Day 43: Paris

October 19, 2022

Dammit, I'm a mechanic Steve, not an electrician!

Paris holds a special place in our hearts, but why? It's a long story, that actually extends back about a hundred years. We are of Jewish- Polish, Russian, German extraction, and about a hundred years ago is when family members first began coming to Canada, fleeing persecution in Eastern Europe. They settled in Quebec - in Montreal - which is basically the first big city off the boat.

The first European settlers of any type and significant numbers also came to Quebec, with Montreal being founded in 1642 by the French. As we know from European history, the French and the English had a long intertwined relationship, trading kings and queens and fighting each other a lot. The English had already founded what became the United States, in 1607, and in 1759 in a famous battle near Quebec City they defeated the French and took over the place . In 1764 they even gave a lot of French the boot, with those eventually landing up in Louisiana.

But the English never succeeded in fully getting rid of the French, and Canada ended as a bilingual and multicultural society, but with a lot of trauma and theatrics along the way, something that is still continuing, with new restrictive language laws being passed even this year, by Quebec French still trying to hang on to their language and heritage.

Into this mess waltzed our families. At the time the English had full control of the economy, so to get a job you needed English. Our families therefore settled in English neighbourhoods, and traded Polish, Russian, and Yiddish for English.

Dodie and I came along mid-century, and with our fresh eyes could not see any reason to side strongly with any language group, although we could not avoid the fact that our mother tongue was English. We looked at the two cultures, English and French (then called in literature the Two Solitudes) and saw merit in both.

We tried to find friends among the French and sample the food, theatre, and ambiance in the French parts of the city. We appreciated the stone farmhouses, multi-spired churches, the baguettes! (Those house designs, churches, and foods were all from Brittany and Normandy, where the settlers had come from, and which not by coincidence is where we have come now.)

A lot has been written about how French culture and language had been much admired in Europe, say at the time of Louis XIV, and of course there is a lot to it. But the French culture we admired came simply from empathy with our fellow citizens of Quebec. Their culture was the French culture, but it had been brought to us indirectly through them. It was strange, because in Quebec the elegant French culture had been molded by the harsh Canadian environment and had become something a little different, but still recognizable.

With this background, we sent two of our children to study in France, in 1988 for Joni and mid 90s for Josh. We hoped they would improve their French, but our very romantic view of France and Paris came about when Judy Collins wrote her brilliant song, My Father, in 1969. Joni came back from France a much more elegant young woman than she left, and for the romantic side, she brought Didier. Josh seemed like he could take it or leave it, but the result is evident today as he works and lives in French Quebec, as did my own father.

We ourselves did not land in Paris until 2014, and we immediately saw that it was all true. We loved the place immediately. It was shocking to go on the Metro and to surface at any downtown station, look around, and exclaim Ohmygod, it's PARIS up here. In 2017 we celebrated our 50th anniversary, yes in Paris, in "Grampies Go 50 for 50".

Listen to My Father, you will feel its romance and poignancy. A lot of the commenters expressed it better than I.

Because Didier could only accommodate us at his place for Tuesday, we did a lot of searching for places to stay but without success. That supposed food expo in town may have been to blame, but a lot of places genuinely charge 500 euros per night. In addition we don't suppose most downtown hotels have an easy place for bikes. Imagine our surprise when we cycled up to Didier's place at looked at the Ibis, right across the street. "Let's go in and just ask them", was Dodie's idea. So boom, we were in, for three nights!

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Now that we have a Paris base (Accueil Velo approved, no less) we will take the train (RER-A, a regional line) into town. From there we can get around in the Metro, which goes everywhere. For this first day we had one main objective - go to the e-Bike repair shop I had found, and settle my mind as to whether I was going to crank my way to Marseille in low gear, or whether the e-assist might be reparable. Didier recommended a mechanic he knew who supposedly was supremely capable, but I had already committed to going to "Docto-Velo", a small shop near the Eiffel Tower.

The RER proved to be pretty bicycle unfriendly, with erratic provision of elevators, and no special spaces provided in the coaches for bikes. We also understood that the metro was really not possible with a bike. RER began for us at the Maisons-Laffittes station, where we saw no ticket office but only a machine. We were puzzling over it when a man offered to help. On the subject of language, he preferred Greek but could also do English and French. So we managed to buy a couple of tickets. A one day ticket for RER and Metro cost 13 euros each. We did eventually find the ticket office, which was good, because only there was there a turnstile big enough for bikes. Later, downtown, at a park near the Eiffel Tower, we found this same man again, this time with his Greek parents in tow. We told them they had raised a kind and good son. How unlikely to find someone again amid thousands of people.

