478 - Join Us in France Travel Podcast

Table of Contents for this Episode

[00:00:00] Annie Sargent: This is Join Us in France, episode 478.

[00:00:20] Bonjour, I’m Annie Sargent, and Join Us in France is the podcast where we take a journey through the beauty, culture, and flavors of France. I just changed it. Do you like it? I think it’s good, right?

Today on the podcast

[00:00:34] Annie Sargent: Today, I bring you a trip report with Gregg Rutter about being a flâneur in France, enjoying photography museums, and generally taking it easy, and he also took a photography tour, so we’ll talk about that.

[00:00:48] I know a lot of you only come in France once or twice in your life, perhaps you can’t stay very long because of work, life, etc. So, you pack it in and you go fast. But there are so many of you who come repeatedly and can take it a bit easier, so why not?

[00:01:06] Mind you, Gregg didn’t get bored at any time, it’s about finding a balance between seeing it all and enjoying it all.

Podcast supporters

[00:01:15] Annie Sargent: This podcast is supported by donors and listeners who buy my tours and services, including my Itinerary Consult Service, my GPS self-guided tours of Paris on the VoiceMap app, or take a day trip with me around the Southwest in my electric car.

[00:01:31] You can browse all of that at my boutique joinusinfrance.com/boutique.

Bootcamp 2024

[00:01:36] Annie Sargent: There are three spots left for the bootcamp in May, 2024. The idea is that you come to Toulouse on May 10th, 2024, hang out with Elyse and I, as well as a group of wonderful fellow listeners. There’s going to be 40 of us maximum, .

[00:01:51] We stay together for 10 days and in that time you’ll improve your French with the language classes in the morning and visits in the afternoon. We had such a good time in May 2023 that we want to do it again and we have six or seven repeat bootcampers, I can’t remember, but we have several.

[00:02:10] It’s a great way to visit France, and they want to do it again, and we’re thrilled to have them again.

[00:02:15] If you’re interested, go to joinusinfrance.com/boutique, where you can read all the details and reserve your spot now, but they’re almost gone, so don’t wait too long.

The Magazine Segment: the First “Restaurant” in France

[00:02:26] Annie Sargent: For the magazine part of the podcast, after my chat with Gregg, I’ll tell you about the first restaurant in France and how the word restaurant came about.

Annie and Gregg Rutter

[00:02:45] Annie Sargent: Bonjour, Gregg Rutter, and welcome to Join Us in France.

[00:02:49] Gregg Rutter: Oh, Bonjour, Annie! So happy to be here.

[00:02:52] Annie Sargent: Wonderful to talk to you. You had a lovely trip in France with your daughter who is, so she’s in her early 40s, and you’re in your middle 60s.

[00:03:04] Gregg Rutter: Well, that’s the kind of thing to say. Yes.

[00:03:06] Annie Sargent: Yes!

Planning the Trip to France

[00:03:08] Annie Sargent: Tell us a little bit about the trip, when it took place, why you came to Paris, and all of that.

[00:03:13] Gregg Rutter: Yes. I was in Paris from June 1st to June 18th, 2023, and I had been wanting to go to France for quite some time and actually had a trip planned back in 2020 with a friend that, you know, COVID happened and plus she had ovarian cancer and is no longer with us, but…

[00:03:37] Annie Sargent: I’m sorry.

[00:03:37] Gregg Rutter: That was my plan.

Photography Workshop in Paris

[00:03:38] Gregg Rutter: And then, I found this photography workshop with somebody who I’d been working with a little bit online, Serge Ramelli, and I signed up for it. And so the whole thing started with the photography workshop. And that was the first week when I was in France, and really Paris.

[00:03:56] Annie Sargent: I guess, you got started in Paris with a guide, because the whole time you were with Serge, so he…

[00:04:02] Gregg Rutter: Yes, that’s correct. So, then one thing led to another and I, of course, extended the trip. My daughter, Amelia, wanted to join me. So that was wonderful to have her come and I prepared a lot for it.

Learning French and Preparing for the Trip

[00:04:15] Gregg Rutter: I started taking French language classes at Alliance Francaise in Minneapolis,

[00:04:21] Annie Sargent: Nice.

[00:04:22] Gregg Rutter: About a year ago, so the preceding fall, and that helped a lot to show that I was willing to try to speak a little bit of French when I was there. And understand.

[00:04:35] Annie Sargent: It probably gave you confidence also.

[00:04:38] Gregg Rutter: Absolutely. Absolutely. But the whole focus of the trip was to learn some photography skills and to photograph Paris, one of the great photographic destinations of the world, so…

[00:04:49] Annie Sargent: Fantastic.

Itinerary Planning and Exploring Paris with VoiceMap tours

[00:04:50] Annie Sargent: And then we did a itinerary planning session together. So we had talked about all the places you might consider going.

[00:04:59] Gregg Rutter: Right. One of the big things that helped that was, this was for the second week, I already kind of had the lay of the land from being there for a week.

[00:05:07] Annie Sargent: Sure.

[00:05:08] Gregg Rutter: And staying right in a great location, at the Citadines Hotel right near Pont Neuf. And your advice to stay in one location, one area every day, and just do all the activities in that area was kind of how that week was structured and it made all the difference.

[00:05:28] We still walked, about almost 30.000 steps a day.

[00:05:32] Annie Sargent: Wow. You’re strong, man.

[00:05:35] Gregg Rutter: But so I, you know, we picked out museums or monuments to visit in that area and did your walking tours every day, which were something we just really looked forward to. Yeah, that was the structure of the trip.

[00:05:49] Annie Sargent: And you got to know Paris quite well. I mean, obviously you did quite a lot.

[00:05:54] Gregg Rutter: We did do a lot. And it was, yeah, action packed, a lot of stuff. It was not stressful, but it was a lot. And I would like to come back and probably just ramp it down a little bit.

[00:06:08] Annie Sargent: Yeah. Well, you’ve seen all the biggies now, probably.

[00:06:12] Gregg Rutter: Right. That’s right. Yeah. So I’ve been there, done that. Now I’d like to kind of just maybe focus a little and go a little bit more in depth in some of the things.

Photography Workshop

[00:06:22] Annie Sargent: So, tell me a little bit about the photography workshop, because I’ve never been on a photography workshop. I have some ideas of how it works, but tell me how it’s structured, what you did.

