This view is one of my favorite views of the Sacré-Coeur. Back in the days, when I was walking up or down Boulevard des Italiens and wanted to surprise/impress a foreign visitor friend, I would simply say “look this way” when reaching Rue Laffitte. It worked every time. […]
Despite not having been to Andorra in many years, I had been so often in the 80’s and 90’s that I thought I knew most of what is not to be missed in the country. After all it is a small country. Well, I was wrong… As our small […]
Today, a small piece of Paris recent history. La Samaritaine was one of the biggest, oldest, most famous department store in Paris, and one where Parisians actually went shopping to (unlike Galeries Lafayette). It was closed a few years ago by an unscrupulous owner (LVMH who else?) who used […]
The Pont des Arts (Arts Bridge) used to be my favorite bridge in Paris. It has everything you want for a “favorite bridge.” First it is pedestrian, and it also happens to have one of the best view you can imagine from a bridge in Paris. If you look […]
I don’t have much to tell you about the Ordino Pass (Coll d’Ordino in Catalan). It’s just one of the many passes in Andorra, one that has remained quite unspoiled. This is one of the good things about Andorra, despite its booming development, nature that has barely been touched by […]
As we have two weeks left in France before the big move, we decided not to entirely spend them packing, and to have a mini “goodbye tour” of the region. As we hadn’t been to Carcassonne in about three years, we thought it would be good to go now. […]
We continue with our visit of Andorra with today the village of Pal, possibly the most charming village in the country. While the rapid growth of the Andorran population has seen among other consequences a quite chaotic and not very aesthetic surge of new constructions everywhere, the village was […]
As you already know, I was in Paris this past week. Among all the things I did there, one of them was to go eat in my favorite Japanese restaurant in town. See, for the past five years or so, Paris has literally been invaded by Japanese restaurants. Except […]
This is the way the Place de la Bastille looked about 100 years ago : And this is the way it looks now : On the postcard, one can see the building that use to stand before the Opera Bastille was built. The July Column […]
When I was a kid and I used to go to Andorra once or twice a year, there was always one landmark that stood out on the road to Andorra-la-Vella. See, that road, following the Gran Valira river crosses a few towns but none of them are aesthetically or […]