Right now we're in a cafe/bar 1.1km from the Stade de France. It's not in the most exclusive area, more likely the part of the city where the most recent immigrants have settled. David thinks it's one of the most dangerous areas in the world.
He has obviously never been to South Oak Cliff.
It was more dangerous on the Metro getting here, where a strange little man wearing a Glasgow Rangers shirt and an England football beanie cap (a definite sign of someone up to no good) started to unzip my bag. He didn't get very far. I travel with a bag with an uncooperative zipper!
Whatever area we're in, we had a chance to look around it when John lost his bearings when trying to locate the pub we're in now. I never felt threatened, maybe because I'm wary when out and about anyway, even in Birmingham.
David, bless him, is very protective. He came back to the hotel last night before the rugby matches on telly were over because he was worried about me. He and John had seen a bloke have his iPhone 4s stolen (the same phone I have) and had someone try the old "distract them by pretending you dropped a gold ring" trip. A women tried that to me in the Place de la Concorde on my way back to the hotel, but I ignored her because her acting was highly suspicious!
This morning we started off with a trip up the hill to Sacre-Coeur. Not up all the stairs at the front though. We're all old and unfit.
We still had quite an uphill trek, enough to get the blood pumping and the endorphins going, by approaching from the back, just as the bells began to toll.
No trip inside this time to see whatever is in there. It's a remarkable building, but for a woman who was a historian specialising in the Middle Ages, it's just too modern for my interest, having been begun in 1875 and completed in 1915. I'm more interested in St Denis, which is 331m from where I'm sitting right now!
Instead of going around the cathedral, we found an Irish pub on the corner (middle of the photo with the green awning) and people watched while drinking cafe au lait and eating fresh croissants.
I had to laugh because there were two tellies on in the pub plus music. One was showing Catholic mass, the other the news. At the point in the mass where the priest elevated the host, P!nk came on the radio singing "I'm Not Dead".
My supervising partner Anne said her favourite part of Paris is Montmartre and we had a wander through the artists' market. I remember when I was taking French in high school and enamoured with all things French, I said one day I would buy a painting in Montmartre and I did.
Not from the market itself, where a small oil painting can cost 55€ but from a little shop down the hill where I think artists must take their surplus paintings that they paint on the market but don't sell. After all, you can't have hundreds laying around your stall. I paid 20€.
The England supporters were out in force already, and I won't be surprised if these lads end up on telly because we saw the BBC Sport van parked up around the corner from Sacre-Coeur.
Now more or less back to the present. I can't write in my blog as easily when I'm out with these two, but they're watching rugby on the telly and drinking beer so they're content.
Although David has told John that blogging is one of the world's great inventions for keeping women quiet. How rude.
7.30pm - What an afternoon!
We went next door to the pub where I was blogging before for a pizza, having seen a few other England supporters go in. It looked like a very rugby-friendly place.
I had stopped to take the picture and when I walked in there were cries of "Oh no! Not another England supporter!"
In this "dangerous area" in Paris, they took us into the back part of the restaurant, brought us free champagne and told us we were going to have the couscous. We never saw a menu.
I don't even know what the name of the restaurant is! But it was so much fun, the food was fantastic and they really looked after us.
Then ... Le Crunch!
I won't give a full match report here. Suffice it to say England beat France 24-22. The atmosphere in the Stade de France was incredible! I've never been to a rugby stadium that loud, not even the Millennium Stadium with the roof shut!
Typical French rugby supporters. More noise when England was kicking than at any other time despite the announcements to respect the kicker!
Now I'm being quiet and blogging again, but I sent David and John out for a beer to keep them quiet!
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