[00:06:32] Gregg Rutter: So the structure is, and this is true, I think, with a lot of photography workshops, and I’ve been on others, it’s early morning and late at night, because you want to get the sunrise and the sunset, the blue hour, the golden hour times around the sunrise and sunset, because that’s when the light is the best. During the day, not so much.

[00:06:54] If there are, were photographs during the day, usually I’d turn to black and white photos.

[00:07:00] Annie Sargent: Mm.

[00:07:00] Gregg Rutter: It’s one of Serge’s sayings is, if the color’s not right, go black and white. And so that is a…

[00:07:07] Annie Sargent: I like it. I like it.

[00:07:08] … pretty good advice. So it was, we’d get up, go out, do photography, and then the mornings were free after that.

[00:07:16] Annie Sargent: Which I spent that time just kind of wandering around, and exploring things by happenstance, which was wonderful.

[00:07:26] Yeah.

[00:07:27] Gregg Rutter: I found so many great things. And then the afternoons were a workshop, kind of in a classroom setting at the hotel, where we would work with Lightroom on the computers and process photos, and he would give a lesson, and then we would all go out for dinner together, and then do photography in the evening.

[00:07:48] Annie Sargent: Mm hmm. Very nice.

[00:07:50] Gregg Rutter: And it was, they were very, very full days. And not a, you know, minimal sleep.

[00:07:56] Annie Sargent: Yeah, well, you have to get up early and go to bed fairly late for photography workshop. Yeah.

[00:08:03] Gregg Rutter: Yeah, yeah,

[00:08:04] Annie Sargent: So, if you don’t nap during the day, eh.

[00:08:06] Gregg Rutter: Right. The morning would be the time to, to take a nap if you wanted one. And some, you know, just kind of a little bit of downtime was perfect.

[00:08:14] Annie Sargent: So yes, you rank your photography, it looks to me like top of your list of your favorite things you did on this tour.

[00:08:21] Gregg Rutter: Right, right. And I got some great photos. So… mission accomplished.

[00:08:27] Annie Sargent: Excellent.

Photography Equipment for the Trip

[00:08:28] What camera did you bring? Let’s geek out a tiny bit.

[00:08:31] Gregg Rutter: I brought two cameras. I brought a Fuji X H2, which is a high resolution, mirrorless camera

[00:08:40] Annie Sargent: Mm hmm.

[00:08:40] Gregg Rutter: With interchangeable lenses, of course. And so I, you know, could use whatever lens I wanted, and then I brought a Leica Q2, which is a smaller camera with a fixed lens, but takes amazing photos. So, the Leica was a great one to walk around with, and that’s the one that I used a lot more during the week when Amelia was with me.

[00:09:03] Annie Sargent: You didn’t want to, yeah, you didn’t want to carry everything around. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:09:08] Gregg Rutter: And then, of course, a tripod, because you’re shooting in the morning or at night, it’s dark and you need to have a longer exposure.

[00:09:15] Annie Sargent: Yes, and obviously for that sort of work, you need quite a bit of equipment if you want to, you know, set things up just right, just so, and

[00:09:25] Gregg Rutter: Right.

[00:09:26] Annie Sargent: It makes sense. But the fixed lens is good because you can let your feet do the focusing, you know, you can just move back closer or whatever, and usually for city scapes, fixed lens works pretty well.

[00:09:41] Gregg Rutter: Yeah, and it’s a fairly, I think it’s a 24 or maybe a 28 millimeter.

[00:09:45] Annie Sargent: So a little bit wide. Yeah.

[00:09:48] Gregg Rutter: It’s a little bit wider.

[00:09:49] Annie Sargent: Yeah. Nice.

[00:09:50] Gregg Rutter: And then I had Amelia along, so she could be my little Sherpa. She happy to carry things for me, so…

[00:09:56] Annie Sargent: That’s good, that’s good. Alright.

Visiting Museums and Exploring Art

[00:09:58] Annie Sargent: What else did you enjoy on this trip? Perhaps your second best or…

[00:10:02] Gregg Rutter: Well, of course the museums, we just, we both love going to see all the art and the museums. So like I said before, focused our time in an area where like the museums were.

[00:10:14] The day that we did the Eiffel Tower, that was near the Rodin Museum.

[00:10:21] And so we worked all that in together. And we had tickets for to go to the top of the Eiffel Tower, but on the way there, we got a text message saying: We’re sorry, but we can’t take you to the top of the Eiffel Tower today because they’re doing maintenance or something on the elevators.

[00:10:36] Annie Sargent: Ah, okay. So how did that work out? Did they refund the money?

[00:10:41] Gregg Rutter: Yeah, they just refunded. I got the tickets right through the official Eiffel Tower website. Those things happen. And it was still really busy. We, you know, we did your tour, of course there, walked around the tower, and there’s still a lot of people. And I think we could have walked up, but I didn’t feel like walking up, so we didn’t.

[00:11:00] Annie Sargent: Yeah, that’s a lot of steps. It’s fine. It’s fine. But it’s a lot of steps.

[00:11:05] Gregg Rutter: And when you’re in the, you know, your, you go up the Eiffel Tower, you still can’t see the Eiffel Tower.

[00:11:09] Annie Sargent: That’s true.

Not the First Visit to Paris

[00:11:12] Annie Sargent: But so is it your first time in Paris or you had you been to Paris before?

[00:11:16] Gregg Rutter: I was in Paris in 1978. So it was a long, long, long time ago. So it was kind of new. It was all new to me.

[00:11:25] I looked at some of the photographs I took back in 1978, and that was fun to see how much things are the same.

[00:11:32] Annie Sargent: Yeah.

[00:11:33] Gregg Rutter: But I don’t really, you know, I didn’t have a good recollection of being there before.

[00:11:39] Annie Sargent: Yeah, of course. Yeah years go by and you forget, obviously. That’s just how life works, I think, you know that’s how life works.

Favorite Museums

[00:11:48] Gregg Rutter: One of our favorite museums was on the last day we went to the Picasso Museum. We both just loved that. And of course it was during the 50th anniversary of his death, so they had special exhibit set up for that, and the building that it’s in is very interesting and… it was great!

[00:12:08] Annie Sargent: Yeah, it’s a beautiful, it’s a beautiful museum, and it’s right there in the Marais, it’s easy to get to. But the problem with the Marais is that there are so many great museums, you know, which one do you pick? If you’re only going to spend a day or two, you have the Picasso, which is great, you have the Pompidou, which is also great. But that one is going to close, I think it’s scheduled to close after the Olympics, for renovations.

