Paris, Part Three: A Walk Down the Champs-Élysées

Our trip to Paris, continued…

Our last day in Paris and we still did not eat a French meal. Instead, I found a Chinese restaurant with good reviews and took my parents there. Since my dad was fighting a cold, we figured that some hot n’ sour soup would be good for him. It was a Saturday, so I decided to attempt driving in the city, and the trip was relatively uneventful compared with our first foray into Paris. The only exciting moment came while driving through a multi-lane roundabout with about 7 busy streets feeding into it. Crazy. After negotiating that stressful roundabout, I decided to pull into the nearest parking garage to get rid of the car, which happened to be under a mall. We parked the car, and found out that the mall was actually offering free parking for the holidays. Free parking in Paris!?!?!?! Unheard of. So we left the car there and continued the rest of our day on foot and Metro.

First stop: The Chinese restaurant featuring the cuisine of the Shandong region. It was different from the Cantonese cuisine that we were used to, but delicious!

Our Chinese lunch in Paris

After this delicious warm meal, we headed back out into the cold towards the Champs-Élysées…

Place de la Concorde

The Citroen Shop with many levels of cars, both classic and new…

Looking Down from the Citroen Shop to the masses of people walking along the Champs-Élysées…

Sunset on the Arc

With all this walking, we decided to take a little break into the beautiful cozy surroundings of Ladurée. Ladurée is famous for their beautiful, delicate macarons, in fact, the place was packed full of people buying these macarons for the holidays.

Our tea, cake and macaron at Ladurée, in elegant surroundings…

Although Ladurée has the ambiance, I found my favorite macarons at Pierre Hermé. The flavors were richer and more interesting. They even had foie gras (which, as much as I love foie gras, I was not adventurous enough to try) and white truffle (which I did try) flavors. My favorites, though, were the hazelnut and caramel.