Day 10 - St. Germain des Pres and Yellow Vests

More "manifestations" today.  I was planning to take the #67 bus up to Montmartre, then walk down Rue des Martrys, which is a popular market street.  But, when I got to the bus stop, the electronic sign indicated that the bus was not running because of the "manifestations." I walked back to the hotel, sat in the lobby and looked at my maps to decide where I might go and how I would get there.  I saw that I could take the Line 7 Metro across to the Left Bank and transfer to the Line 10 that would take me to St. Germain des Pres, so that is what I did.

Four of the Metro stations on Line 7 were closed due to the demonstrations, and it was really weird going through the empty stations.  Line 7 goes to the Opera, which is where some of the action was today, so that station plus the 3 leading up to it were closed for security reasons.

St. Germain is in the 6th arrondissement and is probably "tourist central."  There are a couple of very old churches and some famous cafes, including Les Deux Magots (pronounced "magoh" and refers to a couple of Chinese gentlemen) and Cafe de Flore.  Both of these cafes were popular among the literary set back in the 1920s to 1950s and were frequented by the likes of Hemingway and Sartre.

There is a small Christmas market around the Church of St. Germain des Pres that had some nice things, but I only bought some more foie gras.

I decided to have lunch at Les Deux Magots as I had never been inside before.  It was not nearly as intimidating as I thought it might be.  The service was fast, and there were lots of people in there, and nice decor.  I ordered a croque monsieur that came with salad greens.  It was okay, but I have had better, also a beer and something chocolate for dessert.  It was a pleasant lunch and I was glad to be in from the cold weather.

After lunch I walked up Rue Bonaparte to the Pierre Herme (should be an accent on the last e - I need to figure out how to do those on this Chromebook) shop and bought 7 macarons, which cost, and I am not kidding, 20.50 euros.  They had better be good - I am taking them home and hope they survive the trip.

Leaving the shop, it was bitterly cold and starting to rain, so I flagged down a taxi.  I 1gave the driver the address of my hotel and he explained that there are barricades around the Opera, so he can't get through. I suggested an alternate route up Boulevard de Sebastopol, and he agreed, so off we went.  It was actually a pretty direct route and probably better than one going through Place de la Opera.  I saw a lot of police vans and other vehicles, even a tank (!) as we rode up the boulevard but no "yellow vests."  However, when the driver turned west onto another main boulevard we saw a bunch of "yellow vests" marching towards us and the police had a barricade on one side street.  But, this was a peaceful march and not a large one.  A couple of the marchers even told the driver how he could get through,  I noticed that people walking on the sidewalks were simply going on with their business and didn't appear to be at all concerned.  Fortunately, the street leading up to my hotel was clear, so that was the end to the excitement.  I did not feel at all threatened or in danger.

Getting back to the hotel, I spent some time getting organized for packing as tonight is my last in this hotel.  Tomorrow I will leave my bags with the concierge and go out for awhile before heading to airport where I will spend my last night at the Novotel.

I had my last dinner in Paris at Le Petit Cadet where I had that good lamb shank earlier in the trip.  This time I had a really good salad with lots of veggies and cheese for a starter, and a main course of prawns and risotto that was good and had lots of garlic.

Just as I am ready to leave I have finally made a realization.  Many doors have the French word for "push" and "pull" on them, but I can never remember which is which.  Today it finally dawned on me that the word for "push" starts with a P and the word for "pull" starts with a T.  So: "Push = P" and "Pull = Tug = T."  So instead of pulling the door open, I now "tug" it open.  And, it has taken me how many trips to figure this out??  I just hope I get to open a lot of doors tomorrow, now that I know what I am doing.