[00:12:35] Gregg Rutter: It’s going to be a long time, right?

[00:12:37] Annie Sargent: Yeah, well, they say it’s for four years, but I don’t think it’s going to be just four years. It’s probably going to be longer than that. So the Pompidou, you have the Chasse et Nature Museum, so that’s a private museum, but it’s very good.

[00:12:51] You have the Carnavalet Museum, obviously. Did you make it to the Carnavalet or not?

[00:12:56] Gregg Rutter: No, no.

[00:12:57] Annie Sargent: That one is a favorite of mine. It’s a museum of the history of the city of Paris. So it’s for history geeks, you know. If you don’t know anything about the history of the city of Paris, it’s still a beautiful museum.

[00:13:10] You have this gorgeous entrance. You have a lovely café. It’s a lovely setting, but of course, all the displays are probably not going to speak to you as much as they do to somebody who knows the history of the city, but it’s a fun one.

[00:13:25] You have the Shoah Museum there. You have another, I can’t remember where the exact name of the museum is, but there’s a museum to the kind of Jewish history in that area. Anyway, there’s a lot of them. And you could spend a week in the Marais just going from museum to museum and not get bored. But that’s Paris for you. You know, there’s always more that you could be doing.

[00:13:46] Gregg Rutter: Well, I’m going to, I will be back.

[00:13:49] Annie Sargent: That’s good. You list also the Musée d’Orsay as a favorite.

[00:13:53] Gregg Rutter: Yes. Yes. of course, that was a favorite. It had, just the building and the architecture was so interesting. And there was the Degas, Manet exhibit there when we were there.

[00:14:05] Annie Sargent: That’s right. That’s right. There’s a special exhibit that was going on. Yeah.

[00:14:08] Gregg Rutter: We loved that. We ate there, thought the food was really good. They seated us right beneath the big clock.

[00:14:15] Annie Sargent: Yes.

[00:14:16] Gregg Rutter: Which was great. It was like, wow, we lucked out. We got the best seat in the house. And then all the Impressionism wing, I guess, or floor.

[00:14:26] That was a favorite.

[00:14:27] Annie Sargent: Yes. There are two restaurants in the Orsay Museum plus several places where you can get a snack or a drink. I think it’s called Café Compass, the one with the clock.

[00:14:37] It’s very nice because you, I mean, obviously the… you know, the massive clock that everybody knows about is right there, so yeah, it’s very fun.

Fondation Louis Vuitton

[00:14:44] Annie Sargent: Looks like you made it to the Fondation Louis Vuitton. What was that like?

[00:14:48] Gregg Rutter: Oh, that was fabulous. I have a background in architecture, so I was seeing the Frank Gehry building and it was amazing. I wouldn’t have gone there without your recommendation, I don’t think. So, it was, it was great. Loved it.

[00:15:02] Annie Sargent: I wonder why, why wouldn’t you have gone there…?

[00:15:05] Gregg Rutter: It wouldn’t have been on my radar.

[00:15:07] It just, you know, probably just would have escaped my notice. It’s a little out of, out of town.

[00:15:13] Annie Sargent: A little bit.

[00:15:14] Gregg Rutter: But not bad at all. It was gorgeous. I mean, walked around that, I don’t know if, like in a place where you bring kids with the rides and stuff.

[00:15:24] Annie Sargent: Yes. Yes. There’s the Jardin d’Acclimatation next to it. Yes. Yes.

[00:15:29] Gregg Rutter: It was fun. Beautiful, beautiful area.

[00:15:31] Annie Sargent: Yes, it’s a very peaceful part of Paris. If it’s not too hot, which we’re recording this on a very hot day for both you and me, so heat is on my mind. But if not too hot, it’s a really nice, fun place to go, I think. And the museum is stunning, I don’t know how he pulled this off, I have no idea, but it, it stands there and it’s glorious.

[00:15:55] Gregg Rutter: It is totally glorious. And we were the first to, we had the earliest tickets available. So there weren’t other people, I mean, we were one of the first people in. And then by the end, there was a lot more people there, but it’s nice to be in these places where it’s not so busy.

Musée Rodin

[00:16:11] Annie Sargent: Very nice. Musée Rodin was one of your favorites. Are you always a fan of Rodin or is this just a special ocasion?

[00:16:19] Gregg Rutter: I am, and so is Amelia. And I’d also been to, there’s another significant Rodin Museum in Philadelphia, that I had been to, I forget, fairly recently. And so it was fun to compare the two.

[00:16:32] Annie Sargent: Tell us, what’s different and similar?

[00:16:35] Gregg Rutter: Well, it’s similar in that they’re both in these interesting buildings, the stand alone buildings, and they’re all, the entire museum is really devoted to Rodin. There’s not other exhibits there.

[00:16:48] Annie Sargent: Mm hmm.

[00:16:48] Gregg Rutter: And the one in Philadelphia was very nice, but the one in Paris, of course, was larger, you know, as you would expect. That was, it was great.

[00:16:57] Annie Sargent: A good place to go.

[00:16:58] Gregg Rutter: The way it was, everything was exhibited was nice. We saw one or two groups of school kids that were all sitting around on the floor in a big circle, learning about Rodin.

[00:17:09] And so that was, that was fun to see. And the gardens there, of course, are gorgeous.

[00:17:15] Yeah. It was just a wonderful thing. I think that was the same. We also, that day, walked around and went to three fromageries.

[00:17:26] Annie Sargent: Aha!

Self-guided Cheese Tour of Paris

[00:17:26] Gregg Rutter: And that was fun to see how the cheeses are sold in Paris different than…

[00:17:32] Annie Sargent: Yes, I like to tell people that they could easily go on a self-guided tour, food tour in Paris, just by going to several cheese shops and ask for your favorite type of cheese.

[00:17:46] So if you like goat cheese, just say, do you have a great goat cheese that I could try? And they will sell you one and then you go to a different one and you ask them for their best goat cheese and you know, and see what they sell you and it’s pretty good to do it that way because you can try different things. I would be shocked if they all had the same favorite.

[00:18:11] Gregg Rutter: I would, I would too.

[00:18:12] Annie Sargent: Because we have so many.

[00:18:14] Gregg Rutter: Yeah, and everybody was so friendly and helpful. And we ended up buying more than we should have. And, had a little, had a dinner picnic in the back at the hotel that night.

