Christmas Eve Day began overcast - we got up nice and early to get a good start for our long walk to our breakfast destination and Paris's claim to THE best hot chocolate, Angelina's on Rue Rivoli in the 1st Arrondissement across from the Tuileries. What a glorious walk! The sun appeared for the first time, the streets were very quiet, way quieter than I'd experienced before. We cut through a courtyard, like a grand plaza really, at the entrance to the Louvre, and it was practically empty. Then we arrived in the area of the Louvre where the glass pyramid is and the line of people waiting to get in was enormously long - so that's where all the people were! Fortunately we've done that museum - I had another museum planned for this day while Dan had lunch with a business colleague who lives in Paris.
 |
| Courtyard at the Louvre - practically empty! I didn't take a picture in the next area we passed into - the hordes of people and the longest, depressing line to get in. |
 |
| At Angelina's for incredible hot chocolate - a pitcher of melted ganache, really! Heaven! |
After we had our breakfast of hot chocolate, croissants, baguette, butter, jam and chestnut cream, we walked further into the 1st and 2nd Arrondissements where all the haut couture is - such gorgeous shops, all the fashion houses, the huge and stunning hotels and plazas, it was so breathtaking just to walk and smell it all - we hadn't either of us been back there before. Then we found our way to the Champs Elysees and there was a open street market going on on both sides of the road for blocks and blocks. At the Franklin Roosevelt metro station, we parted ways; Dan to his lunch meeting and I to take the metro to the 16 Arr to the Musee Marmottan Monet. This museum houses the largest collection of Monet's in one place in the world - over 130 of his paintings. I spent 3 hours in there - it was marvelous! I walked around the residential areas for a while after and then into the commercial to look for my train station. So deliciously fun!
 |
| I know there's a children's book about this statue but I can't remember what it's called! The fox, a crow with a coin, what is it??? This statue and park are about a block from the Monet museum. |
 |
Yay! I found it! I was so excited I could hardly bear it.
|
 |
| This area was the most residential I had seen so far in Paris and neat and tidy as could be. |
I took the metro back to our hotel and met up with Dan and we walked Rue St Germain to find two more bakeries on my list before our Christmas Eve dinner. It began to rain and we got soaked but didn't care as it was pretty mild, around 50 degrees. Our first was Un Dimanche a Paris. A truly elegant and beautiful chocolate and pastry shop, very high end down a heaving, uneven cobbled street. I bought a shot of the strongest hot chocolate I have drank so far in my life. Dan passed on this one - couldn't handle the hard stuff - ha!!
 |
| The recipe is written on the counter for their hot chocolate - dark bar chocolate, heavy cream, whole milk and vanilla bean. We bought two large bars of the chocolate they use to make our own at home. They serve it to you in small paper shot like glasses when you buy it at the counter. Hallelujah in a cup. |
 |
| Un Dimanche a Paris |
 |
| Another view of that splendorous street |
Next stop, perhaps the most famous bakery in all of France and the bread by which artisan bakers everywhere measure their own, Poilane!! We bought the 2.2 kilo wheel to take home - it's a sourdough with a melange of flours, chewy, full of holes - ours was fresh out of the oven and held the heat so that when we got back to our hotel, it made the room smell like we had just baked bread. As soon as we got back to NH, I cut the 5 pounder in quarters and kept one out for eating and wrapped well the other 3 and put them in the freezer.
 |
| More pleasing neighborhood Christmas lighting |
Scenes on the walk back to our hotel where we needed to change in to jacket and tie for Dan and a dress for me for our dinner reservation at Au Bon Accueil near the Eiffel Tower. We took the metro and arrived at our restaurant just as the Eiffel was twinkling all over. What a sight!
The restaurant offered a fixed menu for the special Christmas Eve dinner. Almost everyone in there was American except for the two Spaniards sitting at the table next to ours. Most good restaurants are closed on Christmas Eve except a few like this one - we had to do a lot of hunting online to find one and to get a spot.
 |
| My love! |
First course, oysters in jellied champagne with lime - I ate the two oysters but passed on the jelly.
 |
| I'm sad this is blurry - Dan had foie gras with chestnut and cinnamon mascarpone cream for the second course and I had scallops with truffles, parsnips, leeks and tiny potatoes in an lobster sauce. |
Third course; I had Brittany lobster in rolled cabbage stuffed with tarragon pasta and carrot with a lobster sauce. It was exquisite. Dan had guinea fowl, poached egg, black truffle and parsnip puree - he said it was sensational.
