We arrived in Paris a few minutes early, about 7:45AM. The plan was to get a train by 8:30 to Saint Michel RER station, which is a block from Notre Dame Cathedral, and to start a walking tour of the city from there. Unfortunately, while we were in the immigration queue, an abandoned bag somewhere in the airport caused a security alarm and shut down operations. It resulted in a delay at immigration and customs, which meant we didn't get a train until 10:00.
We were still able to cover a lot of ground, but unfortunately were unable to make it over to the Eiffel Tower. Other than that, we were able to see everything we had planned. The pictures below tell the story.
Our starting point: Notre Dame cathedral on Ile de la cite The Seine River, 4th accrondissement Quay of la Megiserrie on the Seine River Bustling live bird market at Place Louis Lepine The Louvre courtyard, featuring the pyramid by Chinese-American architect, IM Pei The grand entrance to les Jardins Tuileries Even on a brisk late winter Sunday, Parisians love to sit and watch other Parisians! Obelisk in Place de la Concorde, with the Eiffel Tower in background The Champs-élysées leading to l'Arc de triomphe. You don't even want to know how I took this picture!! One of the grand old signs indicating a stop on the Paris Metro
It took about 45 minutes to get back to Charles de Galle on the train, followed by the usual immigration and security steps. CDG is a huge airport, so getting around takes a lot of time. We gave our transit passes to a young man in a transit pass queue - he seemed to think he had won the lottery!
Our Air Mauritius Airbus A340-300 provided a pleasant 12-hour flight to the Indian Ocean.
Above is our routing from Paris to Mauritius. No simple 3-hour March Break flight to the beach for this crazy couple! But I think next March Break, that's exactly what we will do. In any case, we have just arrived in Mauritius - half an hour early, on Monday morning, after a long trek from Halifax.
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