Tony's 50th Birthday - Day 2

For the second day of Tony's 50th Birthday Celebration (you have to call it that if it is more than 1 day surely), we wandered off into the Latin Quarter in search of Shakespeare's Bookstore. It was a cool, but slightly sunny day, so it looked to be much better than the day before.

We found the bookstore, which has a history of housing starving students on its second floor. It is full of fun books, and we made a point of purchasing a copy of Julia Child's "The Art of French Cooking". We thought it would be fun to have one actually purchased in France.










We then wandered down to Luxembourg Gardens. Marie de Medici longed for her palace in Italy, so she had this private estate built. I wish I could have a private estate built too, but oh well. Today, it is a lovely park.









It was decked out in fall colors, which made it quite picturesque.









We really enjoyed walking around in it.







We even found a statue dedicated to the Marie De Medici. Big Surprise!

















From there, we wandered back up to the Jewish Quarter to get a Falafel from a famous Falafel stand that Lisa had recommended the night before. The place was packed, with a line running down the street just for takeaway sandwiches.

Falafels are essentially deep fried Garbonzo Bean Dough in a pita. Sounds dreadful, but wait it's garbonzo beans - this is practically HEALTH FOOD!

It reminded me of "The Falafel King" in Westwood that was such a staple of my UCLA college days.

Mark's train arrived in Paris about this time, so we made our way back to the hotel to meet him, but on our way, we grabbed a Baklava from a Jewish/Parisian Bakery. It was the largest Baklava we'd ever seen. Very good too and Kosher, so again, it was healthy eating. . .

We arrived at the hotel to find Mark being fussed over by all the Hotel Management. He is Hilton Brass afterall.

We met for cocktails a short time later in the bar before the Hotel Car picked us up to drive us to Versailles. Mark had arranged reservations at the Hilton Tianon Palace for dinner. It was nice to have an opportunity to put on our sport coats for dinner.

We were led to a fine table in a beautiful dining room, where not just sparkling wine, but real French Champagne was served. Tony loved it.










It was an absolute joy spending time with such a dear friend we've know so long in such a special place.


Dinner was a culinary feast of Scallops and Pork. The ongoing moving feast of our travels continues.









We ended the night back at our hotel for a nightcap. It was a magnificent evening in the ongoing Tony's 50th Birthday extravaganza.