Paris - Wednesday 30 August

We sailed into Paris this morning during breakfast, and docked just along from the Eiffel Tower and beside the bridge that has Paris's 'Statue of Liberty'. There were a number of tours available this morning and we chose the walking tour of Montmartre as we hadn't been there before on our previous visit to Paris in 2011. The option of a tasting tour could be fraught for me, and we had visited the Louvre previously and it would only be another quick skim over some paintings and displays.

We travelled by bus to the bottom of the hill that is Montmartre (enjoying the experience of driving through the enormous Arc de Triomphe round-about). I reckon I could drive through there, no problem, now we understand how it works!

We caught the 'Noddy Train' to the top of the hill and admired the rather hazy views over the city there was a high of only 26C today, with rain threatening on a couple of occasions). We did a quick tour through Sacré Coeur, and then a walk around some of the narrow streets around the top of the hill. It was interesting listening to the history of the area, once a small 'hippy' village (best description for it) attracting drinkers (no wine tax), artists and musicians. We passed some of the cafes and apartments frequented by people like Picasso, Van Gogh, Monet, Eric Satie. We saw where grapes were grown on the hill, and sold as a rather poor but expensive wine. We stopped in the market square area for a coffee, soon joined by the Todds, and enjoyed watching all the tourists strolling past or getting their portraits sketched by the numerous artists.

















Back at the boat by 1pm, we had lunch - a somewhat stressful experience for me on this occasion, partly due to language translation issues with the waiter. Then we stepped out and walked the very short distance to a modern shopping mall, but it was very expensive and didn't have anything of interest to us. Then it was back to the boat to begin packing before our journey to Bordeaux in the morning.

At 6:30pm we headed out in the bus on an increasingly drizzly evening, headed for the world-renowned cabaret Moulin Rouge. It took us 40 minutes to get there in the hectic traffic. We were checked and scanned through security, and ushered to our tables in random groups. We had a fantastic view of the stage up close on the ground floor. The seats were quite jammed together but it was ok. A three course dinner with bubbly was served very efficiently from 7:30pm, including a nice GF and dairy-free meal for me (?).

At 9pm the show started and we were treated to an incredible hour-and-three-quarter show that included spectacular dancing and costumes, music, acrobatics and strength/balancing acts. There was even a scene with girls swimming in a big water tank with several live pythons (all raised up from floor level near our seats. Many moments had the audience gasping in astonishment. This show, with dinner, apparently costs between 175 and 220 Euro per person, so it's not something we would even consider under normal circumstance. However, the price of all outings is already included in our tour price, so it is up to us to make the most of it, and most of the people on this cruise did take the opportunity.

Then it was out into the drizzle and this time only a 20 minute drive back to the boat, again negotiating the Arc de Triomphe round-about. During our return, in the dark and while raining, we saw a woman trying to get through it on her bicycle! She survived, although a car nearly came to grief when it failed to give way to our bus that had the right of way. Vehicles have to give way to all traffic on their right, including vehicles coming into the round-about ahead of and from their right. We also passed through the tunnel in which Princess Diana lost her life. We arrived back at 11:30pm, with some people intending to stay awake all night for their 4:45am departure at the end of the cruise. Thankfully, we were not to be that early!