[00:18:24] Annie Sargent: Right, because at the Citadine, you have a tiny kitchen in most the rooms, right? I mean, it’s not big. I’ve stayed there. It’s a very small kitchen, but you have a small little fridge and a little hot plate. And you know, you can cut your bread and prepare a plate and stuff. So it’s not bad, yeah. It’s a pretty good place.

[00:18:42] It’s not the cheapest place in Paris, but I think for families it’s good because they can do, you can have, kind of a, a two bedroom setup or at least a bedroom and a sofa or something.

[00:18:54] Gregg Rutter: Yeah, and the location can’t be beat.

[00:18:56] Annie Sargent: Yeah, the location is perfect. It’s really central and they’re very helpful with, you know, if you need a taxi, you just tell them, can you call me a taxi?

[00:19:05] Two minutes later, there’s the taxi. They’re very professional.

[00:19:09] And the coffee’s in the lobby.

[00:19:11] Gregg Rutter: Oh, the coffee is tremendous. They did arrange for a taxi to the airport when we were leaving. But we found that taking the Metro was the best way to go.

[00:19:21] Annie Sargent: To go to the airport?

[00:19:23] Gregg Rutter: No. To get around, just to get around town.

[00:19:25] Annie Sargent: Yeah, yeah. It’s fast. I prefer the bus. But I’m never in a hurry. And I know that people in Paris, they just want to get places, so they’re not patient enough for the bus. But for me it works, you know, so that’s just me.

[00:19:41] So to go back to our idea of a, of a self-guided food tour, try some yogurts as well, like we have so many kinds of yogurts in France. So just try some that you don’t recognize, you know, just to see what they’re like. You could do the same with cold cuts. We have all sorts of cold cuts if you eat meat. Vegetables, we have fantastic fruits and vegetables in season, obviously. If you come in February, it’s not quite as good as August, but you know, that’s how you can do it.

[00:20:12] Gregg Rutter: And the smoked salmon was everywhere.

[00:20:15] Annie Sargent: Oh yes.

[00:20:16] Gregg Rutter: And we both love that. So we got some of that along with the cheese.

Photograhy at the Musée du Louvre

[00:20:19] Annie Sargent: Yeah, excellent. So you also enjoyed the Musée du Louvre. What was that, what was your visit like?

[00:20:26] Gregg Rutter: Well, on the photography side, we went there at sunset to get photos of the courtyard. And actually, we went on a Monday. I think it was a Monday, maybe Tuesday, but the day that the museums closed.

[00:20:41] Annie Sargent: Yes, that would be a Tuesday.

[00:20:42] Gregg Rutter: That was on purpose, so there weren’t as many people around. So we got good photography at sunset there.

[00:20:50] And then when I went back with Amelia and went through the Louvre, we never saw any paintings. We just did the sculptures. So, it’s so huge, and we had, going to all the other museums, we’re looking at a lot of paintings already. So we skipped the paintings and just focused on the sculptures. And also went down below to see the history of the Louvre, where they have the old, like the moat, like walking where the moat was for old palace. That was really interesting.

[00:21:23] Annie Sargent: That’s really cool. Yeah, and the Louvre is so big.

[00:21:26] Gregg Rutter: I wouldn’t, I mean, I would highly recommend that.

[00:21:29] And all the Egyptian stuff was interesting to see, of course.

Musée de l’Orangerie

[00:21:33] Annie Sargent: So, the last museum that you listed was the Musée de l’Orangerie, which is a favorite for a lot of people. Why did you like it so much?

[00:21:41] Gregg Rutter: Well, I like the way that it was laid out. It was small, you know, smaller than a lot of them. And the way that it just, it took you through all the different works kind of, you know, in a just thoughtful way. Easily digestible.

[00:21:56] Annie Sargent: Yeah, it’s not that big. It’s really a good size.

[00:21:59] Gregg Rutter: So I loved, I loved all, I love all the artwork in there.

[00:22:02] It’s not a good place for the cafe, the food isn’t so hot.

[00:22:07] Annie Sargent: It’s very basic.

[00:22:08] So did your daughter tend to agree with you on favorite museums, or was she…?

[00:22:13] Gregg Rutter: Yeah, I think the Orangerie, she was maybe a little bit museumed out, at that point. But, she did, yeah,she loves museums.

[00:22:22] We love doing this kind of stuff together.

[00:22:23] Annie Sargent: You must be pretty close that you came on a trip like this.

[00:22:27] Gregg Rutter: Right. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:22:29] We tend to do a lot of stuff like that.

The Charm of Sidewalk Cafes

[00:22:31] Annie Sargent: That’s fantastic. So one of the things you listed was Café Croissant du Matin and L’Apéro. Ah! So tell me about those! Yeah,

[00:22:40] Gregg Rutter: Just to sit at the sidewalk cafes and enjoy your café crème et croissant in the morning was just like heaven. And then every afternoon, you know, you go, go, go, and then in the afternoon it’s like, oh, it kind of pooped out and it’s warmer in the afternoon, so it’s time to take a rest.

[00:23:04] So we would find a place to stop and have a, I don’t know, a cure or a Campari spritz or something, and just relax a little bit and watch the people go by.

[00:23:16] Annie Sargent: I think that’s what a lot of people say they want to do, but I’m afraid a lot of them don’t allow enough time for that, but that’s great that you did. Yeah.

[00:23:25] Did you particularly research specific cafés or did you just go wherever it looked good?

[00:23:31] Gregg Rutter: We went just wherever it looked good. Of course, I was, you know, familiar with Café Fleur.

[00:23:38] Annie Sargent: Yes,

[00:23:39] Gregg Rutter: Café

[00:23:39] Annie Sargent: de Flore, yeah,

[00:23:41] Gregg Rutter: Le Deux Magots.

[00:23:43] Annie Sargent: Yeah, Les Deux Magots, yeah.

[00:23:44] Those are all right next to each other, Saint-Germain-des-Prés.

[00:23:48] Gregg Rutter: They’re right next to each other. So we, you know, I walked past them and looked at them, but we didn’t go there.

[00:23:55] Annie Sargent: Yeah.

[00:23:56] Gregg Rutter: Everybody else went there. But I don’t, it’s like, you can hardly go wrong.

[00:24:00] Annie Sargent: Yeah, and that’s what I try to tell people but sometimes they don’t believe me, they think they have to have THE recommendation to end all recommendations.

[00:24:09] Gregg Rutter: All the cafes are great. All the little bistros are wonderful.

