Paris Trip - 5th to 12th March 2010 Part II

Day 4:
- SIL and I went out at 10+am and walk to 233 rue saint Honoré again to find the Goyard shop. At the same time also went to a nearby shop to look for LongChamp bag which SIL need to help a friend to buy.
- End up both came out of the shops empty handed because the Goyard bag was not as nice as what I saw online, and the other shop did not sell the color my SIL wanted. It was not a Longchamp boutique, just a shop carries Longchamp and other brands.
- So we walk along the street to buy more souveniers for Hui's whole family and tabao Mcdonald back for lunch.
- Hui was at home looking after the kids making them happy and ensure they took their nap. :)
- The ladies returned back to the hotel around 1pm. The young "ladies" were still sleeping when we returned. Good job Hui!
- After the girls were awake, we left the hotel around 3pm to Parc de la Villette. It was a park which have some fun activities for the kids. In order to go this place, we need to walk pass Cites Des Sciences et de i'industrie (A place like Singapore Science Centre). After asking around, we found Parc was abit too far to walk to hence we hang around the park opposite Cites Des Sciences.
- We let the girls play and run around the park freely before we proceed for some meals inside Cites Des Sciences. The girls had porridge which I cooked in the morning to bring it out, while the adults had waffles and hot drinks.
- Left the place and went to underground shopping at Chatelet.
- Window shopping for 1hour or so I guess, and proceed back to hotel.
- Adults had Sodebo (pasta) for dinner while the girls drank milk and head to bed.

Day 5:
- Left the hotel at 10+am to our first destination - Jardin de Accalimation. This day, we strike out the idea to leave the hotel in the noon because we wanted to go 2 places. If was like yesterday, we could only be able to go 1 place.
- The place was not that difficult to find. Probably 10mins walk away from the metro (or RER?). I guess I have 2 very good walking street directory. I simply just follow them :)
- Elsie was asleep in the train and only woke up after we almost finished our breakfast in one of the cafe (near the entrance) of Jardin de Accalimation.
- It was a nice place for kids. It's like our local funfair with rides for the kids and games to play to exchange for soft toys or other little gifts. It also have a small area that rares farm animals (goat, cow, birds etc). The girls had learnt some new words there...."cow...mooo....goat....meh meh..." and ofcourse some of their already known words as they goes..."BIRD...DOG" when they saw them.
- Ofcourse, Chloe had the chance to ride on the carousel again. She wanted to try out so many other rides and kept saying 'chor chor...sit sit...'. But too bad, there are age limitation where many of the rides are for 3-4 years and above. Only selected are for their age, but with adult accompanied.
- They also had fun playing and chasing after bubbles which their GUGU bought at the toy shop there.
- We spent 1/2 a day there and left the place around 2 or 3pm for factory outlet shopping at Val D' Europe, 1 stop away from Marne-La-Vallee-Chessy (Disneyland). The train ticket to this station was quite expensive, $6+ euro per pax because it was considered the more expensive zone (zone 6). But like the locals at paris which always like to sit the ride for free by climbing or jumping over the gantry, we as foreigners decided to play cheat too. :)
- We paid for a cheaper fare, as if we are travelling to zone 1 or 2 for $1+ per ticket. When we reach Val D Europe, with that ticket we were not able to get out of the gantry. But if there is someone coming/going in/out of the gantry, we will chiong out before the door closed. Usually the gantry that was used for the wheelchair/stroller have bigger openings and the door will take longer time to close. Therefore as soon as that person came in or went out, we followed closely behind and Ta-Da! We were out of the gantry at a cheaper price ticket...haha...Do this at your own risk. Do not follow suit if you were in Paris and you are not comfortable or daring to do this :P
- Ok, so here we are at the Factory Outlet starting our journey for branded goods. LongChamp was our first stop and good grace..the bags were so much cheaper compared to local! But they are usually those out of season bags that were selling at a further discounted price off the retail price at Paris boutique. So LongChamp at Paris boutique is already cheaper than in Singapore. Can you imagine another 30% discount cheaper than Paris boutique? Hohoho...we bought $440 Euro worth of bags there! Some as gifts, some for personal.
- Move on further to Agnes B but the bags at the factory outlet were quite limited. The shop were selling more clothes instead. Other branded shops were also there, a whole stretch of them. But some probably if you buy in US will be much cheaper like the Polo RL.
- Left the place around 7pm and head back to hotel.
- SIL cooked macaroni pasta for the girls and adults. Another day ended again...