An unloaded Bike Friday fits well in the RER.

The lifts (which were rare) were designed like funiculars.

We came up from the Charles DeGaulle - Etoile station, randomly choosing one of many streets you could exit to. And yes! they still had Paris up there - with the handsome buildings and the red awning outdoor cafes. Here are a few shots, though I didn't really try this time to capture the wonder of it all (Hey, I'm sick, I caught Dodie's cold really badly).

This one confused me, though Dodie seemed to see clearly. I took a seat on the left, and a man came and told me they were closed. "But, but" I replied, "there are people eating just over here." "They are eating and this is for drinking, except I am closed because I am a Socialist and this is a strike day". Oh.

We circled around the Arche de Triomphe. The monument honours those who fought in the Napoleonic Wars and the Revolution. The close-up shows a pretty chaotic scene.

Also chaotic is the multi lane roundabout (rond point) that surrounds the Arche. We were once brave enough to cycle this. Dodie became famous for facing down a car load of African diplomats in a black limo, grabbing the right of way.

The back Mercedes and man in a black suit made this look like something from the French Connection.

We had put a marker in the GPS for Docto Velo, and made our way steadily towards it. Paris traffic is surprisingly tame, making crossing roads quite easy. The shop was down a laneway, and in an unlikely place for a bike shop. Still, there was Jonathan, the mechanic, and true to his website promise he was ready to listen to my story SRV. "SRV"? - Sans Rendez-Vous, of course.

Jonathan was looking a little dubious as I prattled on about Anderson connectors, the torque sensor, and USB connection into the Controller brain. He tried to tell me that my scheme (that I wanted him to do) to cut the power connector from the old controller and splice it into the new one, was dangerous, because of the high currents involved. Nonsense, I countered, Bike Friday told me they do it all the time. We left it with Jonathan and went tottering back into Paris.

Just down from Docto-Velo was another great Paris landmark - the Eiffel Tower. Approaching it from the Docto-Velo side (from the north) you run first into the Trocadero, with it's fountains and park in front of it, facing the Seine. Trocadero is the name of the 1878 palace which was demolished in 1937 to make way for the current Palais de Chaillot. The huge Palais building houses a museum, but we saw no one going in. Maybe that is because we never quite spotted the entrance. Instead everyone plus us was gawking at the Eiffel Tower, which stands just across the river by the Pont de l'Ena.

In the Trocadero - presumably where Judy Collins would learn to dance.

Tomorrow we plan to jump on one of these.

On and around the bridge there were numerous souvenir vendors, all with the same merchandise. We saw them here years ago too, and still have some of those darn Eiffel Tower trinkets waiting to give away.

We found other vendors such as this one with charcoal in a bucket, roasting corn. We saw another one with chestnuts. The vendors seem to be frowned on by police.

Here was a percussion expert, with just a few parts to his drum kit!

We carried on past the Eiffel Tower to Rue Cler, a market street that had been much praised by Rick Steves. There was indeed some interesting stuff on Rue Cler, but it was not a flat out blockbuster market.

Vienoisserie with many folds, comme il faut.

We returned to Docto-Velo to find Jonathan just putting the final touches on the bike. It works! Jonathan agrees that poor sealing must have allowed water inside the last one. So for this one, he did a lot of wrapping with tape.

We bought two new tubes, since we weren't impressed with the one that went flat or the one that started with a split. Jonathan asked for 50 euros for the repair, but we saw he had spent most of the day on it. We got him to accept 60.

We hope this will now keep the water out

Today's ride: 15 km (9 miles)
Total: 1,750 km (1,087 miles)

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Jacquie GaudetI hope the repair holds up, at least for the remainder of your trip!
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2 years ago

Steve Miller/GrampiesTo Jacquie GaudetSo do we, Jacquie, so do we.
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2 years ago

Michel FleuranceWater ingress ? hope Dr Jonathan found and solved the problem with your bike. Stay dry.
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2 years ago

Polly LowGood haggling on the repair price!
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2 years ago