The Joy of Spontaneous Dining in Paris

[00:24:14] Gregg Rutter: I didn’t make any reservations for dinner, with one exception, I guess we called ahead at one place that we had walked past earlier. A little, a small little oyster place.

[00:24:25] But they could always, you know, even if they’re busy, they would find a table for us.

[00:24:29] So we didn’t have any problems.

[00:24:32] Annie Sargent: Yeah, with two people, it’s easier than with twelve people, obviously. If you have a big group, you need to plan these things. If it’s just two people, three people, four people, eh, it’s usually okay.

[00:24:44] And you do have a list of places that you enjoyed. There’s quite a few though.

[00:24:49] Gregg Rutter: Quite a few.

Sharing Favorite Dining Spots

[00:24:51] Annie Sargent: Yeah. You want to tell us a little bit about those?

[00:24:54] Gregg Rutter: The first day that I arrived in Paris, of course you get into the airport at like eight o’clock in the morning and get to the hotel. They store the luggage, but then you have all day to walk around and you’re also tired from an all overnight thing, but, also kind of have a lot of energy for being there for the first time.

[00:25:14] But I found this place, it’s over near Shakespeare and Company, over in that area, Ostra Paris, and it was a, just recently opened, a little oyster bar, it was really good, so I would, recommend that.

[00:25:29] And of course I’m excited to be there and trying out my French on the poor waitress.

[00:25:34] And I said, I bet you’re tired of people practicing their French. And she goes, no, no, I love it, so…

[00:25:42] Another oyster bar that was a small little one was called Opium La Caban, Rue Dauphine, that was another favorite place. That was, if you like oysters, so…

[00:25:52] Annie Sargent: I do like oysters.

[00:25:55] Gregg Rutter: And then we also have on your recommendation, we went to Vendée Pyrénées.

[00:26:01] Annie Sargent: Ah, yeah. Vendée Pyrénées. Yes. What did you think of that?

[00:26:04] Gregg Rutter: Oh, that was maybe my favorite dinner of the whole trip was there, it was really, really good. Food was great, then upstairs there, there was like a bar kind of, but we didn’t go there, but it looked really interesting and they, they said come back tomorrow night, there’s live music, which we didn’t make it to it. But it was, that was a favorite, I would definitely go back there again.

[00:26:26] Annie Sargent: Yeah, yeah, so that’s in the Marais area, and it’s one where I’ve eaten, and they do classic French food, it’s very good, the food is very good. And it’s mostly locals, but of course, now that I talk about it, who knows who’s going to go? I’m sending the riff raff, ain’t I? Just kidding, just kidding.

[00:26:49] Gregg Rutter:

Experiencing Local Creperies

[00:26:49] Gregg Rutter: We took a side trip during the photo workshop week to Mont Saint Michel, and on the way back, we went to Saint Malo and ate at a creperie and had buckwheat crepes.

[00:27:02] Annie Sargent: Les galettes!

[00:27:03] Gregg Rutter: Are really good and are kind of famous there. That’s what I had and they were, oh my gosh, they were so good. So that was fun.

[00:27:13] Annie Sargent: Yes. It’s funny. So my daughter is staying with us for a few days because it’s so hot here in Toulouse that, she’s a climate refugee, I call it, because we have AC and she doesn’t where she is, where she lives. And I made some galette at home, one night. And I made one too many and so we put that in the fridge. And the next morning I woke up and I was like oh I just want to eat that galette for breakfast. And you know what, it was good, it’s even good for breakfast. So there you go.

The Beauty of Parisian Architecture

[00:27:45] Annie Sargent: You list a couple of restaurants that are famous like Au Vieux Paris d’Arcole. That one, you get to if you walk my Ile de la Cité tour. It’s a really pretty place. You see it on Instagram all the time because there’s the flowers outside and it’s just gorgeous.

[00:28:01] Gregg Rutter: It is a gorgeous place.

[00:28:03] Annie Sargent: But, was the food good?

[00:28:04] Gregg Rutter: Yeah, it was, it was okay.

[00:28:06] Annie Sargent: It’s okay. Okay.

[00:28:07] Gregg Rutter: I mean, it was…

[00:28:07] Annie Sargent: It’s prettier than… you go for the pretties.

[00:28:11] Gregg Rutter: Right. I love that area.

[00:28:14] Is that on the Île Saint-Louis, or no?

[00:28:17] Annie Sargent: No, it’s Ile de la Cité. That one’s on Ile de la Cité. It’s really a stone’s throw away from the, from Notre Dame Cathedral.

[00:28:25] Gregg Rutter: Okay. Yeah. Yeah. It’s really, it was really fun.

[00:28:28] Annie Sargent: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:28:29] Gregg Rutter: Fun people watching.

Le Consulat, in Montmartre.

[00:28:31] Annie Sargent: Yes. Yes, it would be. And then you list one that I have never, where I’ve never eaten Le Consulat. That’s in Montmartre. It’s a famous one. I mean,

[00:28:41] Gregg Rutter: It’s a famous one. I think everybody would recognize the building. The food was remarkably good.

[00:28:47] Annie Sargent: Oh, excellent.

[00:28:48] Gregg Rutter: Yeah. That was for lunch. And we were there with, Amelia’s friend who lives in Amsterdam came to visit. So there was the three of us. I felt lucky to, we got a table right away, which was…

[00:29:00] Annie Sargent: Sometimes it works out, you know.

[00:29:03] Sometimes it works out.

Le Mabillon, Boulevard Saint Germain

[00:29:05] Annie Sargent: Yeah, the other ones that you listed, I don’t… uh… oh, Le Mabillon, Boulevard Saint Germain. Yes, that one I’ve been to as well. But there’s so many restaurants in Paris, you know, don’t make yourself crazy picking restaurants, just go with the flow.

[00:29:21] It’ll be fine.

[00:29:22] Gregg Rutter: I agree. I mean, this list I sent, was not obviously not every place we went, but it’s a long list and they were all, I thought they were all good.

Opinion on Paris Prices

[00:29:32] Annie Sargent: Yeah. What do you think of the prices in Paris? Did it seem expensive or did it seem fair?

[00:29:37] Gregg Rutter: I think it seemed fair.

[00:29:38] Annie Sargent: Uh huh. Not bad.

[00:29:40] Remarkable. It’s that wasn’t anything that was like where we went, nothing was like way too expensive. I don’t think it was really inexpensive either. I thought it was just kind of like right, right in there, so…

[00:29:55] Yeah. All right.

