Tony's 50th in Paris

Many years ago, Tony announced that he wanted to spend his 50th Brithday in Paris. Little did we know back then that we would be living an easy train ride away from there come that day. We made our way once again over to St. Pancras train station and caught the Eurostar over to Gard du Nord.

From there we took the Metro to the Arch di Triumph where our neighbor Mark had booked us rooms at the Hilton, where he has connections. We arrived to rainy November Paris weather. However, the autumn colors made for a picturesque backdrop to our wrong turns until we eventually made our way to the hotel.



Mark, who is a VP with Hilton, booked us into an amazing suite on the Executive floor. We were sent from the front desk up to the VIP lounge where we were checked in while we had a glass of wine (it is France afterall) and some snacks.

Our room was just down the hall, and WOW, was it wonderful. It had 2 full bathrooms, and a nice sized reception.





This will be great for when I wake up early and want to watch TV, and Tony will want to sleep in. Awesome.





From the hotel, it was only a couple blocks to the actual Arc di Triumph, and we walked up there just to assure ourselves that we were in Paris. We then walked down the Champs Elysee in the cold and rain, doing some window shopping and some snacking on the way. Tony got a bowl of French Onion Soup, and I got a Croque Monseiur (a ham and cheese sandwich).



The main boulevard drops you at Plaza de Concorde, which is where Marie Antoinette and so many others lost there heads. We found a plaque in the ground commemorating the location of the Guillotine.







It is nice to return to Paris having hit so many of the main sites. We were now able to see some of the sites that we simply didn't have time to see on our previous visits. We went to the L'Orangerie Museum, which houses Monet's Waterlilies.

To be honest, I wasn't that impressed with the Waterlillies, though the space and the art was specifically created to house this art installation. I was however happy to see so much Renoir, whose work I really, really like. Of the impressionists, his work seems to strike the best balance between impression and reality. It's a little tighter than some of his contempories, and I think I like that quality.

For Dinner that evening, we met up with Tony's friend Lisa, who is an American who lives in Paris. She took us to a small restaurant that we'd seen on Anthony Boudain's Gourmet Traveling show. It is a real throwback to medieval Paris. The restaurant is tiny, and has an open fire grill in the center of the restaurant.




All the meat is grilled on this open fire. Certainly not the most sanitary option, but boy was the meal delicious.










A bottle of wine later, and who has anything to worry about from germs, despite the fact that all the food is served on traditional wooden plates.





We walked around wet Paris to work off our meat-laden meal. Paris really is an amazingly beautiful city. One of my coworkers commutes into London weekly as his wife doesn't want to relocate - I can't blame her.

We ended our evening back at our hotel with a Nightcap at the Hotel Bar. They offer Absinthe drinks, and whenever I am in Paris, I'm always curious to try it. They made me a really cool Zombie, and they poured the flaming Absinthe over the drink. A really cool presentation.






We still had one more surprise waiting for us when we got back to our room. Mark had told them that it was Tony's birthday, so they had a cake and a split of Champagne for him. It was a great day to start our celebration of Tony's 50th.