A tight wad's guide to Paris

We visited Paris the same way as we did 2 years ago - on a shoestring. This means instead of staying in one of these...

Three of us stayed in one of these, just 15 minutes by train outside of Paris, but situated on an Island in the middle of the Seine. A snip at £165 Monday - Friday including the ferry crossing! Staying here means that we can make ourselves a decent breakfast before we go out, buy ham and cheese baguettes at the local Boulangerie for 3 euros each before we get on the train, and return to eat in the local town instead of paying Parisian prices. When 2 x coffee's, a coca cola and a very small bowl of ice cream cost 25 euro's in central Paris, you can see why it makes sense to do this!
The Eurocamp caravan was really comfy and they even greeted us with a free bottle of wine. Its not the quietest place on earth with a train line nearby,aeroplanes coming in to land and huge barges passing by, but this is a city break after all. We were very luck with the weather again and got to sit out on the deck on a couple of occasions.

The railway station is a 10 minute walk from the camp site, and the trains are every 5 minutes. They deposit you on the top of the Champs Elysee - right under the Arc de Triumphe.
The young man hates shopping, but would happily spend all his holiday in the spectacular shops on the Champs Elysee. We saw our first "celebrity " spot of the day in the Adiddas shop - Nigel Clough - son of Brian and current manager of Derby County.
We walked down towards the Place de la Concorde, the Tuilleries Gardens and the Louvre. This is one of my favourite bits of Paris.

I am blown away by the scale of everything here. The little black machine on the pyramid was cleaning the glass - so thats how they do it!

One thing I really love about Paris is that if you have enough stamina, things are close enough to see most of them in one day. We certainly charged around like loons on our first full day in the city.
I had read about the bridges where lovers leave padlocks - to signify that they will return again as lovers on Paris Daily Blog, and was delighted to come across these. Next time I am taking a padlock!! Most had their names and dates engraved on them, some had just written on them in felt tip pen. Its wonderful to know that there is so much love and hope in the world.
We hot footed it over to the left bank to find another haunt - which much to my disappointment was closed!! (just for the day!!). Its here we saw our 2nd celebrity spot - but I cannot think for the life of me what her name is. Can you help? She is a Black American lady who appears on TV - I thought she was a comedienne, but I'm sure Ive seen her on Andrew Marrs show recently. She used to be fairly large, but she has had weight loss surgery and is much slimmer now, and she has short hair. Any clues? Any way, she was as disappointed as I was to find the Shakespeare and Co closed.

Edited to say "many thanks" Rosie - it was indeed Jenni Trent Hughes.
At 6.30pm, we decided to take a trip on a Baton Mouche. Nicely timed as we were on the point of collapse! (especially the teenager!)

You get to see the fabulous detail on the amazing bridges. I introduced the phrase "Belle Epoque" (Beautiful Era) to the young man and pointed out features in the Belle Epoque style. I realised a few days later that he though I was saying "Belly Pork"!
As well as providing a nice sit down and a running commentary, we got to float through the city at dusk, and watched her change from her day time attire, into her sparkly evening gown.




A great way to end our first day.

Paris

Ive been away.

But I'm back with millions of photo's and tales of my very poor school girl French that caused much hilarity!

Park Life

One of our favourite city walks is through Endcliffe Park in Sheffield. You start out in the city and end up in the Peak District - if you walk far enough. Sheffield is famous for being a very green city and this place is very special and well used by the locals.

We spotted these yellow holly berries,
side by side with plenty of red ones - another harsh winter me thinks.
Before our walk, we partook in a few minutes in the outdoor gym. I think this is a brilliant idea. I wouldn't mind a few of these in my garden.

The park and woodlands are really picturesque now, but back in time, this was the area in Sheffield where the steel forges started. The Shepherd Wheel is being restored, and this weekend the woods were full of masters students from Sheffield Uni re creating some of the sights, sounds and skills from the steel making, forging and grinding industry.


I loved it. You can't beat a real fire in the middle of the woods on a crisp day. And all the kids love this kind of thing. Two little boys had me in hysterics trying to pump the massive bellows.

I think its great that people still do this kind of thing. Some of the workers explained the chemistry and science of what was happening, and other forged products.

