books can do for business.

You can't read it very well, but I loved what it says on the front of this shop.  "King of Pastrami..."

Here are a couple more shops in the Marais....

As I was leaving the Marais....a gate, between two buildings, led to this.....