[00:29:56] Gregg Rutter: Well, one place for food that I wish I had tried earlier was Odette.

[00:30:02] The puffs!

[00:30:05] Right, right. Oh, my gosh, they were so good. If I had known, I would have been going every day, so.

[00:30:13] Annie Sargent: Yes. On my Latin quarter tour, you get to that at the beginning of the, of the walk. It’s dangerous. It’s dangerous, but it’s really good. Isn’t it?

[00:30:24] Gregg Rutter: It’s really, really good.

[00:30:25] Annie Sargent: Yeah. That’s a delicious thing.

[00:30:28] So tell me a little bit about what you learned about France on this trip. You know, good advice that you would share with other people.

The Importance of Pre-Trip Research

[00:30:34] Gregg Rutter: It was really helpful for me to do some reading ahead of time and looking at the maps to see where everything was and to read about the history of Paris, helped me appreciate things a lot more, where I could place them in time. So I would recommend that and I gave a list of some books that you could include.

[00:30:55] Annie Sargent: Oh, good. Yeah. Yes.

[00:30:58] Gregg Rutter: And, I think staying where we stayed was also really helpful because, boy, you just walk out the door and you could just say, well, which, do I want to go right or left or straight it’s all good. So it’s like every, every place I went, you know, everything was wonderful.

[00:31:14] Annie Sargent: Yes.

[00:31:15] Gregg Rutter: And even just on that, like I said, in the workshop week in the mornings, I would just wander, wander about and come across fun things.

[00:31:24] Like close by was the place where Picasso painted Guernica. That was fun to see. There was what’s called the Beat hotel where the Beat writers from the United States in the middle of, in the 1950s stayed.

[00:31:38] And I was really fascinated with that. Salvador Dali sundial that was up on the side of a building. So, I mean, stuff like that. It’s just like, you just stumble across it.

Paris: A Safe Place to Be–Be Prepared for Pickpockets However!

[00:31:48] Annie Sargent: That’s cool. Yeah, and you mentioned in your document that you felt safe the entire trip, like Paris is not a scary place, is it?

[00:31:57] Gregg Rutter: Not at all, not in the least. So, you know, I was a little bit nervous, and I think a lot of people are, as far as, you know, what the safety aspect and you’d hear all about the, you know, pickpockets stuff like that. I never, I mean, if you just pay attention, be aware of what’s around you and pay attention, it’s no, it’s, it’s just, it’s wonderful.

[00:32:19] It’s a wonderful place. I always felt safe here.

[00:32:22] Annie Sargent: Yeah, so it is a problem because some people are so gobsmacked by just the surroundings, they are distracted. And the pickpockets are very good about making you feel sorry for them.

[00:32:37] Gregg Rutter: Uh huh.

[00:32:38] Annie Sargent: So they approach you and they ask you for help, or they ask you a simple question, like, do you speak English?

[00:32:44] And they, you know, they appear to want to be your friend. And it’s human nature not to be rough with these people. But you don’t need to be rough. You just need to keep walking, say, no, keep walking, you know.

[00:33:00] Yeah, just walk on by and mind your phone. Because your phone is what they want most, because they can resell that very easily.

[00:33:10] Gregg Rutter: Yeah, so no, no issues there at all.

[00:33:12] Annie Sargent: You also mentioned the traffic signals and to stay on the sidewalk. That’s a biggie. That’s a big safety item because again, you get looking around and you don’t even realize you’re in the middle of the street all of a sudden.

[00:33:23] Gregg Rutter: That’s true, yeah, pedestrians don’t necessarily have the right of way.

[00:33:27] Annie Sargent: Yeah, that’s true, unfortunately. They should, but you know, people are trying to get somewhere, and the bikes in Paris, it’s out of control, lots of bikes everywhere, right?

[00:33:37] Gregg Rutter: And the motorcycles drive like crazy.

[00:33:40] Annie Sargent: Yeah. So you need to keep your wits about you, and before you step onto any road, look, look, look both ways, be kind of, you know, … because you don’t twist your ankle and break something and end up in the hospital, you know.

[00:33:55] Gregg Rutter:

The Pleasure of Early Morning Photography

[00:33:55] Gregg Rutter: Other advice, if you’re taking pictures would be to get up early and go out before the city really wakes up. We got pictures at the Trocadero of the Eiffel Tower with nobody there because we were there super early at sunrise. Kind of hard to motivate yourself to get up and out of bed at that hour, but once you’re there, it’s worth it.

[00:34:16] Annie Sargent: Yeah. Yeah. Trocadero. I always tell people, you know, if you’re going to walk my Eiffel Tower tour, go like, you know, within 10 minutes of sunrise and you have about 40 minutes of beautiful light.

[00:34:29] And as you walk down, you’ll find all these beautiful places and you have great shots of the Eiffel Tower.

[00:34:35] Gregg Rutter: Yeah, so many wonderful places. So, carry a extra SD card with you. So if yours fills up in camera, you can quickly replace it. I had. We went to Père Lachaise Cemetery.

[00:34:49] Annie Sargent: Ah, yes.

[00:34:51] Gregg Rutter: And I did not bring my extra SD card. So I learned my lesson.

DSLR or Phone Photography?

[00:34:56] Annie Sargent: Ah, yeah. Well, perhaps you could take some photos with your phone as well.

[00:35:01] Gregg Rutter: I did. So that’s what I did. Yeah.

[00:35:04] Annie Sargent: Yeah. I mean, it’s not ideal, but it can be done. Lots of people just have a phone these days and it works fine. They get great photos. I mean, sometimes you luck out with a phone.

[00:35:14] Gregg Rutter: Sometimes you get better photos, yeah.

[00:35:16] Annie Sargent: It happens. It happens. Those phones, they can do dark, like in a church, if you don’t have a tripod and so forth, it’s going to be hard to get a good shot.

[00:35:28] With a phone, usually you get something, you know. It’s not ideal, but you get something.

The Convenience of Digital Payments and Don’t Get Cash at the Airport!

[00:35:33] Annie Sargent: Did you make any mistakes on this trip that you want to warn people about?

[00:35:38] Gregg Rutter: Well, the big miss, it’s really, it wasn’t a big deal, but I exchanged money for Euros at the airport. And I got more than I needed. I didn’t need as many euros since I thought I would. Everything is so easy to do with a credit card. And then the exchange rate at the airport was not great.

[00:35:57] Annie Sargent: Yes.