Brilliant stuff.
And then it was on with the walk.


Seeing what nature has forged and placed along the paths for us to see.

A very favourite place.

The Help

Last night my pal and I went to see a freebie preview of the film of the book - The Help. We loved it. It made us laugh and it made us cry. The movie is set in the town of Jackson in America in the 1960's and focuses on one girls ambition to tell the story - from the perspective of the maid - the help. The women who employ the maids are often not kind. It is a longish film - about 2 hours 15 mins, but it doesn't seem it. If you get chance to see it - do. I highly recommend it.

I believe it is out on general release on the 26th October.

Imperial Buildings Rotherham

Ive mentioned before that my nearest town, Rotherham has suffered greatly over the last few years as new out of town Malls have spring up around it, and all the big name shops moved out leaving only mobile phone shops, betting shops and several Greggs! It has an OK market, but the town centre can often seem like "Chav Central" as there isn't much for the ordinary shopper. However, the council have spent money renovating the beautiful Edwardian Imperial Building which is right in the centre of town, and a few very individual shops have moved in.

I'd heard good reports about this shop and thought I might have an early Christmas shopping trip for stocking fillers.
A lot of the original features have been kept throughout the building.
And the interior of the Yella Brick Road is very funky.
They sell vintage and accessories and I could have spent ages looking at everything that was on offer.

Hubby thought that the sign outside was funny.
We also called into the Yorkshireman Deli for refreshments. The lovely gent who runs this had been made redundant and has taken a risk starting up a business - despite of the recession as he says it better than being on the dole. I wish him all the best.
We also called into the new sweet shop and bought a selection of our childhood favourite sweets. The lady in here told us that they had recently had a visit from Mary Portas who was impressed by the friendliness and service she had received.

If you are local and what to pop round for Halloween, she is having a toffee apple making session on the 31st October.
There are still plenty of empty units in the Imperial Buildings, but I hope it does really well.

We just had enough time for a quick zip around the minster (as we had never been in before!) and discovered that a few local history groups were having a get together and showing off some of their findings which was very interesting.

Nights out

Ive had a few great nights out recently. On Saturday night, we went to see Sheffields own "Everly Pregnant Brothers". These are a great Ukelele band with a great lead singer that sing tunes you all know, but amend the words to make them very significant to Sheffield - and hilarious at the same time. They were playing their first BIG gig at the Lyceum Theatre and it went very very well for them. My favourite songs were about the "Hole in the Road" (or "Oil in ruard")a Sheffield landmark that we no longer have, and one about "Hendersons Relish" our local sauce!

If you are local, try and catch these at some point - If you're not, you probably wouldn't have a clue what they were singing about!

(Photo from their website)

Earlier in the week, we went with our WI group to a local small theatre to see the musical version of "The Full Monty". It was highly entertaining as you can imagine and we all had a great laugh. However, I did notice that one of the strippers was a guy who delivers stationery to us at work. I shan't know where to look when he calls next time!
You all know that I like a freebie night out, and so I signed up for "An Inspirational talk" to coincide with Fashion week in Sheffield - something organised by our local Business Link. In the past, these events have been accompanied by a great buffet and a couple of glasses of wine, but on this occasion it was disappointingly only nibbles and fruit juice. Business Link is being disbanded next month though, so I think they maybe saving the budget for a farewell party! Any way, the night out was great. It was held at the newish swanky St Pauls Hotel in the middle of the city.
The first speaker was Eric Musgrave who has been a fashion editor for some time. He talked about the decline of manufacturing fashion in the UK - something that hit hard in this area, and also how most of what is still manufactured is very high end fabrics and garments which are exported abroad.

Then we had a talk and fashion show by one of the directors of a company that manufactures clothing for many of the high street stores - Phase Eight, Hobbs, Laura Ashley etc. They have launched their own brand which can be currently bought at some John Lewis stores and also on line. The brand is called Damsel in a Dress. The brand is aimed at the professional woman who wants more than the high street, but can't afford designer. Way out of my price range - but I was impressed by the fabulous fabrics they used, and treated myself to something from their sale range (which I have to say I am highly delighted with!). The whole evening made me realise that slip into "Waynetta Slob" mode far too easily, and I need to rethink my entire wardrobe!