Day Two in Paris: Monmartre

This morning we braved the crowds at the Musée D'Orsay. They had a great Manet exhibition on, and also some of my favourite Monet works.

check out that queue. C'est incroyable!

Once the Musée closed, we hopped on the metro to Monmartre, my favourite district in Paris. We climbed the hill to Sacré Coeur the back way, up narrow streets that are probably the most stereotypical French I've ever seen. We shared an incredible baguette on the way up, and a few sweet treats too. 

Sacré Coeur 

I took a panorama of the view from Sacré Coeur on my iPhone.

What we did next was the highlight of my trip to Europe so far. Les Refuge de Fondues is a little bohemian fondue restaurant in a narrow street. The walls are covered with scrawls from people who have eaten there, and you have to literally climb over the table to sit on the other side (the waiter helps you over). They even  avoid the tax on serving wine in a stemmed glass by serving it in baby bottles. Yes, baby bottles.

We had heard about this place from our friend Alix and planned on just having a quick wine, but somehow ended up having a three course meal. Blame it on the language barrier? The fruit salad was from a can, and the entree was average... but the fondue was great, and the atmosphere was alive. We made friends with the couple next to us and ended up sharing some of our cheese fondue for some of their meat.

 

After about four hours in Le Refuge de Fondues, we wandered through the red light district to that windmill everyone seems to have heard of.

I don't know why I was so excited.

We only just managed to make the last metro back to our hotel, and it was 2am by the time we got to bed... but well worth it!