Bonjour Mon Amour

 J'adore

 Every year my best friend and I celebrate our birthdays within a day of each other, we decided to be extravagant this year and booked two tickets to Paris for the day, in search of the worlds’ finest macaroons, inspired by a mutual obsession of Goissip Girl. I used to live in Paris for three months before I went to Uni and I hadn’t been back to Paris since, so for me it was a real treat. Determined to arrive in style we travelled via Eurostar, leaving St Pancreas International at 8.30am, armed with a mini bottle of champagne, juice and croissants we arrived into Gare Du Nord at 12pm, casually dressed in floral dresses, ready for a day full off French culture and cuisine. The first stop was the home of Tim Burton's 2012 Parisian exhibition, Cinematheque Francaise we had prepared well, watching Alice & Wonderland the night before; we arrived the day after, to find the Museum, closed. Fortunately we quickly laughed off this unfortunate moment, we had previously checked the website sadly, when travelling always triple check. Instead we headed back to the Metro, on to the next stop Musee d'Orsay.

Musee d'Orsay

Surprisingly, it was our first time at Musee d'Orsay despite being massive fans of impressionist art, that the gallery is well known for. We couldn’t believe our eyes as soon as arriving outside, we were confronted by a massive queue, it was so long we couldn’t see the front. We took our chances and joined the back, we happened to get nattering to a girl, who was travelling the world and quit her job back in Hong Kong. Her next stop was London and she wanted to know the best places to go shopping in London, she also kindly complimented us on our outfits, telling us interestingly, British girls are known for their style in Asia. She had to ask us if we drank eight cups of tea a day and we replied yes to truthfully, we are so British.

The Cakes Inside Laduree

At this point time was passing too quickly, as we finally made it to the front of the queue. The interior of Musee d'Orsay is beautiful as it’s a converted Parisian train station, we were very eager to explore however very conscious of the time, we were only there for one day and it was already 2.30pm. Luck finally blessed, we saved money on the entry fee to the gallery, as we’re under 25. This meant we could buy more macaroons, later. Inside the gallery, we admired some of Van Gough’s stunning paintings and were hoping to see some of Monet’s, one of our favourite artists’; unfortunately his collection happened to be on the 5^th floor of the gallery… Charlotte has a fear of heights and the gallery was open plan that didn’t help the situation.

Yum, Yum, Yum!

The world famous French patisserie Laduree, the birthplace of the macaroon, was next on our agenda. We visited the branch on Champs-Elysées, on route, we got a little bit lost due to lack of iPhone satellite navigation and it also started to rain. As we got closer to Laduree, it appeared to be closed for refurbishment. It was safe to say we were having an unlucky day, we were in such a good mood as we were in Paris and found the fact everything seemed to be closed/going wrong, amusing. Outside the Laduree was a temporary store luckily we were still able to purchase a box of macaroons, in addition we prior to the day had dreamed about sitting down and eating a lovely French cake in Laduree. Across the road we spotted the patisserie, Paul luckily, were still able to devour a Tarte Au Fraises and Café Au Lait.  Confidently we can say everything we planned went wrong, but everything we didn’t, went right.

Charlotte Was Happy to Finally get her Macaroons

Montmartre was the final destination of the day, it’s the vibrant area known best for the Moulin Rouge, Sacre Cour and forms the back drop to the French film, Ameliee, as soon as we arrived we made a quick dash to the supermarket to stock up on wine, cheese and the boulangerie to buy a baguette, obviously! Charlotte and myself previously did a fantastic tour of Montmartre, when she came to visit me while I was living Paris, four years ago, which is must do if it’s your first time to Paris.

Montmartre

I had arranged to meet my lovely French friend for dinner, we meet outside the Metro station Abbess. As a resident of Montmartre, she took us to her local French bistro, Charlotte is a vegetarian and I’m not the biggest meat eater, so luckily my friend, ordered for us, thank you Anais! As a result we got to experience, delicious French food had a proper catch up before we headed back to Gare Du Nord our train back to London left at 9pm.

Birthday Cheese

 There were so many memorable moments of our trip to Paris including, listening to Charlotte randomly speaking Spanish instead of French was amusing to say the least. Eye-witnessing a lot of Parisian pigeons fight for bread outside a French patisserie who could blame them? 

Happy Ladies

Finally I was able to speak French this time people magically understood me, result thanks to my new French App, god bless the iPhone. I really don’t know how next year’s birthday could possibly compare. The best bits really were getting spend the day with my lovely best friend and finally catch up with my amazing French friend and finally getting to visit Paris. I feel like a very lucky girl despite everything going wrong, everything turned out really well.