[00:35:58] Gregg Rutter: That’s the big mistake I made.

[00:35:59] Annie Sargent: I recommend people do not get any cash at the airport because whether you go to an exchange booth or use the ATMs at the airport, they have very high minimums and you’re going to end up with more cash than you know what to do with.

[00:36:17] Because honestly, you can pay with your credit cards, contactless especially, goes everywhere. Like, and if you have an iPhone, you could set up Apple Pay, or Google Pay. And it’s like everywhere. They take it everywhere. You don’t need to worry about anything.

[00:36:36] Gregg Rutter: That’s right. That’s how I paid for everything. And now I have euros at my house I can use next time.

[00:36:41] Annie Sargent: Sure. And if you do want some cash, it is better to get it at an ATM in the city. So you go to one of the big banks, you know, BNP or something, and you just withdraw at one of the ATMs. Because sure, your bank might charge you a couple of dollars, a fee, because you’re using a foreign ATM, but you can get 40 euros. Which is likely all you’re going to use the whole time you’re there, and you’ll be good to go.

[00:37:08] Gregg Rutter: Yeah, I did pay the taxi drivers between the airport and the hotel both ways in cash.

[00:37:14] Annie Sargent: Ah, you’re a nice man. I just tell them, shove it, I have a credit card, nothing else.

Greggg’s Book Recommendations

[00:37:20] Annie Sargent: I really like your list of books that you recommend, let’s read through that.

[00:37:24] It’s Paris, the Novel by Edward Rutherford.

[00:37:27] Gregg Rutter: Yes, and that was fun because there was somebody on the photo workshop that had also read that. And so we could talk about that. I would really recommend that. It’s a fun, fun book.

[00:37:39] And it bounces around time-wise, but there’s a thread through there.

[00:37:43] It’s a historical fiction. So there’s, it’s not, didn’t really happen, but a lot of it did happen. So you learn a lot in that.

[00:37:51] Annie Sargent: That’s cool. The Seven Ages of Paris by Alistair Horne. I have not read that.

[00:37:57] Gregg Rutter: Well, again, that, of course, that goes way back to the beginning of Paris. That’s more anchored in, just a history kind of a book, but again, I thought it was really interesting.

[00:38:09] Annie Sargent: Then you have two books by Sue Rowe, In Montmartre, In Montparnasse.

[00:38:14] Gregg Rutter: Yes, those are…

[00:38:15] Mysteries?

[00:38:16] No, those are about art. And so, it’s about the art scene. In Montmartre, that would be the first one, and then from there, all the, the whole art scene kind of moved to Montparnasse. And so, it kind of follows that, and the artists that are in there, and…

[00:38:32] Annie Sargent: Yeah, then you list The Paris Bookseller by Kerry Mayer, and she was on the podcast, talking about her book as well. I can’t remember what it was, 371 perhaps. It was one of the 370 episodes.

[00:38:45] Gregg Rutter: Boy, that’s, I recommend that book to everybody, but it’s, you know, all about the writing scene.

[00:38:52] Annie Sargent: Yeah, it’s a good book. It’s a good book. Oh, and then older books, My Life in France by Juliet Child and Alex Prudhomme.

[00:38:59] Gregg Rutter: Yeah, how can we not go to France and not think about Julia Child?

[00:39:04] Annie Sargent: Of course, of course. And A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway, a classic. Fantastic. Yeah, these are all good books.

[00:39:12] Gregg Rutter: They’re all easy to get through. And I think they’re all available in Audible, audio books as well.

The Value of Guided Tours, Annie’s Tours

[00:39:19] Annie Sargent: So, now to close, you say you loved my VoiceMap tours, so I want you to sell them for me. What, did you like about them?

[00:39:28] Gregg Rutter: Well, having Annie in your ear is the best thing, because you’re so full of, kind of wit. And have a kind a, a nice sense of humor. And it took us to places that were off the beaten path in these areas. We’ve seen things and learned about stuff that would have escaped us otherwise. There was two of us, Amelia and myself, and we just, she had one earbud and I had the other one, and so we just listened to it with the one, one phone. And it was, it worked out great. Lot of information.

[00:40:02] And they were nice, nice length tours. I liked that. And the fact that you could kind of like turn it off and go sit down at a cafe if you wanted, or go and spend some time in one of the sites that we walked past, and then turn it back on and pick it up.

[00:40:20] Annie Sargent: I think that’s the best part about it. The app makes it easy, it’s easy to find your way around, you’re not lost, you’re, you know, you feel like you’re following a narrative to, like you discover this neighborhood is the idea.

[00:40:34] Gregg Rutter: Yeah. And so we did, that was a lot to do, you know, but it gave us a structure every day. And we stayed in the one area for the whole day, and then one of the anchors of that was your walking tour.

[00:40:47] Annie Sargent: I absolutely think you should not zoom around from one area to the other. You’re just wasting your time in the metro. And trust me, the Paris metro is not that fun. I mean, it’ll get you places, but there are many, many things that you could do besides spending time in the metro.

The Importance of Pre-Booking Museum Tickets

[00:41:06] Annie Sargent: And the last thing I’m seeing is, get your tickets ahead of time for museums and monuments. That is true for a lot of places, especially the Louvre, the Orsay, the big ones like that, you really need to.

[00:41:20] And if you’re going in the summer or in the high months, you know, I guess it’s May through October these days, there’s lots of people, then do get your tickets in advance.

[00:41:31] Gregg Rutter: Yep. And I think if you, you know, like, we had such good luck early in the day where there weren’t quite as many people there, but the Louvre, the Louvre was still packed. I mean, a lot of people, I don’t think you can avoid that.

[00:41:45] Annie Sargent: Yeah. It’s popular. Yeah. It’s just popular.

[00:41:48] Gregg Rutter: Every other museum, I thought was pretty reasonable, as far as number of people are concerned.

The Joy of Exploring Parisian Landmarks

[00:41:53] Gregg Rutter: And the monument, we went to the Pantheon, and that handled people really well there. We went to the top, and great view, great cityscape view there. We went to the top of the Arc de Triomphe.

[00:42:07] Annie Sargent: Nice.

[00:42:08] Gregg Rutter: And again, great views.

[00:42:10] Annie Sargent: Yeah. So you didn’t get to the top of the Eiffel Tower, but you went to plenty of nice views.

[00:42:16] Gregg Rutter: Yes.

[00:42:17] Annie Sargent: You didn’t miss out. You did great.

[00:42:19] I don’t think so.