I took a picture of our neighbor's dessert because I forgot to take one of my own in my excitement. Although it wasn't chocolate, we were both thrilled with it - sweet meringue stick-like things in a frozen mousse of tonka bean and chervil and candied chestnuts - it was incredible.
Next stop - a Christmas service for the next two hours 10 pm to midnight - it was awe inspiring! Musical numbers by very talented people, handbell choirs, harp with cello duets, scripture readings and brief sermons in between and several congregational Christmas hymns sung standing up together. No guitars thank goodness - just strings, organ and trumpet accompaniment. At the end of the service, we all lit our candles, greeted our neighbor and sang Silent Night. What a perfect way to welcome in Christmas Day!
If the streets were relatively quiet on Christmas Eve by Paris standards, they were really crowded on Christmas Day. We had breakfast at the St. Regis cafe on I'le St. Louis (and I could look at that painting again - not - it was gone!). After breakfast, we headed back to Eric Kayser bakery to buy some of his bread and 6 more chocolate chip cookies to take back to NH. We watched some street pianist play his upright smack in the middle of the road - what talent! and then we headed to a very old cinema to watch "Singing In the Rain" - the Gene Kelly film that neither one of us had ever seen.
 |
| St Regis - it felt English to both of us - cozy |
 |
| The Kayser cookies to Go! |
 |
| This swell theatre was red velvet from floor to ceiling and wall to wall. Dan sent me back to the lobby for drinks and they served neither beverages nor any kind of snack. The restroom was right near the seats (very convenient but we remarked that we hoped we wouldn't hear the toilet flush during the movie - we didn't). We were the 3-4th people in the theatre and then it began to fill. The audience loved the film (English with French subtitles) and so did we. This was a super experience; the very old theatre, the movie projector on old reel film, the smell, the seats - everything. |
After the movie we headed back to the I'le St. Louis to have the third and final hot chocolate on my must have or I'll die list. We meant to have it at breakfast but the place is closed until early afternoon.
This is the place - in the top three hot chocolates in Paris according to all sources I read. Again, I could hardly bear the anticipation.
It was the richest, thickest and darkest so far - truly, like a batch of ganache had been made and we were able to drink it hot. Dan found it to be almost too strong for his stomach but I found it to be liquid joy. We pushed the whole experience over the top by ordering a chocolate tart to split - hot ganache to drink, and cold ganache in a chocolate tart shell. We felt a bit sick afterwards and when it came time to go to our dinner reservation, our fanciest meal of the whole trip, even after walking for a couple hours after the chocolate, we had no appetites and didn't want to waste the expensive meal not having an appetite.
 |
| I just love to look at hot chocolate. The gloss, variations of brown, the anticipation of the first sip. |
We had reserved at the Ciel de Paris, a restaurant on the 56th floor of the Montparnasse Tower said to have a better view of the city than the Eiffel Tower. That's how sick and full we felt; we cancelled our reservation! Several hours later, we had a very late light dinner of cheese fondue and some meat before ending our Christmas Day activities. Meanwhile, we did more strolling across bridges and down magnificent little streets. I took these pictures of one bridge crossing because of the light, white and gray and tiny bit of pink in buildings, sky, clouds and water.
Dinner! Not quite what we would have experienced at Le Ciel de Paris but we'll keep that one on our list for a next time.
The next morning, our final morning, we talked to my son Dane via Skpe for one of two yearly phone calls he can make while serving a two year mission for our Church. He is currently in Tasmania, Australia, and we spent a joyful hour talking and listening to him. Then it was time for one last meal, a brunch, and final shot of hot chocolate.
 |
| Connected - There he is!! |
 |
| This hot chocolate with our brunch was not from any top HC I had on my list, just the one they serve at this brasserie. It was thick and good but not remarkable. That's why I had one last shot at Dimanche before leaving Paris. I have a problem, I know. |
 |
| Brunch! Mine on right, Dan's on left. |
 |
| A quick run to the market across from our hotel as we wait for our shuttle driver - Salers Cheese |
 |
| Salers cheese - a huge hunk we took home in the suitcase - we remembered this cheese from our time in the central, Auvergne part of France. Regulations stipulate that milk for this cheese come only from cows grazing on mountain pastures in the summer. |
Parting shot of Hot chocolate from Un Dimanche a Paris - right in the street, right before heading to the airport. Good bye beloved Paris!! No one can do hot chocolate like you can! What an unforgettable Christmas. Thank you Dan for being such an adventurer and perfect travel companion, for asking me to plan our itinerary, meals, and hotel and run with it (and enduring so cheerfully all my crazy obsessions/passions) and all around lovable, wonderful, generous, happy man.