Day 6:
- My birthday!
- Morning, SIL went out alone to 404, Rue St Honoré to the LongChamp boutique to buy the bag which she need to help her friend buy. As it was a new color, therefore the factory outlet do not have it.
- So morning Hui & I took care of the kids and I cooked porridge for the girls as lunch and dinner (to be brought out).
- We fed the girls lunch, make them sleep awhile and got them dress up just before SIL came back. We had a target to leave the hotel before 2pm.
- Left the room as targetted and reach Eiffel tower as our first stop.
- Chloe fell asleep during the ride to Eiffel tower hence her face was covered in the photo when we took it infront of the tower. And when she's awake, we were already queuing up to enter and forgot about re-taking with the tower after we came out. Wasted!
- It was horribly cold at the 3rd level outdoor. Snap some photos quickly and went back into the indoor as I scared the girls could not take it. The view were breathtaking as usual but I guess the girls were too young to appreciate.
- It was my second time in the tower, but the experience at the 3rd level outdoor never fails to WOW me!
- Loiter around in the tower for some time and fed the girls milk before we started to descend down. Chloe was as friendly as usual to the Ang Mors and seems my girls were quite well-liked by them. During the few minutes time in the lift to descend down the tower, an angmor couple were playing with Chloe and it did kept her entertained for that couple of minutes. Anyway the girls were not shy at all and wave 'Hi' & 'Bye' to many angmors in Paris where ever we went.
- Left Eiffel tower and proceed to Champs-Elysees again for shopping as we still had some things need to buy from there.
- First to the disneyland shop to get 2 cups for the girls because I saw the design there on Sunday when we went to purchase the tickets, but couldnt find the exact cup at the shops in Disneyland.
- Then proceed to Agnes B boutique shop as SIL need to help friend buy a bag from there as well. I bought a bag from Agnes B as well because I just couldn't resist it. Although I was quite hesistant at first because the bag do not come in Black, only White. Anyway I still bought it as Hui keep sykoing saying it's not always we will be in Paris and the price was quite attractive as well. 95 Euro for that bag which might be selling like few hundreds in Singapore. I have a Agnes B bag, size slightly bigger which Hui bought for me in Singapore selling at $300+ before discount (He bought it when it was having sale!). Will go checkout in local see if the bag I bought do sells here and how much is it..haha..
- Left Champs-Elysees at round 7pm and took the train back to our hotel station.
- Because it was my bday, they insist we should have dinner at some restaurant this time round instead of those pathetic dinner in the hotel room.
- Settled down at a restaurant nearby our hotel for dinner. Guess it was the best dinner we had for the trip here! Service was very good as well.
- After we called the bill, the girls were given a stick of poky each from the waiter and a few packets of biscuits. Ofcourse the girls showed their seductive smile again with their little dimples and wave happily to the waiters, bitting their poky away!
- After the dinner, we hurried back to the hotel. It should be very cold since it was almost 9pm. But luckily we took all the small lanes and I guess the buildings in between us had helped to block away the winds.
- Back at the hotel, we cut the birthday cake which SIL bought when she was out in the morning. It was a very very nice cake but because we had such a heavy dinner, 3 of us could not managed to stuff the whole cake down. Although I hope I could, but stomach told me to stop before it explode!
- The girls had many bites of the cakes too to share the joy.
- We ate 1/2 of the cake and left the balance for tomorrow breakfast before we check-out.
- I brought the girls to bed while the other 2 were busy packing the luggage. We had to check-out by 8am as the taxi would be waiting for us outside the hotel to fetch us to the airport.

Day 7:
- Everyone woke up late as per planned!
- Rush like mad to stuff all last minute items (like toiletress, sleeping attire etc)into the bags.
- Suppose to have the leftover birthday cake as breakfast but end up throwing 1/2 the cake away because we do not have time to eat. Super heartpain because the cake was so nice! Anyway, I still managed to take a few bites out of the rushing madness! :p
- Managed to checkout hotel in time and board the taxi.
- Reached the airport quite early so that we could have time to claim for the tax rebate for the bags we bought and loiter around the airport.
- The girls were much more well-behaviour in the plane on the way back to Singapore.
- Arrived Singapore Changi airport around 7am (13th March) with the whole gang of Chua family waiting at the arrival gate for us.

This marks the end of our 7days 6nights Paris trip. Our very first trip with the kids. With this experience, I guess I could do it much better for our next trip.

Havent have time to upload the photos to shutterfly yet. Will post to blog again once I have uploaded them. Stay tune....