[00:42:20] Fantastic.

Wrapping Up the Parisian Adventure

[00:42:21] Annie Sargent: Well, Greggg, we’ve been talking a long time, but thank you so much for talking to me. I hope you come back to France, and take it easy. Be more of a flaneur, even, even more of a flaneur next time, I think you did good.

[00:42:36] Gregg Rutter: I will. I will be back. There’s no question.

[00:42:38] Annie Sargent: Merci beaucoup, Greggg.

[00:42:40] Gregg Rutter: Oh, merci. Au revoir.

[00:42:41] Annie Sargent: Au revoir.

[00:42:42]

Thank You Patrons

[00:42:49] Annie Sargent: Again, I want to thank my patrons for giving back and supporting the show. Patrons get several exclusive rewards for doing that, you can see them at patreon.com/JoinUs.

[00:43:05] Thank you all for supporting the show. Some of you have been doing it for many years. You are wonderful.

[00:43:11] And a shout out this week to a new patron, Laurie Belinsky. It is wonderful to have you on board in the community of Francophiles who keep this podcast going.

French History Brief about Victor Noir

[00:43:21] Annie Sargent: This week, I published a French History Brief about Victor Lenoir. Does that name ring a bell for you? Hmm. If you’ve visited Père Lachaise in Paris, you probably saw his grave as it is one of the most visited graves in this world famous cemetery. Who was he? Why do people still visit him in great numbers in Paris? it’s all explained in the French History Brief, exclusive content for patrons.

[00:43:48] Again, to join this wonderful community, and enjoy all the extra content, go to patreon.com/JoinUs, and to support Elyse, go to patreon.com/Elysart.

[00:44:04] And, you know, I’m working towards doing a regular video reward with Elyse. We’ve done it a few times in the past, but whenever I ask her, you know, shall we record a video for our patrons today? She usually comes back with something like: um, my roots are showing, or my eyes are puffy, or my office is a mess. So, I’m working on her. But she needs reassurance that nobody cares, right?

[00:44:29] I mean, will you think less of her if her eyes are a little puffy? I hope not. Otherwise, what is wrong with you?

[00:44:36] For me, I know that nobody follows this channel for my wonderful looks. You know, the saying come as you are, applies to my outlook on life. I strive to accept everyone, including myself, as we are.

[00:44:51] And yes, now you can start singing the Nirvana song.

[00:44:55] My thanks also to Meris Ruzow for your one time donation using the green button on any page on Join Us in France that says: ‘Tip Your Guide’.

[00:45:06] Meriz wrote: “Thank you for all you do, Annie, to enrich our travels.” My pleasure. And thank you for giving back, Meriz.

Annie’s Tours and Services

[00:45:14] Annie Sargent: If you enjoy the podcast and would like to keep it going for another 10 years, keep this small business happy and thriving by using my tours and services. You can go to joinusinfrance.com/boutique to see all of them.

[00:45:28] Now, right now on that page, you will see the signup page for the bootcamp 2024, but it’s not going to be there much longer. The link to reserve an itinerary planning session, a link to get audio tours where you get your listener discount. Those are my tours of Paris on the VoiceMap app. And also the sign up page for day trips around the Southwest with me in my lovely electric car.

[00:45:54] There’s also a links to get my cookbook, Join Us at the Table. And also a link to my favorite travel related products on Amazon, where if you start your shopping from that page and you buy anything at all, it doesn’t have to be anything I recommend, I get a small commission. And it does not cost you a penny more. That’s the beauty of it. It’s win-win. Plus I recommend some things on that page that can really make your trip easier.

The First Restaurant in France

[00:46:21] Annie Sargent: Let’s talk about the first restaurant in France and about the word restaurant. A restaurant is a place where we eat, right? Well, you see, originally it’s a present participle, like eating, devouring, lunching, feasting.

[00:46:40] And in French, present participles end in ‘ant’, like mangeant, dévorant, déjeunant, se régalant. So, the word ‘restaurant’ is a French present participle.

[00:46:56] Today, restaurants are everywhere, from fast food to Michelin stars. But they haven’t always existed, and the first to have the idea of selling dishes to be consumed on the spot, at a table, after having chosen them from a menu, that was Monsieur Maturin Rose de Choiseau, and he did this in Paris in 1765. And this business, he did not call it a restaurant because the word did not exist.

[00:47:30] He called it a Maison de Santé, so House of Health. And in the Maison de Santé, you would enjoy a bouillon restaurant, a broth that would restore your health or at least restore you to a state where you’re not hungry anymore.

[00:47:49] Now, in English, the word restore is written with an O and restaurant with an AU, but they are the same thing.

[00:47:57] In French, we did not change the spelling to an O, so to restore a piece of art is spelled the same as restaurant with AU. But, even with the spelling change in English, it’s not hard to understand that ‘restore’ and ‘restaurant’ are cousins.

[00:48:14] So, going from Bouillon Restaurant to a Restaurant, a place where you can sit down and order food, happened quite quickly, and it spread all over the world.

[00:48:26] Many languages use the word restaurant. In Italian it’s ristorante, in Albanian it’s something like a restaurant, in Danish it’s restaurant, in Spanish ristorante, in Turkish it’s restaurant. In short, it’s a present participle that has become a common noun and has proliferated everywhere in the world.

[00:48:47] And we still have restaurants called bouillons restaurants in France, especially in Paris, but that’s a story for another day.

[00:48:56] My thanks to podcast editors Anne and Christian Cotovan who produced the transcripts and make the podcast sound good.

Next week on the podcast

[00:49:02] Annie Sargent: Next week, it’s going to be the 10th anniversary of the podcast, so Elyse and I recorded a special episode, answering questions from all of you. And we reveal many of the things that we normally don’t talk about on the podcast. I hope you’ll participate by listening, reacting, and sharing the episode. This is a huge life milestone for me because producing a podcast for 10 years, it’s not something one does casually, so I gave it my all for 10 years and it’s been wonderful.

[00:49:32] Thank you very much for listening and I hope you join me next time so we can look around France together. Au revoir.

Copyright

[00:49:39] Annie Sargent: The Join Us in France travel podcast is written, hosted, and produced by Annie Sargent and Copyright 2024 by AddictedToFrance. It is released under a Creative Commons, attribution, non-commercial, no derivatives license.

Subscribe to the Podcast

Apple Google Spotify RSS

Support the Show

Tip Your Guides Extras Patreon Audio Tours